413 | Sensory Sapiens: Finding Optimal Health through our Foot Health with Dr Emily Splichal

[00:00:05] Welcome to the Optimal Body Podcast. I'm Dr. Jen and I'm Dr. Dom and we are doctors of physical therapy bringing you the body tips and physical therapy pearls of wisdom to help you begin to understand your body, relieve your pains and restrictions and answer your questions. Along with expert guests, our goal of the Optimal Body Podcast is really to help you discover what optimal means within your own body. Let's dive in.

[00:00:28] So being that this is an episode about foot health and specifically foot sensation, I need to bring up Vivo Barefoot Shoes. They are the shoes that Jen and I have been wearing almost exclusively for over five years now and I can't believe the changes that I have seen in my own feet. The thin and flexible soles help us so that we can truly feel the surroundings and the ground below our feet. When our feet can actually feel what we're moving on, it helps us move better and it helps us move more safely up the chain and throughout our body.

[00:00:57] Wearing these shoes for the majority of time can truly help improve your foot and toe mobility, improve your foot and toe strength and help to normalize movement patterns in a way that you won't realize until you try them out. I especially love Vivos during the summer because they have shoes for everything. They have sandals, they have water shoes, they have hiking shoes, casual shoes and so much more. So head down to the link in the show notes and you can use code OPTIMAL20 at checkout to make sure you get 20% off your entire order and start improving your foot health today.

[00:01:26] Alright, let's take a chat with Dr. Emily. Today we're welcoming back to the podcast Dr. Emily Splickle aka the Movement Longevity Doctor who's a functional podiatrist, human movement specialist and author of Barefoot Strong and her new book Sensory Sapiens and CEO and founder of Neboso Technology.

[00:01:46] With over 23 years in the health and fitness industry, Dr. Splickle has positioned herself as a global leader on the topics of postural alignment and human movement as it relates to barefoot science, foot to core integration and sensory integration. And today we're really going to be talking about that sensory aspect and humans as sensory beings. So let's get into it. Dr. Emily back for the third time on the podcast, our favorite functional podiatrist. Thanks for being back.

[00:02:16] Of course. It is always a pleasure. I love talking to both of you. Now we are talking about your new book Sensory Sapiens which is a really cool title. Oh yeah. Especially from a podiatrist where the thought is typically it's all mechanical and structural and you know we don't, I don't feel like there's as much touch and talk about the sensory aspect when it comes to foot health and whole body health. So I'm really excited to dive into that.

[00:02:46] Now where does the inspiration for this book, like why write it? Why bring this to the surface? Yeah, I think that the book Sensory Sapiens is really a representation of my journey and how I look at human movement that as a podiatrist, my journey did start very focused in on feet. And then of course that was sensory feet.

[00:03:08] My first book that I wrote 10 years ago, which is called Barefoot Strong was essentially that it was a deep dive in the power of the sensory foot, barefoot science, understanding the impact of footwear and surfaces. And that is where my career essentially started.

[00:03:24] Then I started to dive in even more into the other aspects of sensory because I'm just fascinated with the nervous system and the brain and how it affects movement and emotion that I just inherently had to pull into more of the visual, vestibular, interoception. So how we connect to our internal sensory awareness. And it's also a reflection of my practice because my practice is very much focused on chronic conditions, chronic patients.

[00:03:53] And I always tell people that as soon as you have a diagnosis that is chronic, even like plantar fasciitis that's chronic, there's a level of emotion that is involved with that, that I started to observe that in my practice. And I was like, okay, I need to take a little bit deeper dive in understanding emotion, trauma, processing of experiences and how every human is going to process that a little bit different.

[00:04:22] And then it kept going back towards sensory connection to self, how we feel our body in space, which is essentially what this book is about, is that journey and how sensorially connected we need to be. Yeah. Okay. Okay.

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[00:06:28] And I mentioned this to you and, you know, there's a big foot on the front cover, but I love how the whole first part of the book doesn't talk about the feet at all. It talks completely about how humans developed into sensory beings and how humans experience, how we experience the world and how we experience the life is done through sensation. Yes, we need to move through the world, but the experience really holds nothing without that sensory experience.

[00:06:57] So can you talk about why you feel like it's important for people to understand? I mean, you go in depth and I haven't read the full book. I kind of did like the, I'm last minute cramming for a test last night, just skim through it. And I'm excited to get more into it. But talk about the concept around that first part of the book, talking about the development of us as sensory beings. Yeah.

[00:07:20] So the first chapter, which is called Gravisensin, which is one of my favorite words, which I did not make up as a word. But Gravisensin is our awareness and our connection to gravity. And what I often say is that the most important sensory constant in our world, in our day is gravity. And we often take it for granted. We don't think about it.

[00:07:44] We don't realize that it is a critical part of posture, self-awareness and movement. And so really that's kind of setting the tone. And when you think of littles, especially your son who was born five months ago, is that really when you look at the movement milestones of a newborn baby, or just also in general, the milestones of a baby, a newborn baby, a really movement based.

[00:08:10] So this is also the premise of the book is that we were born to move and longevity is critically tied to our capacity to move. So there's this deep interlinking, but it's really the newborn baby establishing these different levels of relationship within its nervous system to gravity. So it's how do we reconnect that?

[00:08:31] And when you see individuals who have a neurological injury, such as a stroke, a mask, Parkinson's, concussions, one of the most important first steps is that you have to reconnect them to gravity so they can feel their body again to then support their posture and their movement and their balance and their movement confidence. And that's a really big overlooked part, I feel, within the movement longevity space.

[00:08:59] The second chapter then flows into one of my other favorite topics, which is fascia. And how our fascia and our connective tissue is very, very important to movement. We know this, the listeners probably know this, but your fascia, your connective tissue web in your body has over 100 million sensory nerves.

[00:09:20] And the fact that you have that many sensory nerves in tissue, like to me, as someone who loves sensory is like, well, of course you have to be able to tap into this tissue to optimize your movement. And what's interesting is that your fascia, a majority of the nerves in your fascia actually have what's called an interoceptive function. Interoception links to emotion.

[00:09:48] So there's this powerful interplay between movement and emotion or motion, emotion. And that was a very powerful self-experience, but also what I would observe in my patients. And I'm a huge advocate of mental health and mental well-being as well. So this is a way to kind of connect that. I love like how the journey is going back into the whole person.

[00:10:14] You know, it's not just about a structure, which I think we get so focused on because this is where I have my pain. This is what's happening in my body. I need to fix this area instead of looking at that whole picture. And this is helping to be able to understand how it's linked together and how it ties in more. And how would you tell someone who's like, well, but I don't have a neurological issue or I don't have I didn't have a neurological injury. I didn't have a stroke. I didn't have any of these things.

[00:10:42] Like, why is this so important for me to start to understand and learn? I mean, we all have stress. We all need to sleep. We all need to focus. Right. So really the power of connection to self to feel your physical body in space. This is not just for people with neurological injuries. We use it without realizing it.

[00:11:06] One of the easiest examples outside of someone who has had a neurological injury would be a child who is on the sensory spectrum. Autism, autism, ADHD. So kind of within that category. And most of those children, they're just sensory seeking. They're trying to reconnect to their body. So when they're constantly moving or they fidget. So fidgeting and moving. And if you're kind of like flapping your wrist, which is what I'm doing right now,

[00:11:34] I'm stretching the proprioceptors of the joint capsule, which is part of this myofascial spider web, which helps me to feel my body in space. I'm very much into weighted apparel, compression apparel, which is talking to this hundred million sensory nerve fascial web, which connects to your brain. So you feel yourself. And again, that's emotional regulation. That is memory, cognitive function. Of course, it's movement.

[00:12:04] It's posture. That affects everyone. So yes, everyone needs to be in the book and connect to their sensory side. And I really, something pinged for me when you talked about how such a large percentage of those nerves throughout our fascia are interoceptive and how there's a direct connection into kind of our emotional state or our psychological state through that. It makes sense when people are experiencing chronic tightness, chronic pain, chronic neck pain.

[00:12:33] Those tissues are involved. And when those tissues are involved, we're disrupting that kind of flow of the sensory information coming through there. And that is why we tend to see so many associated mental health issues or can contribute to why we see so many associated mental health issues with people who have these chronic conditions. So when someone becomes aware of that, what is their next step?

[00:12:57] What is their next step to start to use that information to then tap into the emotional side along with the pain or the perceived problem? Yeah. No, that's a really great question. I think understanding and appreciation is the first layer, right? That there is an important role in body work. Um, let's take an example of, let's say mental health and meditation.

[00:13:25] When I think about meditation or breath work, I try to do sensory based breath work or sensory led meditation, which means take your shoes off. Maybe you want to dry brush before you do your breath work. Maybe you want to wear a compression apparel when you do your meditation and you're, you're trying to not necessarily disassociate.

[00:13:53] And I think sometimes people think that part of like meditation is you are disassociating from self. You're trying to kind of find this heightened level of peace through that where really I find that it should be through the connection of yourself. And can you feel your body and use that during this calming or recalibration of your emotional state?

[00:14:19] Let's say, um, the body work is very important is possibly working with a body worker who appreciates the depth of the emotional connection between fascia and interoception. Um, so like somatics, somatic, somatic, or rolfing. Rolfing is very much based on the premise of knowing that we actually trap or house emotion in our connective tissue.

[00:14:41] So as soon as you were asking that, Dom, I was thinking about how sometimes people will cry when they have releasing like body work release. Right. And I think the, the general lay person consumer individual might not understand why that is that they, and then that's, that's scary. Right. Like as soon as that happens, most people don't want to face the, the heaviness. Also the great thing of me talking about these things, especially with my patients, I've done a lot of therapy myself.

[00:15:11] So I'm very comfortable with like looking yourself in the mirror because I'm, I'm doing that for my patients. I do that for my team, but I'm also doing it for my daughter that I'm trying to like really push into these things and be like, how do I be the most present best version of myself for my family, for my team? And then that, that involves things like this is understanding how to work with the nervous system and the connective tissue.

[00:15:40] I love this also because it's, it's a different aspect of how we're talking about body work and the purpose behind it. Because I think so many times when the word fascia gets brought up, it's I'm releasing my fascia. I'm breaking up my fascia. I'm getting body work to mechanically make something change, which we know doesn't necessarily work.

[00:16:05] But what does work is tapping into this sensory world to connect us to our brain and our body and our emotions. And I remember specifically, there is one friend that we had who was a body worker and he came over and he said, I specifically work to evoke emotion.

[00:16:26] So would you be open to like exploring, like whatever sounds might come out, whatever feeling might come out, whatever things. And it was interesting because he hit a spot that I was like, whoa, that is intense. And he was like, don't hold it in like express. What is, what are you feeling? What do you want to say? What do you want to, you know, whatever it is, like let it out. And I did. And then I didn't feel that tension anymore.

[00:16:52] And I was like, that was a cool experience, you know. So can you talk about like shifting that mindset from the mechanical to the sensory and what can people start to do now rather than having to see someone? Like how do you start to approach that differently? Yeah. So, I mean, it can be done on yourself. So you're doing self-based body work. Um, this is where it would kind of go back to where people know me as like the barefoot, right?

[00:17:20] You're trying to connect to the natural version of yourself. You're releasing your feet. You're thinking about toe spacers. You're releasing, you know, your lower leg, how these fascial lines connect to each other, release the pelvic floor. And then there's a lot of fascial based movement that is out there that you're, you're moving from, you know, toe to head in a integrated way and integrated mobility way. Right.

[00:17:46] Where you're thinking, okay, how do I open my hips based off of how my rib cage might be involved or my shoulder or my ankle? And you're thinking doing fascial based mobility work or whole body mobility work. Be very connected to your breath, be connected to your awareness of the sensations when you're doing it. Um, that's, that's where I give kind of exercises and things like that in the book.

[00:18:10] But I was on another podcast talking about it and the individual was like, oh, okay. So, you know, when you start to tap into sensory, you could just go to the gym, take your shoes off, throw on some weighted apparel and, you know, maybe stimulate the hands with like the neural ball or the hand kit. And he's like, and that's it. And I was like, well, there has to be the, the consciousness or the intent behind it. Right.

[00:18:37] Which is why I love teaching professionals or the coach who then is the conduit to the client or the individual. But you could do it to yourself. You just have to have the intent. Right. Right. So as you were doing, let's give an example of you're doing breath work barefoot on your back on a nebozo mat, just so I can kind of cue towards sensory. Right. And your eyes are shut and your hands are on the texture and your feet are on the texture.

[00:19:06] And as you're inhaling and exhaling and maybe you're meditating at the same time, I would want people to just feel the texture under their feet, like consciously connect to the awareness of their hands on the texture. Right. Feel and hear the breath. And you're, you're essentially guiding. Right. So this is kind of like yoga classes where they're really good at cueing where they want your focus to be.

[00:19:32] That's a really important part of this as well, is you have to force the intent to where your attention will be. Particularly here, we're using sensory awareness or the perception of your body. So continuously feel and connect with the awareness of these sensations you are feeding to your body. I like what that other podcast host you mentioned said, because I feel like that's people's mentality a lot of the times. It's like, okay, we do it once and then we just go out and do what we normally did.

[00:20:02] And I think that's what people think about a lot of different processes. It's like forming a new breath pattern or maybe adjusting your running gait or maybe, you know, any sort of neurologic pattern that we've developed that is relatively automatic. It's something that takes a lot, a lot of conscious, intentional, aware practice to train into becoming more automatic.

[00:20:29] And that's, you know, what you're talking about here is that initial step. Every time you train, it needs to be very, almost meticulously conscious and aware to then train. Like our nervous system is smart. If we do things right and we give it certain inputs, it can't ignore us.

[00:20:47] And then it will start to develop those new patterns of becoming more generally aware of our surroundings and more sensory, like have that sensory awareness of what's going on in our environment. Yep. Yep. Yeah, that's exactly summarized what I had said as far as that meticulous presence in what we're doing. And that is the important part of it.

[00:21:12] I mean, a lot of people who are in the space of, you know, mind, emotion, mind, body, mental health, emotional well-being. It's really about just like a nugget of being present. And like, where are you navigating? We are in a world of distractibility and technology. And like, I totally fall into that. I'm a super type A personality.

[00:21:35] But I've actually found that when I intentionally don't, like I now actually leave my phone on silent my entire day. And if my team wants to get a hold of me, I mean, they just need to kind of like keep pushing. There's a way that they can like SOS and get to me. But a majority of it, like I don't need to know when someone is texting. Like, oh, I go and check it at my pace, but I'm not dinged or buzzed in any way. And just doing that, I've been doing that the last like six weeks.

[00:22:04] Oh my gosh. It is like there's this new level of just space for me to feel like I'm a little bit more connected in my day versus like zipping around. And so that's a lot of what I try to create as well through things like this. I mean, such an important reminder for people as well. It probably removes like multiple hundreds of little micro stressors from your day just doing that one little thing. Exactly.

[00:22:31] Now, what are some other like lesser known sensory systems of the body? You brought up the fascia. People probably wouldn't think about that, right? But what are some other areas that people might not be thinking about that could be highly effective into accessing more of this sensory system? Yeah. So there are there's four main ones. Well, actually, let me let me actually take a step back so you can break it down into how we connect our physical body to the external world.

[00:22:59] A lot of that is referred to as exteroception. So your awareness to the external world. And then you have interoception. I mentioned that word already. That is your awareness to your internal world or sensations in your body. Exteroceptively, obviously, that would be used really for movement or navigation or navigating other people, moving objects, right? Things like that. So that will be your visual field. And when I refer to the visual field, it's obviously your eyes.

[00:23:29] So it's what's coming into your eyes. But it's also the movements of your eyeballs. And when your eyes move, you stimulate these small muscles that wake up a part of your brain called the basal ganglia, which actually affects larger motor movements. And there's some really great research about doing eye movement exercises to improve balance in people who have MS, Parkinson's, stroke, etc. So this powerful effect. A lot of athletes will utilize this.

[00:23:57] And they will do different eye movements, such as a saccade, where you're moving side to side with your eyes. And they'll do that before they go onto the cord or onto the ice or whatever it is that some athletes are actually utilizing this. Do that one. Your ears, you have your vestibular system, which people are familiar with, right? Your inner ear fluid. But also when I think about the ears, sound is really, really important.

[00:24:23] So we are designed just through, you know, our evolution to respond to rhythm. And rhythm is really, really powerful to how we find movement. And we are first introduced to rhythm when we are in utero and our mother is walking. So it's actually the walking that helps us to find this rhythm. So there's a kind of a beat per minute.

[00:24:48] So like classic aerobics, like a 132 beat per minute, that's actually a pace that we naturally fall into. That's also why what's interesting is sometimes people with Parkinson's will freeze when they walk, but then they can dance effortlessly. And they never freeze when they're dancing, right? So there's something really, really magical to rhythm. And then of course, there's a lot of people who are into music and the power of music and dancing and kind of the fluidity of what that does.

[00:25:18] Then we have our joints, proprioception that goes a little bit into the fascia. So all of our joints are surrounded by this spider web of connective tissue, fascia connective tissue. And it's literally spider webbing and you have your caps and ligament and reconnection and everything kind of radiates out. And that's where you're packed with those millions of sensory nerves. It's also in your muscles.

[00:25:43] So all of your muscles, like your whole arm, all of the muscles are surrounded by this connective tissue, which is nerves. And then you have your muscle group and then it breaks down even smaller in your fascia and even smaller in your fascia. So you cannot contract your muscles without stimulating these hundred million sensory nerves. And then finally, you obviously have your touch, which is your hands and your feet. That's where I love my bare foot.

[00:26:10] But those are mechanoceptors and those are specific to different stimuli. Your brain uses all of those input systems and it brings them together before it even reaches the brain. So they start to integrate. So I call it sensory stacking. Sensory stacking is the pulling in of stimulation of your hands with stimulation of your eyes.

[00:26:36] And there's really interesting research that if you were to hold something, so I have a neural ball in my hand, which is textured. So it's stimulating mechanoceptors. And I look at it as I'm stimulating it. So I feel it, but I see it as I feel it. That is really activating to your brain. And that's what I try to encourage through all of this different work, right? That's a very powerful stack.

[00:27:02] The other one, not to go too long, but the other one, interoception is all of the fascia that surrounds your organs. So that's called visceral fascia. And you have a lot of fascia that connects your stomach to your liver to all over in your gut.

[00:27:20] And it is packed with, again, millions of sensory nerves that we have to be able to feel and connect with the subtlety of butterflies in our stomach, our heart beating, flushing, right? So these different sensations that internally tell us, are we safe or not safe? And then based off of that, we use it to navigate the external world.

[00:27:50] So it's a very powerful interplay between internal and external. I'm having so many flashbacks to my neurocourses that we go through in PT programs and that sensory stacking. First of all, if no one's ever seen a dance class with people with Parkinson's, go and look that up on YouTube because it's one of the coolest and most emotional things, seeing someone just light up when the music hits and they start dancing with their partner, which they can't do otherwise without the music.

[00:28:20] But that whole sensory stacking, I remember the example of like, that's how our body starts to, or our brain starts to form associations between a certain touch and whether it's safe or dangerous or a certain, you know, smell. Then we might, our body will start to expect, oh, I'm going to eat soon or, you know, and it's so powerful in being able to develop that anticipatory ability that our brain and body have.

[00:28:48] So we've set up the frame of us being sensory beings. If we haven't convinced anybody yet, I don't know what else we need to do. And now your podiatrist, convince us why the feet are an important key to this whole sensory puzzle. Yes, yes. Probably a lot of times people, when I start talking about all this other stuff, they're like, oh, right, she's a podiatrist. Yeah, we're 25 minutes in and we haven't talked too much about the feet. So obviously our feet are very important.

[00:29:17] They are what I consider the gateway into your nervous system or the gateway into your brain. Being the contact point between your body and the ground, right, the skin and the bottom of the foot, that's really where we're tapping into a lot of this powerful sensory information. You have thousands of nerves in the bottom of the feet.

[00:29:37] These nerves are used to read and adjust to every step that we take, but we use it as a emotional anchor as well. So if we are standing and you feel the ground emotionally, you feel safe. Like to kind of keep going back and using these words that when I'm here, you can say like, okay, I'm standing. I'm here. I'm present. I feel the ground, right?

[00:30:05] Like I'm anchored on my feet. And you're then translating that to how you can carry your body and present yourself to the world, right? So there's a very powerful interplay. Fashionally, there's a lot of fascial lines that run in your feet and connect to the rest of your body. So your feet connect to your pelvic floor through a fascial line. It actually connects to your diaphragm. A lot of people are into breathing. Breathing is literally everything is life.

[00:30:35] So if your diaphragm is connected to your feet and your base, your foundation, to me, that's a critical connection or demonstration of the power of your feet. Of course, there's stabilizing lines, your lateral line, your back lines. Like there's other fascial lines that cross, which again, from a movement perspective, I tell people fascial lines, you're thinking nerve tissue.

[00:31:00] Fascial lines, because it's nerve tissue, I want you to think that they talk to each other quickly. So your feet being fascially connected to your core, which connects to your hip, which is where your glutes contract off of. It's going to be a fast connection or it is by design supposed to be quick. Sometimes it doesn't. So that's where we have to reestablish it.

[00:31:24] But those are just a few examples of how your feet can tap into and be this really powerful sensory structure. And how might we be shutting off those sensory connections to the rest of the body? I mean, I'm going to assume, you know, based on different things that we wear, because you've talked so much about being barefoot.

[00:31:46] But if we can't be barefoot all the time, you know, or we got to go to work, we have to we go to a gym and we work out and we don't want to take off our shoes. You know, so how do we start to rebuild this connection? Yeah, so footwear, of course, footwear is going to disconnect us. Right. But it's more the thick, cushioned, structured, narrow footwear that is disconnecting you. The stack or the cushion of the shoe is taking away that sensory stimulation.

[00:32:16] It's elevating you from feeling anchor on the ground. So that is an important part of it. But as far as the narrowness of shoes, when your foot, when we take a step and you roll through the ball of your foot to take a step, your foot is actually designed to widen. And when your foot widens, you stimulate a ligament, a special ligament in your forefoot, which is actually part of your plantar fascia.

[00:32:43] So the widening of the foot triggers this fascial response within the body to stabilize and to stimulate and to feel. And then technically, when you roll to take a step, your big toe is connected to your posterior pelvic floor. So there's a stabilizing response between those structures.

[00:33:05] So, yes, so having footwear that is more minimal, is free of cushion, is wider, can be twisted and can activate and get into that natural movement. I was just at a barefoot shoe expo and there was a shoe, a minimal shoe that actually grounds as well. I'm very into earthing and grounding that that could be another aspect of really tapping into the power of the foot.

[00:33:33] I mean, we obviously were barefoot people. We are Neboso Vivo Barefoot fanatics. And I think I have Jen convinced now because I transitioned over to toe socks exclusively a while back, you know, probably a year and a half or more ago now. Because I just, after I wore them a couple times, anytime I'd put on a regular sock, I just felt that narrowing. And I felt like I was shutting off my ability to sense what was going on. I'm like, I've got these beautiful barefoot shoes that I'm wearing.

[00:34:01] Like, why would I bind my toes with these? Like, the average sock and the amount of pressure it squeezes in on your toes with, you don't really realize until you go without it for a few months. Yeah. Yeah, I know that. And that's another one. So, toe splay, right? Opening up the toes as much as you can. And so, it's either wearing shoes that have the toe pockets, wearing toe socks, using toe spacers in the shoes and not wearing socks. I don't know.

[00:34:30] So, there's a couple different ways on how you could do it. But yes, absolutely. You have to get into the fascia, the circulation, the nerve endings of your digits as well. And a lot of people will attest to that as well. I actually met with a woman a couple weeks ago, and she was talking about that. And it was a critical part of how she reestablished her emotional healing. She was dealing with, like, some PTSD.

[00:34:56] And she said when she would start to open up her toes, that she started to feel this powerful sensory anchor to her trauma healing journey. It was very much connected to this toe spreading, which is really cool. And I was like, I get it. I hear this stuff all day. So, sensation. And if we talk about along the life timeline, clearly later in life is when we start to see some of these sensory systems break down.

[00:35:26] And balance becomes a huge thing. And a few things you mentioned, like our vestibular system, our sight, our proprioception, our three main systems by which we balance. How can people be more proactive, you know, as they're getting into their later years with reducing their risk of falls and keeping their balance as something that is one of their core pillars of health? Yeah, absolutely.

[00:35:52] So, I talk a lot about fall reduction and kind of active aging, kind of that whole space. And Noboso actually did a business accelerator where our focus was literally fall reduction. So, for six months, that is really all that my brain was focused on was the cost of falls, the concern around it, right? The prevention, all of that.

[00:36:17] And it's a very, very complex, multifactorial issue of what's contributing to these falls. And I wish it was just like tricep strength or something like that. Yeah. I do believe that a large part of it in the prevention or the anticipation of the prevention of the falls, which has to happen really in your 40s, 50s, 60s is what I would be focusing.

[00:36:50] Yeah, probably. It has this map of your size and shape, like your morphology in its brain.

[00:37:16] And then we use that to sense and correct, let's say, a shift in our center of gravity. So, most falls happen because of delayed reaction time. There's a shift in their center of mass and they just couldn't react quick enough, right? So, it could be, okay, well, we need to train literally reaction time, right? You could go towards that.

[00:37:41] But what I feel that it is, is that there was this shift in the center of mass, but there was an inaccuracy in the brain of the size and shape of that mass that was moving. So, then there's going to be an inaccurate response to try to protect itself, right? Which then leads to increased hesitancy and slowed movements.

[00:38:08] And the best analogy is people always say, like, it's very hard to balance on a bike that is moving slow, right? So, once you just start going fast on a bike, you're like, I'm good, right? So, that's a really good analogy to remember that if we are overly cautious in our movement because we don't have an awareness of that movement, that you're just like, where is my foot in relation to the ground? Where's my center mass?

[00:38:33] I have to look that that slowed movement will cause an overreaction and then that's obviously a delayed reaction. So, connecting to the body schema, that's literally everything that we were talking about. I coach trainers and professionals to then utilize and make their fall prevention programming very sensory rich. They're using weighted apparel. They're stimulating the hands at all times.

[00:39:02] They're stimulating the feet. They are challenging balance through visual and vestibular and they're trying to bring in as much sensory stimulation as possible. And then, to kind of follow the individual when they're not with the trainer or the coach is minimal shoes. So, insoles, maybe they wear wrist weights and there's some wrist weights that looks like jewelry now.

[00:39:25] So, it's stimulating the nervous system so that when they are on their own, they have that awareness that follows them throughout their day. So, that's a really, really important side. And I really, truly believe it begins with perception of self. That these people, as we age, especially like later 70s, kind of that, there's kind of this tip that happens when people are in their later 70s.

[00:39:53] And it's kind of almost a drastic slowing down that you can observe in some individuals is that we get this very rapid decrease in muscle mass, so the sarcopenia, and a rapid increase in a simultaneous increase in adipose tissue. That's going to change someone's morphology, the actual makeup of muscle to fat in their arms, in their legs, in their thigh, right? There's nerve tissue in all of that.

[00:40:24] Yeah. Which means it's changing your awareness that unless you're doing something that is strengthening mind-body, mind-body, mind-body, this is also why I believe that Tai Chi, if you look at Tai Chi research for fall reduction, it is one of the most profound benefits for individuals. And I don't think it's necessarily Tai Chi itself. I think it's a mind-body practice that they're connecting. I feel my arm moving. I see my arm moving.

[00:40:54] And it's trying to reinforce body schema. Right. So really adding in all these sensory components is like the more that we can start to practice this and bring that into your everyday is so it really helps, like you said, but that sensory stack to start to map the brain differently and report something. As a result, that is different in what we feel and how we move and all these things.

[00:41:20] It's like, and I hope that's starting to make sense for someone, you know, obviously getting guidance in this and reading the book, understanding it more is going to be the best benefit that you could use for your body. But is it ever too late? Like say someone's listening who's already in their 60s, 70s, hasn't worked on any of this. Where's the most cushioned shoes with the orthotic? Because that's what they've been told they have to do. Like, where do you start then? So yeah, no, it's never too late.

[00:41:48] You will always get some response. And as we were talking, the word neuroplasticity just kind of kept coming to mind, right? Is that we are continuously plastic. Your brain or your nervous system is plastic, which means you can push into it. You can challenge it and you can create adaptation and new neural pathways. So no, it's not too late.

[00:42:14] The progression or the reversal of the movement pattern or the injury, that of course is different from everyone. But will you still see positivity and increased awareness and confidence and even your quality of life? Absolutely. So it would be looking at the footwear, getting out of the footwear. There's certain reasons why people do have to be in cushion supportive shoes or orthotics. Completely understand that.

[00:42:40] But that does not mean that you cannot release your feet, stimulate your feet, put your feet on a vibration platform. You can do all these different things to still tap into the nervous system. Access your hands. Very powerful. All of your skin is packed with nerves, right? So it's very easy to start to sneak it in. Small changes. Everything that we are speaking about here today really is a lifestyle.

[00:43:07] And it's kind of what Dom had said is he was like, you don't want to do it once and never do it again. And like, hey, I did it. So I'm good. My nervous system is going to do it. They have to be lifestyle changes and reminders. And just like the intent of the diet or the intent of the sleep or the vitamins or whatever else people are doing that they focus on for their health and longevity. This has to just be part of it.

[00:43:37] And I know sometimes people, you give recommendations and then they feel like, oh, it's just another thing I need to do. Right. But we have to wear shoes or not have to wear shoes, but we wear shoes anyway. So can we be just more thoughtful on the shoe that we choose? Or could you put a Neboso insole in the shoe and then it's kind of done? It wasn't like an extra thing that you had to do.

[00:44:04] If you are going to work out anyway, could you do it? You have to put clothes on when you go to the gym. So could you just have them be compression or weighted? Like, so it's just a small, slight decision shift that we want versus like, oh, I got to do this, this, this, this, this. That's what I try to bring through anything I recommend is that it's just beautifully integrated in what you're already doing. Yeah.

[00:44:33] And that's when if people are thoughtful about it rather than seeing it as this extra burden of something I need to do. Like, I guarantee most people can thoughtfully find those ways, like you pointed out, to integrate some of these things. And it was interesting to me when I think when I was reading through your book, I read a spot that talked about how when you're 70 years old, the average person will need twice the stimulation to feel the same thing they would have felt when they were 40 years old.

[00:45:00] And it's kind of, when you look at every system, the age-related changes that we, like you mentioned, sarcopenia, or we have osteopenia, you know, in our bones and really in our nervous system. We could see it as like this myelopenia where we're losing those nervous system connections. And that's so much of what you talk about here in this book, what you've talked about on this podcast, the strategies that you can start to instill so we can, our nervous system is so amazingly adaptive.

[00:45:30] And we always have a degree of that neuroplasticity that you mentioned. So I just appreciate you being here and sharing so many little pearls of wisdom that people can get in full in the book, Sensory Sapiens. Where can they go to find this? Yeah. So it's on Amazon, all Amazons across the world. And then it's on the Nebosa website in the United States. Amazing. Again, like it doesn't have to be so complicated.

[00:45:57] And even though it feels like this might be a new thing that seems very complicated, I know that you give the tips and the tools and the ways to be able to integrate that back into life. So thank you for what you're doing and how you continue to adapt your practice and learn along the way and teach and continue to just help us thrive.

[00:46:47] I really appreciate it. So thank you.

[00:47:24] Another fascinating interview with Dr. Emily. So check out any of their products. Get your hands on Sensory Sapiens. Read it. Understand it. And understand how you can start to implement this into your life. And again, that's code OPTIMAL on anything Neboso. And if you heard anything that you think can benefit anyone else, please pass this episode along. That's how we reach more people and share this amazing information. We'll see you back on another episode.