Psychophysical wellbeing, the WAL method
Drugs and drastic treatments are not always the right solution. Listening to oneself, learning about one’s body, eating properly and exercising regularly are a great help enough, in some cases, to treat and prevent many ailments. The WAL Method represents a first step towards achieving psychophysical well-being.
WAL, Walk and Learn
Psychophysical well -being consists in the quality of the health of our entire organism. Man is a psychologically and physically complex being whose parts cannot be considered independently of each other.
Body, mind and emotions function in relation to each other . Psychophysical well-being corresponds to the balance between the various parts, the condition for which physical health, psychological health and cognitive health are treated and treated equally.
The WAL Method and psychophysical well-being
The WAL Method is the medical-holistic discipline founded by Annamaria Crespi in Perugia, and today spread throughout Italy thanks to its simplicity and rapid effectiveness, visible in the short term. The Walk and Learn is based on two principles:
1. Neural plasticity , the ability of the brain to regenerate itself over time even following serious injuries, such as strokes or injuries resulting from aging.
2. Holism , a medical-philosophical approach that sees body and mind as parts of a single system. Holism, from the Greek hòlos, “Global”, is a theoretical position with ancient origins. Born in the East in 200 BC, it then spread to the West where Baruch Spinoza, a Dutch philosopher, developed it in 1600. Referring to Holism, Spinoza gave a new pantheistic reading of the Bible, replacing the vision of dualistic reality (well and evil, earth and sky, life and death) with that in which “God is All”.
The main point in common between the WAL and the holistic philosophers consists in affirming the superiority of the whole with respect to the single parts that compose it. In fact, the effectiveness of WAL is based on the enormous benefits of the double physical / cognitive activity practiced in unison.
The physical exercise of walking is practiced at the same time as the cognitive one thanks to listening to AudioWAL, mp3 cultural documents audible in wireless headphones that deal with various topics by stimulating the functions of memory, learning, concentration and verbal skills.
AudioWALs are specially created to train neural plasticity. The narratives, with a rich and fluent language, follow a very specific rhythm , and are interspersed with / accompanied by relaxing musical pieces. Two sessions a week of WAL, 3 hours in total, are enough to improve the cognitive abilities mentioned above, and to achieve psychophysical well-being.
WAL and natural treatments for the body
Simple regular physical activity is equivalent to a natural cure for our body. There is no need to engage in high-intensity sports; walking 30 (even better 60) minutes a day is able to fight hypertension, prevent and treat type 2 diabetes, Alzheimer’s, cardiovascular diseases, insomnia , depression, anxiety , obesity, and lengthen our life.
Imagine these benefits added to those of good brain health; psychophysical well-being is incomparable to that produced by sports that focus exclusively on the physical aspect. For example, do you know the real differences between running and walking? Furthermore, walking is within the reach of almost everyone, large, small and elderly, it is a stress-free and risk-free exercise.
Walking regularly, following a healthy diet and training the mind is a truly complete natural cure, and a preventive method that protects us from the onset of even serious diseases, such as cancer and those related to aging.
In a 2015 article , La Stampa reports a study by the London School of Economics on the unparalleled effects of a simple walk on psychophysical well-being: “The London School examined 50,000 patients between 1999 and 2012 to see how their bodies reacted to gym exercises compared to regular walking. A half-hour walk a day at brisk steps has proved to be the best way to lose weight and stay fit even from an economic point of view, because it costs nothing. Furthermore, walking is especially beneficial for older people and has been found to be exceptionally effective in women over 50 who begin to gain weight after menopause. Beyond a certain age, often one does not have the necessary motivation and tenacity to face the demanding exercises of a gym and one tends to give up any physical activity “.
Stimulate creativity
A study from Stanford University’s School of Education , published in 2014 in the Journal of Experimental Psychology , confirms the beneficial effect of walking on our brains. The study focused in particular on the walking / creativity connection . The study monitored the response of 200 subjects while walking. Participants were asked questions of all kinds, designed to stimulate cognitive functions, and those who answered while walking showed greater originality and creativity in processing the answers.
The Stanford study, therefore, highlights the enormous benefit provided by performing the two WAL exercises, walking and training the mind, at the same time.
“From a cognitive point of view, we think that exercise, by relaxing the control of the prefrontal cortex, can improve the activity of the so-called associative memory. Hence the increase in creativity ”, Daniel Schwartz, coordinator of the Stanford study.
Walking against stress and depression
We have seen how according to the holistic philosophy the emotional and psychological aspect of a person has an important weight on the health of the organism. Walking also serves to cure this aspect. On the one hand, walking in company represents an opportunity for socializing, on the other, physical exercise in itself triggers favorable chemical processes within the body , such as the production of serotonin and the release of adrenaline.
In addition to relieving anxiety and depression, these processes facilitate sleep , which is essential for psychophysical well-being. The British Journal of Sports Medicine in 2014 published a study highlighting the role of walking in psycho-emotional health.
The study, conducted by the University of East Anglia , consists of a meta-research (an in-depth analysis of other research) on 42 studies aimed at discovering all the effects of walking, carried out in the last 10 years, which involved more than 2000 people from 14 different countries.
The advantages of walking have been numerous , of various kinds and extremely more effective and long-term than those procured by more intense sports activities (such as running). Among these are:
- Blood pressure control;
- Decrease in body fat and muscle toning;
- Improvement of joint flexibility and posture;
- Lowering of cholesterol;
- Heart rate regulation, useful for cardiovascular diseases but also for those suffering from anxiety. The anaerobic activity of walking, if carried out regularly and at a brisk pace, helps people to get in touch with their body and to “trust it”. Listening, and thus being able to regulate your heartbeat, is of great help against panic and anxiety attacks .
Physical activity as a natural cure
Enrico Arielli , of the Faculty of Motor Sciences of the University of Milan, reiterates the importance of walking as a method for achieving psychophysical well-being:
” With an aerobic sport there can be a reduction of up to 10 millimeters of mercury in both systolic and diastolic blood pressure. But regardless of the benefits that those suffering from hypertension can derive from physical activity, it is important to know that those who normally perform an activity, even simply walking an hour, but every day, are much less subject to risk on the other hand, a sedentary person undergoes hypertension.
It is therefore important to exercise, both for those suffering from hypertension and, in a preventive key, for those at risk “.
Medicines, intensive sports and expensive remedies are not always necessary to feel good. The health of the individual is different for each case . According to the holistic approach, man is a complex being made up of experiences, desires and needs that vary from body to body.
Being aware of your body and what it needs is the first step towards psychophysical well-being. The WAL Method helps to take this first step, gradually and pleasantly starting people on the path that leads to the achievement of psychophysical well-being in a completely natural way .
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