While running is my true passion, I’ve come to appreciate the practice of yoga for how it strengthens our mind-body connection. We inhale and exhale slowly to begin each class, drawing ourselves into the present. If you’ve ever had the pleasure of an outdoor yoga class, the instructor often calls upon the gentle sounds of the birds chirping, the breeze blowing or perhaps water flowing nearby at that moment. The meditative, intentional nature of yoga is a wonderful way to bring calm and focus into our often-chaotic lives.

The song “Let It Go” plays such an important role in the Disney movie, capturing Elsa’s character development from moments of isolation to soaring anthems that can’t help but make viewers cheer.

An infant is born with 86 billion neurons waiting to be linked. Through our reflexes, movement occurs and that in turn enables us to build and strengthen those linkages within our brain. Connections build and grow between the base of the brain upwards from our brainstem, the part of the brain fully formed at birth. As a baby develops, movement evolves from primitive reflexes to more advanced motor skills, sending signals that strengthen the neural network, creating connections that increase awareness and control over time.

Do you remember those stress balls that sat on every desk, offering a doughy outlet for a tough day at work? Today, you can’t miss the multitude of calming toys, fidget spinners and tactile strips on the market designed to quell anxiety and redirect our behavioral responses. In stressful situations, these may be acceptable coping mechanisms but provide only a short-term fix for a more complex challenge.

When pressure is applied to the inner pads of an infant’s fingers, they curl inward to grasp or hold something. Palmer is considered a part of cling, associated with early evoluMonary signs of animals aNaching to their mother for safety and care and integrates over the first year of life. The Infant Plantar reflex refers to the curling of toes when pressure is applied to the ball of the foot. It is present at birth and integrates as we develop more complex movements as crawling and later walking develop.