Science continues to shed ever more light upon the magnificence of the human body and its constant interactions with Creative Intelligence. It seems humans have a built-in “fail safe” mode when our conscious spiritual nature switches on, somewhere around age 25. Even when the soul is remembered from birth, the physical body may not be ready to fully engage in soul’s agenda until the age of 25 or later because some of the connective tissue doesn't mature until then.
Today, conscious parenting is a growing trend. Conscious parenting being an awareness of both parents beginning pre-conception that says each parent’s thoughts and feelings are intently influential upon the cells and genetic potentials of their offspring, and thus requiring parents’ nurturance of the highest budding possibilities. With such an understanding, the human species may be moving into an era whereby the divine self having been supported and encouraged from prebirth, birth and through the first 25 to 30 years, will cause the physical body to evolve to advanced levels of capabilities and health. Either way, conscious or unconscious, the connective tissue of the body and the fascial web, appear to play an essential role in our physiology eventually “turning on” to Spirit.
First, let’s define connective tissue so we have a good visual. According to About.com Biology, connective tissue serves a "connecting" function. It supports and binds other tissues. Unlike epithelial tissue, which covers the outside of the body and lines organs and cavities and the cells of which are very closely packed together and joined with little space between them, connective tissue typically has cells loosely scattered throughout the body matrix. For example, in an epithelium, which also connects, the free surface is usually exposed to fluid or the air (like skin) while the bottom surface is attached to a basement membrane. This is different than loose connective tissue, which in vertebrates, is the most common type of connective tissue. Loose connective tissue holds organs in place and attaches epithelial tissue to other underlying tissues.
Loose connective tissue is named based on its characteristic "weave" and is made up of collagenous (cartilage is made up of collagens), elastic, reticular, or fibrous types of fibers. Fibrous connective tissue, which is found in tendons and ligaments, is composed of large amounts of closely packed collagenous fibers. Cartilage, for example, is avascular, meaning that it is not supplied by blood vessels; instead, nutrients diffuse rather like osmosis through the matrix of tissue.
It is true that some cultural traditions speak of humans as being a complex egg-like form of fibrous interwoven energy pathways. Anyway, the main flow of thought here is connections, and science is informing us that our connective tissues, including those of our brain as well as the lower half of the body may not be fully developed until we reach the age of 25 or older.
From the study of embryology for example, we discover that when we are born the upper half of our body’s structure and musculature is more developed than our hips, legs and feet. In some philosophies, the upper half of the body is considered heaven and the lower half of the body relates to earth, with the waistline relating to the mind and being a bridge between heaven and earth. The pelvis at birth is largely made up of cartilage (connective tissue). That makes sense since we have to be fairly sturdy with heart and essential organs for life well protected, as well as really malleable to move through the tunnel into the world. The squeezing through the canal may actually make us stronger for living outside of the womb because of the relationship between pressure, weight-bearing and bone density. We are told our fontanel (the soft spot opening at the top center of the skull) takes about 18 months or longer to fully solidify. In contrast, our pelvic, hip and leg connective tissues and muscles are not fully developed until we reach about the age 25.
From the ages of 0 to 3, children respond to the world and their surroundings as though everything is energy. This means children do not differentiate life experiences with individual senses like sight, sound or hearing and so forth. They process their environment through their whole being and feel it as “This feels good, nurturing and makes me happy,” or “This feels threatening and scary, and makes me feel unhappy.” At this age of sensitivity, children require a great deal of protection, security and comfort.
Interestingly, at the end of life, a person also experiences everything as energy with whole body responses to its circumstances (what feels loving and what feels discomforting). One age group is entering from a holistic environment, and the elders’ age group exiting to a more holistic realm. At this age of sensitivity, elders require a great deal of protection, security and comfort.
What is even more fascinating is that in between those two age groups, humans spend their lives yearning for the knowing of wholeness again, ergo, what does meditation and yoga do for you?
Now getting back to the idea of connective tissue and its importance in supporting our spiritual nature, in the December 16, 2010 Newsweek Magazine article entitled, The Adolescent Brain -The Kids Can’t Help It - What new research reveals about the adolescent brain—from why kids bully to how the teen years shape the rest of your life by Russ Juskalian, science tells us that the adolescent brain is only 80% developed and the connective areas of the brain, the white matter areas, do not completely mature until age 25 or later.
Connective tissue mentioned again, and age 25 again. 25 is the magic number, a magic number for what? The brain is good to go and the whole physical body is strong and structurally sound. What’s next? Spirit is ready to take charge.
I remember when I was writing my 1998 autobiographical book, Soul Aerobics – Conscious Movement of a Soul into Wholeness, I unconsciously said more than once that I reached a point after about 25 years of age, when I felt life was no longer “happening to me.” Rather it seemed to me that age 25 was about the time the soul became the pilot of my life, or at least I had become aware that something had shifted.
Is 25 an age of activation or an age of participation, or both?
To recap so far, science and physiology mention that by the age 25 or so, some of our essential connective tissue webbings have finally matured. This improved phase of physical prowess seems to be some sort of turning point in our human development. The brain is good to go and the whole physical body is strong and structurally sound including the earth part or lower half of the body. Spirit is ready to take charge, to become fully engaged in life in a body.
I see a perfect relationship with the connective tissue of the body supporting a closer partnership with the soul via energy healing. Applying regular energy self-healing in the form of Healing Touch Quick Steps has been proven to help the body rid itself of accumulations in the tissue. In fact, the sooner you apply self-induced healing quick steps after a discomfort or trauma occurs, the less likely it will settle in your tissue. Remember, the varying depths of your biological tissue are all made up of cells. If the tissue is not bogged down with disturbances from conception, in utero and on through adulthood, especially connective tissue that is an intelligent mechanism for experiencing wholeness, how much easier can it be to always be in a conscious state of wholeness? Science validates that our biology speaks volumes.
In the book, The Endless Web: Fascial Anatomy and Physical Reality, Drs. R. Louis Schultz and Rosemary Feitis suggest the importance of looking at the body as a whole when looking at the muscle-bone concept of movement. Key word: Movement. “When one part moves, the whole body responds, and the only tissue that can mediate such responsiveness is the connective tissue.” There are those words again: connective tissue.
Drs. Feitus and Schultz also inform us that from birth onward “increased demand for movement furthers the maturation of the connective tissue. As we use a part, it becomes more capable, more skilled. In turn, as we become more skilled, we explore a wider range of movement.”
“In addition, the physical response to emotion is through the soft tissue. The fascia is the emotional body,” say Feitus and Schultz. The more we move, the more the connective tissue refines and the greater our ability to experience life holistically.
From the perspective of physical anatomy, we begin to see a relationship between our connective tissue, our emotions and living life in a state of wholeness. Our body in its natural state is a vehicle of wholeness. The fascial web is connective tissue. Our emotions and feelings are a link to the higher energies that are experienced through feelings.
Remember author Dr. Jill Bolte-Taylor mentioning in her book, Stroke of Insight when the rational, logical part of her brain, went off line with a stroke, she felt a sense of wholeness, non-duality, and oneness. Ideally, feelings are felt in the whole body, flowing through that fascial web and our connective tissues (those loosely scattered cells full of potential), and from that web of sensation we are able to know and identify the feelings of fear, anger, joy, love, or whatever, and consciously and immediately respond. In addition, the goodness of our thoughts and feelings may be considered nutrients for the loosely scattered cellular wellness
Of course in my personal story of earlier childhood, all of those discomforting feelings were settling in and influencing my tissue, my underdeveloped connective tissues. Similar to the way an infant lying in his crib can help or hinder his developing structure because of the more cartilaginous nature of his pelvis and fascial web connectivity, the still developing brain tissue until age 25 or later is being influenced by physical, mental and emotional circumstances as well.
So our physical connective tissue plays a crucial role in our knowing a holistic, benevolent world as well as our expressing as spirit in matter - Spirit being synonymous with non-duality; matter, earthbound physical body, for example. The body and spirit are intrinsically linked; one part moves and the whole being responds.
Now what about the pivotal age of 25? Dr. Thomas Armstrong, author of The Human Odyssey: Navigating the Twelve Stages of Life, says a person who is 25 years old is in the stage of life he calls early adulthood. In fact he calls this age (20 to 35) “The Lost Generation” because there is the least amount of research devoted to this stage than any other phase of human development. This age also is the time of best health, prime physical abilities, and the least amount of colds and physical difficulties. The prime directive of Early Adulthood is to leave the familiar, parents, community and school, and go off and make something of oneself. You are finally ready to begin life on your own.
In Stefanie Meyer’s Twilight Saga movie Eclipse, valedictorian, Jessica, encourages her fellow graduating classmates "to go out into the world and make mistakes, try a lot of things, date one person and then another, and then when we are asked what we want to be when we grow up, we will know."
Next month we’ll explore more of the spiritual nature that is being “switched on” from about age 25, and what this may mean for so many baby boomers, who beginning January 1, 2011 will be retiring at a rate of 10,000 per day. Is there another wave of something mobilizing here?
In the meantime, take care, take great self-care.
Many blessings,
Barbara J. Semple
Self-Healing Activist and Best Selling Author, Instant Healing - Accessing Creative Intelligence for Healing Body and Soul
(c) Copyright 2010. Barbara J. Semple. Please request permission from the author if you wish to reprint this article, reprinting of which should be in its entirety without changes and with full authorship given to Barbara J. Semple, including her website: www.healingtouchquicksteps.com. Thanks.
