Nothing in life is to be feared,
It is only to be understood.
Now is the time to understand more,
So that we may fear less.”
-Marie Curie
The Thimble Islands form a 22 square mile archipelago of Long Island Sound in the harbor of Stony Creek, Connecticut, where pink granite and golden sandbars pop out through the sparkling ocean. This magnificent sanctuary features birds of all different shapes and sizes: orange-beaked Oystercatchers, sky-roaming Eagles and Osprey, and the majestic Blue Heron. According to North American Native tradition, the Great Blue Heron brings inspiration of self-determination and self-reliance, empowering ability to progress and evolve.
It was the Great Blue Heron that gave me the courage to conquer my fear of a sketchy stretch of rapids that leads into a secluded inlet, where I had fallen off my paddleboard the summer prior. When the shadow of the amazing wingspan (7 feet of pure muscle) swooped over me, I was anxiously recollecting my injury when my pup had jumped off the board to surf down the current, while I landed with my bare foot onto a razor-sharp oyster bed.
Thankfully the Long Island Sound is rarely visited by sharks, or my mile paddle back to shore before getting my foot stitched up would be an even scarier memory. Returning to conquer my fear, the blue beauty roared like a Pterodactyl with encouragement, as I have for all my patients who are afraid to get hurt again during rehabilitation. Landing just 20 feet from me, the Great Buddha of Birds enchanted me into a deep meditative state to dispel the negative thoughts from my mind, allowing me to go with the flow on a path of supreme awareness.
Awareness is the key to overcoming fear. This is especially important for people who remember pain from prior injury, whose apprehension may limit their lives, health span, and opportunity to thrive. We choose our thoughts and must recognize negative thoughts to make a positive shift, to dispel fear-avoidance behaviors that contribute to disuse, depression, and disability. In Sports Medicine and Rehabilitation, this fear-avoidance phenomenon is referred to as kinesiophobia, a significant factor delaying return to participation in pre-injury activities and increased risk of re-injury.
Fear activates our ‘fight or flight’ response and keeps us stuck in a pain and stress cycle, one feeding into the other. Anticipation of pain during an activity actually magnifies pain and hinders function. Fear of movement exacerbates symptoms and leads to avoiding movement. Not moving your body leads to muscles weakening, causing more stress on the body and more pain in turn, and may manifest ultimately as a disuse syndrome. Kinesiophobia is the fear of pain due to movement, yet movement is the antidote!
Let us learn from the majestic great blue heron to move with courage, confidence, and content as we embody grace, self-reliance, and awareness. Understanding our bodies, thoughts, and emotions is essential for conquering kinesiophobia, optimizing our healthspan and wingspan to soar and thrive in joyful active living and sports!