Vital Force

Cut your finger, and within seconds your body is at work. Blood clots, immune cells arrive, new tissue grows, and within days the wound has closed, without a single conscious instruction from you. Every moment, an intelligence far older and wiser than our thinking minds is keeping us alive: balancing, repairing, defending and renewing. Healing traditions across the world have given this intelligence many names. Naturopathy calls it the vital force.

One idea, many names

Almost every traditional system of medicine is built on the same insight: that living beings are animated by a vital energy, and that health flows from its strength and balance.

• In Traditional Chinese Medicine, it is qi, the energy that flows through the body's channels, nourished by breath and food and shaped by our emotions and way of life.
• In Ayurveda, it is prana, the life breath, carried on every inhalation and guided by practices such as yoga and pranayama.
• In Japan, it is ki; in Polynesia, mana; in ancient Greece, pneuma, the vital breath.
• The physicians of the Hippocratic tradition taught that "nature is the healer of disease", an idea later captured in the Latin phrase vis medicatrix naturae, the healing power of nature.

Naturopathy was founded on this principle. Its first guiding principle is to trust and support the healing power of nature: the role of the practitioner is not to force the body into health, but to identify and remove the obstacles to healing and create the conditions in which the body can heal itself.¹

The role of the practitioner is to remove the obstacles to healing, and let nature do its work.

The wisdom of the body: what science sees

Modern science doesn't measure "vital force" directly. But it has revealed, in astonishing detail, the intelligence the old traditions were describing.

Self-balancing. In the 19th century, the French physiologist Claude Bernard described the body's ability to keep its inner world stable, its milieu intérieur, whatever happens outside. In 1932, the American physiologist Walter Cannon named this homeostasis, and called his book on it The Wisdom of the Body.² Every second, without our awareness, the body adjusts temperature, blood sugar, blood pressure, acidity, fluids and hormones within narrow, life-sustaining limits. (See The Hormone Web.)

Self-renewing. The body replaces around 330 billion cells every day, about 1% of all its cells. Within roughly three months, a number of cells equal to the whole body has been renewed.³ The lining of the gut renews itself every few days, and the skin every few weeks. We are not fixed; we are constantly being remade.

Self-healing. Fever, so often suppressed, is one of the body's oldest defences. A raised temperature speeds up immune cells and makes conditions harder for many germs.⁴ Inflammation, coughing, sneezing, tiredness and loss of appetite are, in the first instance, intelligent responses: the body redirecting its resources toward repair. In naturopathy, symptoms are seen first as messages and efforts of the body to heal, to be understood and supported rather than simply silenced. (Some symptoms do need urgent medical attention; see the note at the end.)

Energy. Perhaps the closest modern parallel to vital energy is found in our mitochondria, the tiny power stations inside almost every cell, which turn food and oxygen into the energy that powers all of life. Remarkably, research suggests that mitochondria respond to our inner lives: in one study, mothers under the chronic stress of caring for a child with special needs showed signs of weaker mitochondrial function, while positive mood on a given day was linked with healthier mitochondria.^5,6 How we feel, it seems, reaches all the way down into the energy of our cells.

Somatic intelligence: the body knows

Our bodies don't just heal; they also know. A constant stream of information flows from the heart, gut, lungs, muscles and skin up to the brain, telling it how the body is doing. Scientists call this inner sense interoception.⁷ It's how we know we are hungry, tired, anxious or at ease, and it forms the foundation of our emotions. (See Heart-Brain Coherence.)

The body often knows before the mind does. In a famous experiment, people played a card game with hidden rules: two decks were secretly "bad". Their skin began to react with tiny bursts of sweat whenever they reached for a bad deck, and they started to avoid those decks, long before they could consciously explain why.⁸ The neuroscientist Antonio Damasio called these bodily signals somatic markers: the gut feelings that guide us toward what is good for us and away from harm.⁹

Many people have learned to override these signals: to push through exhaustion, ignore hunger and fullness, swallow emotions and keep going. Over time, we lose touch with the body's quiet voice. Yet people who are more attuned to their inner signals tend to manage their emotions better, and practices that build this awareness, such as meditation, yoga and mindful breathing, are linked with better wellbeing.¹⁰ Learning to listen again is one of the most important steps in healing. (See The Sound of Stillness.)

Naturopaths believe this somatic intelligence is always urging us toward healing and wholeness, toward the fullest expression of who we are. When we live in a way that supports it, we feel it as vitality: energy, clarity, warmth, appetite for life. When we live against it, it speaks first in whispers, then in symptoms.

How traditions nourished the vital force

Across cultures, the ways of building vital energy are remarkably similar:

• Breath: pranayama in yoga, qigong breathing in China, and the breath prayers of many faiths. (See The Healing Breath.)
• Gentle, flowing movement: tai chi, qigong and yoga, designed to move energy rather than exhaust it. A review of 77 studies found that qigong and tai chi benefited heart health, bone density, balance, immunity and quality of life.¹¹
• Nourishing, seasonal food, chosen to suit each person's constitution. (See The Architecture of Balance.)
• Tonic and adaptogenic herbs, such as ginseng, ashwagandha, astragalus and reishi, given to restore depleted energy. (See The Inner Life of Plants and The Hidden Kingdom.)
• Rhythm: rising and resting with the sun, and living in tune with the seasons.
• Nature cure: the early naturopaths of Europe prescribed fresh air, sunlight, cold water, earth, rest and simple food to rouse the body's own healing powers.
• Stillness and spirit: meditation, prayer, contemplation and a sense of meaning.

Optimising your vital force in the modern era

Modern life drains vitality in ways our ancestors never faced: artificial light, constant stimulation, processed food, chronic stress, isolation and endless sitting. The principles of renewal, though, remain the same. Start by removing what depletes you, then add what nourishes.

Remove the obstacles

• Steady your blood sugar, so your energy no longer rises and crashes. (See Balancing the Sugar Seesaw.)
• Calm the quiet fire of chronic inflammation. (See The Quiet Fire.)
• Heal the gut, the root of nourishment, immunity and much of our mood. (See The Master Regulator and You Are What You Absorb.)
• Lighten the load of everyday chemicals, alcohol and other burdens. (See Lightening the Load.)
• Reduce constant stimulation: screens, noise and notifications that keep the nervous system on alert. (See Wired and Tired.)

Nourish the source

• Sleep deeply. Sleep is when the body does its deepest repair. (See The Art of Sleep.)
• Live by the sun: morning light, dark evenings, regular rhythms. (See Living by the Sun.)
• Eat living, whole food, rich in colour and as close to nature as possible. (See Food as Medicine and Stressed Plants, Stronger Medicine.)
• Breathe slowly and fully, several times a day.
• Move every day, ideally outdoors, and try a gentle, flowing practice such as tai chi, qigong or yoga. (See Born to Move.)
• Spend time in nature. (See The Green Prescription.)
• Connect with others. (See Social Resonance.)
• Embrace gentle challenge, such as a cool shower, a brisk hill walk or a day of lighter eating, followed by proper rest. Like plants, we grow stronger through manageable stress.
• Rest without guilt. Vitality is built in the pauses as much as in the effort. (See Filling Your Own Cup.)
• Live with purpose. In a study of almost 7,000 American adults over 50, those with the strongest sense of purpose in life were far less likely to die over the following years than those with the weakest.¹² Meaning is medicine.

Listen to your body

• Do a daily body scan. For a few minutes, move your attention slowly from your feet to your head, noticing warmth, tension, ease or discomfort, without judging it.
• Pause before eating to notice your hunger, and stop when you feel comfortably satisfied.
• Notice your energy after meals, activities and time with different people. What leaves you lighter? What leaves you drained?
• Honour tiredness as a message, not a weakness.
• Keep a simple journal of sleep, food, mood and energy. Patterns soon appear.

Tending the garden, not a quick fix

It's tempting to search for the one herb, supplement or superfood that will change everything. But vitality doesn't work that way. A gardener can't make a seedling grow by pulling on it. Instead, they enrich the soil, give it water, light and shelter, and the plant grows by itself. Each thing they give helps the others to work: rich soil holds water better, and a strong root reaches more nourishment. Our bodies are much the same. Each foundation of health helps the others to flourish.

• Good digestion lets you absorb the iron, B12 and magnesium that fuel your energy, and the minerals your bones are built from. (See You Are What You Absorb and Living Bones.)
• Deep sleep steadies blood sugar, appetite and hormones, so healthy choices the next day come more easily.
• Movement softens stress hormones, enriches the gut's bacteria and tells the bones to grow stronger. (See Born to Move.)
• A calmer nervous system switches on "rest and digest", improving digestion and sleep, and can ease the hormonal changes of midlife. (See The Second Spring.)
• Enough nourishment is what allows exercise, and every other healthy habit, to build us up rather than wear us down. (See The Natural Edge.)

This is why small, steady changes, made together and kept up over months, so often achieve what no single remedy can. Each one makes the next a little easier, and the benefits multiply. Herbs and supplements can be wonderful allies, but they work best on these foundations, not in place of them. True vitality isn't something we take; it's something we grow.

You can't pull a seedling into flower. You tend the soil, and it grows.

At Rootwise, this is the heart of everything we do. We don't see ourselves as healing you; we see ourselves as helping your body do what it already knows how to do. Every plan we create aims to clear the path, nourish the source and help you hear, once again, the quiet wisdom of your own body.