WEBVTT 1 00:00:00.240 --> 00:00:00.560 Foreign. 2 00:00:07.360 --> 00:00:11.320 Welcome to Inclusion Bites, your sanctuary 3 00:00:11.320 --> 00:00:15.200 for bold conversations that spark change. I'm Joanne Lockwood, 4 00:00:15.200 --> 00:00:18.720 your guide on this journey of exploration into the heart of 5 00:00:18.720 --> 00:00:22.640 inclusion, belonging and societal transformation. 6 00:00:23.120 --> 00:00:27.040 Ever wondered what it truly takes to create a world? Remember, everyone 7 00:00:27.040 --> 00:00:30.760 not only belongs, but thrives. You're not alone. 8 00:00:31.320 --> 00:00:35.200 Join me as we uncover the unseen, challenge 9 00:00:35.200 --> 00:00:38.760 the status quo and share stories that resonate 10 00:00:38.760 --> 00:00:42.480 deep within. Ready to dive in? Whether you're 11 00:00:42.480 --> 00:00:46.400 sipping your morning coffee or winding down after a long day, let's 12 00:00:46.400 --> 00:00:50.360 connect, reflect and inspire action together. 13 00:00:51.080 --> 00:00:54.870 Don't forget, you can be part of the conversation too. Reach out 14 00:00:54.870 --> 00:00:58.670 to jo.lockwood@seechangehappen.co.uk 15 00:00:59.070 --> 00:01:02.590 to share your insights or to join me on the show. 16 00:01:03.470 --> 00:01:07.230 So adjust your earbuds and settle in. It's time to 17 00:01:07.230 --> 00:01:10.830 ignite the spark of inclusion with Inclusion Bites. 18 00:01:14.990 --> 00:01:18.640 Today is episode 166 with the 19 00:01:18.640 --> 00:01:22.520 title Powering Minds One reflex 20 00:01:22.520 --> 00:01:26.200 at a time. And I have the absolute honour and privilege to welcome 21 00:01:26.280 --> 00:01:30.040 Niki McGlynn. Niki is a neurodevelopment 22 00:01:30.040 --> 00:01:33.080 therapist, trainer and ADHD coach, 23 00:01:33.480 --> 00:01:37.320 dedicated to helping people unlock their full potential through movement 24 00:01:37.560 --> 00:01:41.560 and understanding primitive reflexes. When I asked Niki to 25 00:01:41.560 --> 00:01:45.260 describe her superpower, she says it is translating 26 00:01:45.260 --> 00:01:48.780 neurodevelopment science into life changing movement strategies. 27 00:01:48.940 --> 00:01:52.940 Hello, Niki, welcome to the show. Hi, Joanne, lovely to have 28 00:01:52.940 --> 00:01:56.580 you here. Whereabouts in the world are you? So I'm based just outside 29 00:01:56.580 --> 00:02:00.500 Reading, which is about 40 miles west of London in a small 30 00:02:00.500 --> 00:02:04.220 leafy town called Wokingham. Called where, sorry? 31 00:02:04.380 --> 00:02:08.140 Wokingham. Wokingham. Oh, I know Wokingham. I'm 32 00:02:08.780 --> 00:02:12.500 in a suburb of between Portsmouth and Petersfield. 33 00:02:12.500 --> 00:02:14.630 So. Okay. Oh, I never too far away. 34 00:02:17.030 --> 00:02:21.030 I wouldn't say quite a leafy suburb, but there are leaves and 35 00:02:21.030 --> 00:02:24.950 it is a suburb, but it's close. It's towny, I suppose, 36 00:02:25.430 --> 00:02:28.710 other than villagey. So, Nikki, 37 00:02:29.590 --> 00:02:33.510 your journey into neurodevelopment therapy. I think predictably, based on what 38 00:02:33.510 --> 00:02:37.430 you've written in your show notes, it's down to your own undiagnosed dyslexia 39 00:02:37.430 --> 00:02:41.210 and adhd. So how do you get into into associated this 40 00:02:41.210 --> 00:02:45.050 with reflexes and movement? So 41 00:02:45.050 --> 00:02:48.570 really my journey was started with my daughter 42 00:02:49.050 --> 00:02:52.690 who at age 12 was diagnosed with 43 00:02:52.690 --> 00:02:56.650 dyslexia and I was 40 at the time and 44 00:02:56.810 --> 00:03:00.610 became very obvious from her diagnosis that I had the same 45 00:03:00.610 --> 00:03:04.570 issue. So I got a diagnosis and then discovered actually very 46 00:03:04.650 --> 00:03:08.600 recently that, that my mum had suspected 47 00:03:08.600 --> 00:03:12.400 I was dyslexic when I was very young. But at that point my 48 00:03:12.400 --> 00:03:15.480 dad didn't believe in dyslexia. So kind of nothing happened. 49 00:03:16.440 --> 00:03:20.120 So. And it's very. I find working within this 50 00:03:20.280 --> 00:03:23.880 sort of neurodivergent world, that it's a very common 51 00:03:24.040 --> 00:03:27.600 progression now is that. Is that parents get their children 52 00:03:27.600 --> 00:03:31.440 diagnosed and then recognise their own issues. So she was 53 00:03:31.440 --> 00:03:35.400 diagnosed with dyslexia and then more recently 54 00:03:35.480 --> 00:03:39.440 diagnosed with ADHD just after the pandemic. And same thing, you 55 00:03:39.440 --> 00:03:42.600 know, it's that greater understanding that we now have of how 56 00:03:42.760 --> 00:03:46.680 neurodiversity exhibits in women and girls and a 57 00:03:46.680 --> 00:03:50.520 lot of that was discounted or not recognised until. Until very recently. 58 00:03:51.080 --> 00:03:55.000 So she got her diagnosis, I got my diagnosis and the rest is history. 59 00:03:55.240 --> 00:03:59.040 But I think seeing her really struggle at school and 60 00:03:59.040 --> 00:04:03.000 knowing how I'd struggled at school and at college and at university, I 61 00:04:03.000 --> 00:04:06.840 didn't want her to have to deal with the same issues that I dealt with 62 00:04:06.840 --> 00:04:10.400 and, and I thought there had to be, there has to be something that I 63 00:04:10.400 --> 00:04:14.200 can do to help her. So I started to look and came across 64 00:04:14.520 --> 00:04:18.360 this whole world of neurodevelopment therapy, which is 65 00:04:18.360 --> 00:04:21.240 movement based and really effective, and 66 00:04:21.960 --> 00:04:25.800 learned some of the techniques to help her and it. And it made a huge 67 00:04:25.800 --> 00:04:29.520 difference. And then I started to pursue it, learned how 68 00:04:29.520 --> 00:04:33.460 to practise with movement programmes 69 00:04:33.460 --> 00:04:37.420 and then eventually became a trainer myself. As you're 70 00:04:37.420 --> 00:04:41.380 talking now, I'm thinking our son, who was born in the early 71 00:04:41.380 --> 00:04:45.260 90s, we realised that he 72 00:04:45.260 --> 00:04:49.180 was struggling to learn to read. I have to admit, as a 73 00:04:49.180 --> 00:04:53.140 parent, I was getting really frustrated with him. I didn't understand it. There 74 00:04:53.140 --> 00:04:57.140 was no obvious label sign on his 75 00:04:57.140 --> 00:05:00.550 forehead saying, I'm different, I've got a dyslexic problem. 76 00:05:01.670 --> 00:05:05.670 We just thought that he was being awkward and not trying. 77 00:05:05.750 --> 00:05:09.630 And I remember going through flashcards in the Alphabet. Yeah, 78 00:05:09.630 --> 00:05:13.590 A for Apple, B for B and whatever, B for butterfly. And it's 79 00:05:13.590 --> 00:05:17.510 like that, what's this? He wouldn't know. I said A for Apple. And 80 00:05:17.510 --> 00:05:20.110 then I'd put it down, I'd pick it back up again, ask him again within 81 00:05:20.110 --> 00:05:24.000 a few seconds, and he wouldn't, he just wouldn't be able to grasp it. And 82 00:05:24.000 --> 00:05:27.760 it was really, really frustrating. It's so frustrating. My, 83 00:05:27.920 --> 00:05:31.760 my biggest issue with processing is I'm dyscalculic, 84 00:05:32.000 --> 00:05:35.720 so I can't do numbers, can't do numbers at all. But my grandfather was a 85 00:05:35.720 --> 00:05:39.719 maths teacher, so as a child I would have to go on a Sunday afternoon 86 00:05:39.719 --> 00:05:43.360 and have maths lessons with my grandfather and he would 87 00:05:43.360 --> 00:05:46.920 explain things to me, which I. Which I understood, I thought I 88 00:05:46.920 --> 00:05:50.320 understood. We'd go through it, it was fine. And then we'd go back to it 89 00:05:50.320 --> 00:05:54.170 and I would. Wouldn't have a clue. And I had the word stupid thrown 90 00:05:54.170 --> 00:05:57.810 at me on many, many occasions by my father and my 91 00:05:57.810 --> 00:06:01.610 grandfather. And that's the conclusion you come to. One must be stupid, 92 00:06:01.690 --> 00:06:05.290 must be stupid. And all the other moving parts of being 93 00:06:06.090 --> 00:06:09.610 dyslexic or adhd, those executive function 94 00:06:09.610 --> 00:06:13.290 problems of not being able to organise yourself, not being able to 95 00:06:13.850 --> 00:06:17.650 keep your life organised, your home life organised, your school 96 00:06:17.650 --> 00:06:21.630 bag organised, all of that stuff you, you don't realise is 97 00:06:21.630 --> 00:06:24.910 part of that processing condition. So 98 00:06:25.870 --> 00:06:29.670 you grow up feeling like you just. Yeah, a bit 99 00:06:29.670 --> 00:06:33.590 hopeless. Well, the thing I came to realise was that 100 00:06:33.590 --> 00:06:37.390 it's not a kind of black and white thing. You don't. It's not that you 101 00:06:37.390 --> 00:06:39.950 can't read this, you can't read that, or you don't know this or you don't 102 00:06:39.950 --> 00:06:43.270 know that. You develop coping strategies or you can 103 00:06:43.270 --> 00:06:47.270 recognise certain patterns or shapes. You may not be able 104 00:06:47.270 --> 00:06:49.590 to. You may not be able to understand that's an A, that's a B, that's 105 00:06:49.590 --> 00:06:52.390 a C, or whatever it is, but you, you kind of know that's a word, 106 00:06:52.630 --> 00:06:56.310 you're reinforcing it enough times. So I think what was frustrating with our son was 107 00:06:57.030 --> 00:07:00.870 he wasn't stupid, he wasn't incapable of functioning in the world, 108 00:07:01.190 --> 00:07:04.910 it was just. He was incapable of learning his Alphabet, 109 00:07:04.910 --> 00:07:08.710 associating the letter with the object and 110 00:07:08.710 --> 00:07:11.950 then. But he was able to follow along a reading book with you or something 111 00:07:11.950 --> 00:07:14.700 like this. So that's where we were quite confused. 112 00:07:16.620 --> 00:07:20.300 Is often very advanced in people who are 113 00:07:20.300 --> 00:07:23.980 dyslexic. And of course now how they teach reading in 114 00:07:23.980 --> 00:07:27.700 schools is to use phonics. And dyslexic people can't work with 115 00:07:27.700 --> 00:07:31.620 phonics at all. They're far better off learning the 116 00:07:31.620 --> 00:07:35.420 old fashioned way of literally spelling out words 117 00:07:35.420 --> 00:07:38.860 and learning to recognise the shape of a word 118 00:07:39.670 --> 00:07:42.630 is a much easier way for dyslexics to be able to learn. 119 00:07:43.830 --> 00:07:46.870 Yeah, because, you know, we read a book, we read something on the screen, whatever 120 00:07:46.870 --> 00:07:50.710 it is, we're not reading every letter, we're recognising the peaks and 121 00:07:50.710 --> 00:07:54.710 troughs and the pattern of that word, aren't we? We can look at whole sentences 122 00:07:54.710 --> 00:07:58.630 almost and gather the essence of what it's trying to say without reading 123 00:07:58.630 --> 00:08:02.430 every word. And that's something you call it speed reading, to call 124 00:08:02.430 --> 00:08:04.790 it development, you become very familiar. And 125 00:08:06.690 --> 00:08:10.690 I have a real trouble reading novels because the way I pick 126 00:08:10.770 --> 00:08:14.730 key bits out of sentences and I don't put any meaning 127 00:08:14.730 --> 00:08:18.490 or feeling in there, so I'm just getting facts. And I find it really 128 00:08:18.490 --> 00:08:22.010 difficult to absorb myself in something that's nonfiction or 129 00:08:22.010 --> 00:08:25.850 fiction, unless it's a technical or I'm trying to 130 00:08:25.850 --> 00:08:29.810 research something, in which case I can hyper focus and lift stuff out quite quickly. 131 00:08:30.780 --> 00:08:34.740 Yeah. So just at what point you look back at your life 132 00:08:34.740 --> 00:08:38.460 and you're seeing, seeing this about yourself, can you see instances 133 00:08:38.700 --> 00:08:42.580 in your, in your own development where this jumped out at 134 00:08:42.580 --> 00:08:46.500 you now with hindsight and you go, ah, that was that. Ah, that was 135 00:08:46.500 --> 00:08:50.420 that. Yeah. 100%. 100%. That whole, you 136 00:08:50.420 --> 00:08:54.420 know, the, the journey of people with 137 00:08:54.420 --> 00:08:57.980 ADHD, which we really only starting to recognise 138 00:08:58.360 --> 00:09:02.160 is this, is this all the different parts to it, 139 00:09:02.160 --> 00:09:05.960 things like rejection, sensitive dysphoria, which 140 00:09:05.960 --> 00:09:09.880 is a sense that people don't like you 141 00:09:09.880 --> 00:09:13.720 or that you're being criticised or that you're not kind of 142 00:09:13.720 --> 00:09:17.720 part of it, you feel that rejection really, really acutely. 143 00:09:18.040 --> 00:09:21.800 And I look back now and I remember that so 144 00:09:21.800 --> 00:09:25.330 clearly. And I also so it so clearly in my 145 00:09:25.330 --> 00:09:29.250 daughter where she would come home from school and 146 00:09:29.250 --> 00:09:32.930 say to me that she, she didn't have any friends and nobody played with her 147 00:09:33.010 --> 00:09:36.810 at lunchtime. And I went into school and went, okay, what's going 148 00:09:36.810 --> 00:09:40.570 on? This is a problem. And the teachers were like, well, no, 149 00:09:40.570 --> 00:09:43.810 she's, she's got this group of friends and she plays with this group of friends 150 00:09:43.810 --> 00:09:47.290 and, and people were coming home for tea and she was going to people's house 151 00:09:47.290 --> 00:09:50.770 for tea. So it didn't make any sense. And it was only later when I 152 00:09:50.770 --> 00:09:54.630 learned about this part of being neurodivergent 153 00:09:55.270 --> 00:09:58.510 that it, that I realised that was what was happening. And the same thing had 154 00:09:58.510 --> 00:10:01.990 happened to me as a child, only I hadn't realised it. I went to people's 155 00:10:01.990 --> 00:10:05.830 houses, fatigue, people came back to me, fatigue. But I felt like 156 00:10:06.150 --> 00:10:09.750 I didn't really fit, that I didn't really have a lot of friends. 157 00:10:09.830 --> 00:10:13.590 But it's that perception, that whole point where your brain 158 00:10:14.070 --> 00:10:17.960 lies to you about, about the reality of what's on, going. Going on, 159 00:10:19.080 --> 00:10:22.920 inhibit you from engaging in social situations? Or 160 00:10:22.920 --> 00:10:26.600 is it just how you, or how was it how you remembered the situation? 161 00:10:26.920 --> 00:10:29.760 Did it stop you going in? Was it just on the way out? I think 162 00:10:29.760 --> 00:10:33.320 probably a bit of both. You know, memory is such an odd thing, isn't it? 163 00:10:33.320 --> 00:10:37.240 You know, what we remember isn't always accurate, but 164 00:10:37.320 --> 00:10:40.480 I think, I think there was a bit of both. I think that partly it 165 00:10:40.480 --> 00:10:44.320 stopped me being involved in things and partly My perception 166 00:10:44.320 --> 00:10:48.180 was that I wasn't involved in things because that was how it felt. 167 00:10:48.260 --> 00:10:50.500 Yeah, I've seen people have 168 00:10:52.660 --> 00:10:56.580 social anxiety without any basis for that. 169 00:10:56.980 --> 00:11:00.900 It's just. It's become a kind of a habit or learned behaviour or 170 00:11:01.380 --> 00:11:04.340 exacerbated probably over. Covid reflex thing often. 171 00:11:05.380 --> 00:11:08.820 And this is the thing about primitive reflexes, which 172 00:11:08.900 --> 00:11:12.180 nobody's ever heard of. Have you heard of primitive reflexes? 173 00:11:13.140 --> 00:11:17.140 Nobody's ever heard of them. And they're really. They're 174 00:11:17.140 --> 00:11:21.140 really, really fundamental and they really, really explain a lot 175 00:11:21.220 --> 00:11:25.140 of some of the behaviour that we see in people. 176 00:11:25.220 --> 00:11:29.020 Not necessarily just people who are neurodivergent, but more typically people are 177 00:11:29.020 --> 00:11:32.780 neurodivergent and it makes a lot of sense of why people 178 00:11:32.780 --> 00:11:36.660 behave the way they behave. And since the pandemic, that I think 179 00:11:36.660 --> 00:11:40.650 has become a lot more obvious. So would 180 00:11:40.650 --> 00:11:43.890 you like me to explain what primitive reflexes are? Go for it. Yeah, go for 181 00:11:43.890 --> 00:11:46.650 it. I think. I think I'm fascinated to know. I'm sure that our listeners want 182 00:11:46.650 --> 00:11:50.610 to know what it is as well. So primitive reflexes are movement patterns 183 00:11:50.770 --> 00:11:54.690 that babies make from conception pretty much 184 00:11:55.090 --> 00:11:58.930 to about the first year of life. And 185 00:11:58.930 --> 00:12:02.370 each of those movement patterns have to express themselves 186 00:12:02.610 --> 00:12:06.380 fully and then allow the brain to make certain connections 187 00:12:06.380 --> 00:12:09.860 and then they integrate back into your system, so they don't 188 00:12:09.860 --> 00:12:13.580 disappear altogether, they lie dormant in your system. 189 00:12:14.300 --> 00:12:17.620 So. And they fall into various categories. So the first 190 00:12:17.620 --> 00:12:21.540 reflexes that develop are fear reflexes. So 191 00:12:21.540 --> 00:12:24.940 you have a fear paralysis reflex and a moro reflex. 192 00:12:25.420 --> 00:12:29.300 Now, the moro reflex some people have heard of, and it's 193 00:12:29.300 --> 00:12:33.150 that baby startle reflex. So when you have a baby 194 00:12:33.150 --> 00:12:36.910 and they're lying in their cot and there's a loud noise or you 195 00:12:36.910 --> 00:12:39.950 bump their cot or whatever, and they do that kind of fling their arms back 196 00:12:39.950 --> 00:12:43.790 and gasp and startle. That's a morrow reflex. 197 00:12:44.350 --> 00:12:47.950 So those two reflexes will have 198 00:12:48.190 --> 00:12:52.110 really profound effects on our ability to be able to 199 00:12:52.350 --> 00:12:55.790 socialise and function within society. 200 00:12:56.030 --> 00:12:59.880 Because although they're called fear reflexes, they don't make you frightened, but they stop 201 00:12:59.880 --> 00:13:03.600 you feeling safe. If you don't feel safe, it's very difficult 202 00:13:03.680 --> 00:13:07.120 to be able to interact with other people, because fundamentally, 203 00:13:07.600 --> 00:13:11.120 you feel unsafe in the world. So the fear 204 00:13:11.120 --> 00:13:15.000 paralysis reflex will shut everything down. So if that's a very 205 00:13:15.000 --> 00:13:19.000 active reflex for you, it makes it difficult to make eye contact, it 206 00:13:19.000 --> 00:13:22.960 makes it very difficult to interact with other people, it 207 00:13:22.960 --> 00:13:26.920 makes it difficult to be able to speak out. So if you've 208 00:13:26.920 --> 00:13:30.730 got a child who's has selective mutism, often it's the fear 209 00:13:30.730 --> 00:13:34.690 paralysis reflex that sits behind that because it literally freezes your 210 00:13:34.690 --> 00:13:38.570 vocal cords. So anything that you do that you find that 211 00:13:38.570 --> 00:13:42.210 you are unable to do even if you want to. Not 212 00:13:42.290 --> 00:13:45.530 procrastination, but that sort of, you know, I really, really want to, but I can't 213 00:13:45.530 --> 00:13:49.290 make myself. Can often be a fear paralysis 214 00:13:49.290 --> 00:13:53.210 issue. You see it also in children and 215 00:13:53.210 --> 00:13:57.160 adults who are really, really good. You know, they're really, really good. They absolutely 216 00:13:57.160 --> 00:14:01.160 toe the line because they don't want anybody to interfere with them. 217 00:14:01.320 --> 00:14:04.920 So they're the kids who do always do their homework. They don't get into any 218 00:14:04.920 --> 00:14:08.680 trouble. They're always really, really well behaved because they don't want to draw 219 00:14:08.680 --> 00:14:11.520 attention to themselves. They don't want to get told off. They don't want to be 220 00:14:11.520 --> 00:14:15.480 called out. They just want to be left alone. 221 00:14:16.600 --> 00:14:20.360 And within schools, that will often work reasonably well. 222 00:14:20.520 --> 00:14:24.200 It's, it can often fall apart when they go to university and that, that structure 223 00:14:24.200 --> 00:14:28.160 is no longer there. Or sometimes what you see are children who are really, really 224 00:14:28.160 --> 00:14:32.160 good at school and that fear paralysis reflex really holds them. And then 225 00:14:32.160 --> 00:14:36.000 they go home and then their moro reflex takes over. Now, 226 00:14:36.000 --> 00:14:40.000 moro reflex is associated with that fight flight state. So 227 00:14:40.000 --> 00:14:43.840 if that's very active, then that's where you see people who have 228 00:14:43.840 --> 00:14:47.640 meltdowns or temper tantrums or overly aggressive 229 00:14:48.030 --> 00:14:51.830 for what you would see as no particular reason. You know, people who become 230 00:14:51.830 --> 00:14:55.750 aggressive because you looked at them or smiled at them. So, and that 231 00:14:55.750 --> 00:14:59.670 can often be that, that I don't feel safe in the world. Therefore my best 232 00:14:59.670 --> 00:15:03.430 way to deal with that is to attack. Because if I get in 233 00:15:03.430 --> 00:15:06.750 first and there are people who then struggle with change. 234 00:15:07.710 --> 00:15:11.550 If you have to, they have to move desks at work, they get very cross. 235 00:15:11.550 --> 00:15:15.230 If, if the temperature changes, they get very cross. They're not very 236 00:15:15.230 --> 00:15:19.180 adaptable. And that whole sensory processing issue 237 00:15:19.180 --> 00:15:22.980 where people struggle with noise or too bright lights 238 00:15:22.980 --> 00:15:26.620 or fabrics, often that's a moro 239 00:15:26.620 --> 00:15:29.980 reflex issue because that sensory processing is 240 00:15:29.980 --> 00:15:33.980 associated with that sort of inability to process what's 241 00:15:33.980 --> 00:15:37.900 going on in the outer world. That's fascinating. 242 00:15:38.220 --> 00:15:42.110 That's absolutely fascinating. As you're talking, I'm thinking, yeah, 243 00:15:42.110 --> 00:15:45.830 I get that now. So the borrow is the fight flight fear. It's a vagus 244 00:15:45.830 --> 00:15:49.750 nerve, adrenaline glands. Yeah. And you're at this 245 00:15:49.750 --> 00:15:53.750 heightened state of stress. Find it. So when people, people go for help 246 00:15:55.030 --> 00:15:58.470 for, for, for, for those kind of issues, 247 00:15:58.950 --> 00:16:02.750 if those reflexes aren't addressed often, you only ever get 248 00:16:02.750 --> 00:16:06.670 so far with recovery. So if, if somebody has ptsd 249 00:16:06.670 --> 00:16:10.620 or complex trauma sometimes. What. What 250 00:16:10.620 --> 00:16:14.500 stops the recovery from those things are those fear reflexes that are 251 00:16:14.580 --> 00:16:18.460 really, really fundamental in development that just sit there 252 00:16:18.460 --> 00:16:21.300 and will stop people progressing forwards. 253 00:16:22.660 --> 00:16:26.540 Yeah, I'm just. I think about this, that obviously personal biases kick 254 00:16:26.540 --> 00:16:30.420 in the world around them, and biases we know are very 255 00:16:30.420 --> 00:16:34.260 primaeval. They're very designed to keep us alive, keep us safe, cut down our 256 00:16:34.260 --> 00:16:38.100 processing time. But if you're mixing that with an inclination, if you like 257 00:16:38.840 --> 00:16:42.640 to go into a defence mechanism quite quickly, then, yeah, we're going to be driven 258 00:16:42.640 --> 00:16:45.880 by these biases quite heavily, aren't we? Well, it's a reflex, you know, it's like 259 00:16:45.880 --> 00:16:49.720 blinking. It's a reflex. You have no control over it. 260 00:16:51.000 --> 00:16:55.000 So often when people don't understand or you don't understand why this 261 00:16:55.000 --> 00:16:58.840 person's behaved this way, or you don't understand why you've behaved this way, it can 262 00:16:58.840 --> 00:17:02.760 be that that reflex has just kicked in, you know, 263 00:17:02.760 --> 00:17:06.300 And I say often to people, we. We're wired for survival, not for 264 00:17:06.300 --> 00:17:10.300 happiness. So even though we think we want to do this because it'll 265 00:17:10.300 --> 00:17:14.140 make us happy, if our brain, if that real sort of 266 00:17:14.140 --> 00:17:17.780 caveman part of our brain perceives it as being dangerous, then 267 00:17:18.660 --> 00:17:21.980 it won't let us do the things that we think will make us happy. Yeah, 268 00:17:21.980 --> 00:17:24.820 I mean, going back to what you're saying there, we were wired for that very 269 00:17:24.820 --> 00:17:28.700 primaeval caveman, fifties, hundred thousand years ago, when we 270 00:17:28.700 --> 00:17:32.550 evolved. Yep. Using. Using Microsoft 271 00:17:32.550 --> 00:17:36.470 Word or logging on or writing a book or reading a book wasn't really part 272 00:17:36.470 --> 00:17:40.390 of the human design criteria, was it? It was cave painting, if you're lucky, 273 00:17:40.390 --> 00:17:44.310 or scratching surfaces or making notches in things. But we're 274 00:17:44.310 --> 00:17:47.990 expecting the human brain, the human diversity, if you like, to 275 00:17:47.990 --> 00:17:51.950 suddenly all be in tune with the needs of today, 276 00:17:52.190 --> 00:17:55.710 when, evolutionary wise, this is like a 277 00:17:55.710 --> 00:17:59.630 millisecond in our evolution. Yeah, yeah. And that whole how we bring 278 00:17:59.630 --> 00:18:03.150 our children up now doesn't. Doesn't really help 279 00:18:03.550 --> 00:18:07.510 with neurological development. The brain develops through movement. So the 280 00:18:07.510 --> 00:18:10.710 less you move, the less your brain develops. The more you move, the more your 281 00:18:10.710 --> 00:18:14.270 brain develops. So with babies now, where babies 282 00:18:14.830 --> 00:18:18.310 sleep on their backs, lie on their backs under a baby gym, stay on their 283 00:18:18.310 --> 00:18:22.070 backs in car seats, they don't move around. They can't move 284 00:18:22.070 --> 00:18:26.010 around in the same way that we used to do in big prams, that 285 00:18:26.010 --> 00:18:29.970 will have a fundamental effect. So after the fear 286 00:18:29.970 --> 00:18:33.890 reflexes, we have the development of neck reflexes. There's three neck 287 00:18:33.890 --> 00:18:37.810 reflexes, and those reflexes are the things that will help with 288 00:18:37.970 --> 00:18:41.810 really good executive function, that sort of processing, reading, writing. 289 00:18:42.450 --> 00:18:46.450 Neck reflexes control eye movement. So if you've got a problem with tracking 290 00:18:46.450 --> 00:18:49.650 left to right, that can often be a neck reflex issue. 291 00:18:50.220 --> 00:18:53.740 Organisation. Things like being able to go 292 00:18:53.740 --> 00:18:57.500 downstairs, things like being scared of heights. If. If there's. If 293 00:18:57.500 --> 00:19:01.340 your first neck reflex, which does this to your head, 294 00:19:01.980 --> 00:19:05.580 if that isn't well integrated, if you look down, what your body 295 00:19:05.580 --> 00:19:09.460 wants to do is collapse. If that reflex is still active, your body wants 296 00:19:09.460 --> 00:19:12.460 to collapse forward or hyperextend backwards. 297 00:19:13.500 --> 00:19:17.330 So what happens is when you look down, you feel 298 00:19:17.330 --> 00:19:21.210 like you're going to fall, because that reflex wants your body to 299 00:19:21.210 --> 00:19:24.370 collapse because it's still active. So 300 00:19:25.330 --> 00:19:29.090 people who have trouble with going downstairs or going downhill, often 301 00:19:29.170 --> 00:19:33.170 it's that reflex that's causing the problem. Or the other neck reflex 302 00:19:33.250 --> 00:19:36.690 turns your head from side to side. So again, if this reflex is retained, 303 00:19:37.570 --> 00:19:41.410 when you turn your head to the side, the side you've turned your head to, 304 00:19:41.570 --> 00:19:45.020 you, your arm and leg wants to extend out and the opposite arm and leg 305 00:19:45.020 --> 00:19:49.020 want to come in, so you get this kind of movement. So if you're 306 00:19:49.020 --> 00:19:52.780 driving in the car with somebody and they. They look at their 307 00:19:52.780 --> 00:19:56.740 sat nav, or they look over their shoulder and they suddenly swerve. That's why. It's 308 00:19:56.740 --> 00:19:59.860 because this arm wants to come in, this arm wants to go out and they 309 00:19:59.860 --> 00:20:03.580 swerve. Or if you're riding a bicycle and you look behind you, this arm wants 310 00:20:03.580 --> 00:20:05.900 to go out, this arm wants to come in and you fall off your bicycle. 311 00:20:05.980 --> 00:20:09.550 So there's. There's lots and lots of issues that makes handwriting really difficult, 312 00:20:09.940 --> 00:20:13.860 because when you're looking across, when you cross 313 00:20:13.860 --> 00:20:17.820 this central midline, this arm wants to extend. So you're trying to hold your 314 00:20:17.820 --> 00:20:21.140 pen on the page and write. So often then what people do is they turn 315 00:20:21.140 --> 00:20:24.700 their page around and kind of write uphill so they're not having to cross the 316 00:20:24.700 --> 00:20:28.620 midline. So. And then that also deals with 317 00:20:28.620 --> 00:20:32.500 organisation and spatial awareness and 318 00:20:32.580 --> 00:20:36.270 timekeeping and all of those things. Proprioception. Where. 319 00:20:36.270 --> 00:20:39.590 Where's my body in space? Where are my arms? Where are my legs? That kind 320 00:20:39.590 --> 00:20:43.470 of famous ADHD walk where people swerve around trying to avoid 321 00:20:43.470 --> 00:20:47.430 things. That's often because of that neck reflex that isn't functioning 322 00:20:47.430 --> 00:20:51.349 properly, to be able to give you that proper feedback about where your arms 323 00:20:51.349 --> 00:20:55.310 and legs are. So this neck reflex you're talking about here, we. 324 00:20:55.550 --> 00:20:58.750 We move on from it after about our first year, is that what you're saying? 325 00:20:59.150 --> 00:21:02.590 Less than that. Less than that, so this, this neck reflex 326 00:21:03.190 --> 00:21:07.190 is integrated by doing this movement, okay? So it integrates into 327 00:21:07.190 --> 00:21:10.870 your central nervous system, lies dormant. So if you've got a 328 00:21:10.870 --> 00:21:14.630 baby who spends all its time on its back, and particularly in a car 329 00:21:14.630 --> 00:21:18.230 seat where it can't lift its head properly, that reflex 330 00:21:18.550 --> 00:21:22.390 can't integrate. So it sticks around. But if you've got a baby who's 331 00:21:22.390 --> 00:21:25.830 lying on its tummy and kind of do that, you know, nod, nod, nod thing, 332 00:21:25.990 --> 00:21:29.840 that's part of that integration process. And the side 333 00:21:29.840 --> 00:21:33.800 to side one, one of the best ways to integrate that is breastfeeding. So you 334 00:21:33.800 --> 00:21:37.200 feed on one side, flip the baby over, feed on the other side. So it 335 00:21:37.200 --> 00:21:41.160 learns that it's got two sides and how to cross its midline, brings 336 00:21:41.160 --> 00:21:45.080 its thumb into the midline, brings its foot into the midline. So 337 00:21:45.080 --> 00:21:49.040 that's, you know, lies on its tummy, picks up toys, brings them to its 338 00:21:49.040 --> 00:21:52.240 mouth. So it's kind of learning that I've got two of everything. 339 00:21:52.880 --> 00:21:56.790 Learning to work its eyes together, learning to work its ears together so that you 340 00:21:56.790 --> 00:22:00.390 develop 3D vision, 3D, 3D hearing, binaural hearing, 341 00:22:00.790 --> 00:22:03.990 which you need, you need to have a dominant eye and a dominant ear 342 00:22:04.790 --> 00:22:08.710 so that you can work out where sound's coming from, what, what you're looking at. 343 00:22:09.190 --> 00:22:12.870 So, so children who, who are, can't converge, who 344 00:22:12.870 --> 00:22:16.750 can't focus, that's often a reflex issue. See 345 00:22:16.750 --> 00:22:20.590 in the, the third neck reflex is still a neck reflex, but it 346 00:22:20.590 --> 00:22:24.210 affects your core. So that's the, that's what we would call the crawling 347 00:22:24.210 --> 00:22:28.090 reflex. So when you crawl, you learn how 348 00:22:28.090 --> 00:22:31.810 to learn how to accommodate with your eyes. So you learn to look near and 349 00:22:31.810 --> 00:22:35.250 look far and be able to focus. You look down where you're crawling, you look 350 00:22:35.250 --> 00:22:39.129 up where you're going. So your, your brain learns to do that process so that 351 00:22:39.129 --> 00:22:43.010 you can focus near, focus far, and focus your eyes 352 00:22:43.010 --> 00:22:46.850 together. And then that helps with being able to focus at the 353 00:22:46.850 --> 00:22:50.010 right length to be able to read and write and paint and draw. 354 00:22:51.880 --> 00:22:55.760 And societies who don't have crawling as a developmental stage don't 355 00:22:55.760 --> 00:22:59.320 have written language. So written language, 356 00:23:00.760 --> 00:23:04.280 fine art comes from being able to have the right focal length 357 00:23:04.840 --> 00:23:08.440 from crawling. So babies who don't crawl, babies who 358 00:23:09.400 --> 00:23:13.400 sit up and then get up and stand, or get up and walk, run. 359 00:23:13.400 --> 00:23:16.600 Because nine month old babies don't want, they run so they don't fall over. 360 00:23:17.290 --> 00:23:20.730 Babies at bottom shuffle often have those kind of focus 361 00:23:20.730 --> 00:23:24.690 improvements. Wow, I'm fascinated by this. Let me just sort of translate 362 00:23:24.690 --> 00:23:28.610 it into my language. So what the baby's doing or the, in their early 363 00:23:28.610 --> 00:23:32.370 stage of life are doing is what we're trying to do is calibrate our senses, 364 00:23:32.370 --> 00:23:36.370 our eyes, our hearing or whatever it may be with our muscles 365 00:23:36.370 --> 00:23:40.290 and movement so that we can understand cause and effect. If I do this, this 366 00:23:40.290 --> 00:23:44.140 happens. My eyes need to compensate, I need to adjust by movement. 367 00:23:44.300 --> 00:23:47.460 So it's all part of that learning to drive a car type thing. It takes 368 00:23:47.460 --> 00:23:51.100 us six months to a year to become comfortable and spatially aware. 369 00:23:51.580 --> 00:23:55.500 That's all the newborn and the young, the toddler's doing is calibrating 370 00:23:55.500 --> 00:23:59.180 all these senses and muscle movements. And those muscle movements 371 00:23:59.660 --> 00:24:03.500 then allow the body and the brain to do things 372 00:24:04.780 --> 00:24:08.660 naturally. So for instance, if you've got a child who's got a 373 00:24:08.660 --> 00:24:12.550 retained neck reflexes, so when they look down 374 00:24:12.550 --> 00:24:16.310 at their desk, they want to slump forward, they want to slump on the desk, 375 00:24:16.310 --> 00:24:18.990 put their hand on the desk, lie on the desk, and the teacher says to 376 00:24:18.990 --> 00:24:22.830 them, right, sit up, pay attention. So you should be able to sit 377 00:24:22.830 --> 00:24:26.830 up naturally without having to think about it. But if those reflexes are active, 378 00:24:27.150 --> 00:24:31.110 you have to make yourself sit up. So all 379 00:24:31.110 --> 00:24:34.750 of, all of your learning brain, all of your cortex, 380 00:24:35.110 --> 00:24:38.710 your prefrontal cortex is taken up with, I must sit up 381 00:24:38.710 --> 00:24:42.310 straight and look forwards. So there's no space 382 00:24:42.470 --> 00:24:46.350 left then for learning. Because the learning part of your 383 00:24:46.350 --> 00:24:50.030 brain is focusing on sitting up straight. Whereas if those reflexes are 384 00:24:50.030 --> 00:24:53.950 integrated, you can naturally sit up straight because you 385 00:24:53.950 --> 00:24:57.950 are not fighting against that reflex that makes you want to 386 00:24:57.950 --> 00:25:01.950 collapse. So we've never developed those as autonomous movements. They're conscious 387 00:25:01.950 --> 00:25:05.880 movements rather than subconscious movements. Exactly, rather. Yeah, yeah. 388 00:25:05.960 --> 00:25:09.960 So and because it's, that's taxing in the prefrontal cortex 389 00:25:09.960 --> 00:25:13.920 because we're actively having to think about, focus on it. As you say, I 390 00:25:13.920 --> 00:25:17.000 haven't got space for anything else in my prefrontal cortex because I'm so worried about 391 00:25:17.000 --> 00:25:20.960 whatever I'm, whatever I've been told to focus on. Exactly, exactly. 392 00:25:20.960 --> 00:25:24.800 So I'm focusing, I'm looking at you, the teacher, I'm focusing on what 393 00:25:24.800 --> 00:25:28.000 you're saying. I can't look down and write because if I look down I want 394 00:25:28.000 --> 00:25:31.870 to collapse. So I have to just, you know, 395 00:25:32.030 --> 00:25:35.830 keep my fingers crossed and stay upright and look upright. So 396 00:25:35.830 --> 00:25:39.630 same with the spinal reflexes particularly, there's a reflex called the spinal 397 00:25:39.630 --> 00:25:42.990 galant reflex, which lives either side of the lower 398 00:25:43.150 --> 00:25:46.949 spine. So that reflex, its job is to help you get 399 00:25:46.949 --> 00:25:50.710 born and it's to help with the, with the kind of side to 400 00:25:50.710 --> 00:25:54.630 side movement. So if that reflex remains active in 401 00:25:54.630 --> 00:25:58.030