No one will dispute the fact that exercise is good for you, but have you ever really considered why this is? Science has taught us that there is an intimate relationship between movement and health that is coordinated through the body’s “master controller,” the nervous system.

If you were asked to close your eyes and visualize the position your right knee is in right now, you could do so. This is made possible by the thousands of receptors in your knee joint and surrounding muscles (called mechanoreceptors) that send information through nerves that travel up your leg, into your spinal cord, and on to your brain.

These receptors function much like precisely aligned satellite dishes. If a joint is subluxated, poor reception results and a scrambled message is sent through your nerves (like static on a cellular phone connection). Your body reacts to this disorder through reflexes which may cause pain (to signal a problem), muscle spasm (to brace and protect the area), and organ disturbance (“somato-visceral” reflexes related to the specific spinal region). Left uncorrected, a subluxation will develop osteoarthritis (“joint rusting”), surrounding muscles will atrophy (like the muscles in a cast), and the related organ may malfunction.