Local Mission Viejo chiropractor stresses mind over matter and self-improvement at Saddleback for Mental Health Awareness Week

Dr. Shervin Tabrizi delivers talk about different stressors and changes that help to cope. (DJ McAllister/Lariat)

Saddleback College’s Associate Student Government hosted Dr. Shervin Tabrizi from the Tabrizi Family Chiropractic as part of Mental Health Awareness Week on Wednesday, Oct. 4. Tabrizi came to speak to students about stress and different ways to use the body and mind to combat these stressors.

Tibrizi identified physical, chemical and emotional stress as the three major stressors in our daily lives.

“It’s important to understand that there are three different types of stressors. We usually think about stress as mainly emotional, but we fail to look at it like there’s physical and chemical stressors as well,” Tabrizi said.

“If you understand that how you move, how you eat and how you think all contribute to how your body regulates stress, and how it responds to it, then you can start to pinpoint the different types of stressors in your body in those different categories.”

When discussing physical stressors, Tabrizi emphasized on the saying “emotion follows motion” which takes in to account our bodies, the way we move and how well we take care of our bodies has a huge impact on our minds on a day-to-day basis. Physical stress plays a huge part in how our bodies respond and function. Tabrizi explained that our physical habits and functions have short and long term effects.

“One of the biggest stressors for college students, is remaining in sedentary position for a long time. Working out should be a good thing, but if you are working out in the wrong forms or position, this becomes physical stressors,” Tabrizi said.

“If you have a dumbbell that you’re lifting, your body is going to change meaning, if you are lifting dumbbells and weights you notice positive change by getting muscle but when lifting wrong you get an injury. Sleeping in the wrong positions is also a physical stressor.”

Tabrizi stressed that paying attention to your body is just as important as your emotional well-being and mindset, emphasizing that they all play pivotal roles in how we go throughout our lives in different ways.

Aside from physical stressors, Tabrizi touched on how not only what we do with our bodies can affect our stress levels, but what we put into our bodies also can have a major influence.

“Chemically, what kinds of food you put into your body, whether you’re using raw foods to give you energy and let the cells proliferate and use good copies of themselves, or you put toxins into your body that your body has to use energy and fuel to get rid of,” Tabrizi said.

“You’re tired at two o’clock because you’ve had to wake up at eight o’clock in the morning, to go get Starbucks, even though you slept for eight hours and all the sudden you need a kick-start in the morning which doesn’t make any sense. You add sugar and cream into that thing and you end up being tired by one o clock.”

Creating a dependency towards something means creating a mental pattern that favors that certain thing, whether it be an activity, object, etc. By telling yourself you need coffee every morning, you are creating a tendency which alters the way your brain and body feel and function. We as humans are creatures of habit, so it’s no surprise that we can fall into the same routines and mental patterns.

“I think there are patterns that we can come out of, finding the patterns of how to deal with fear, anxiety and anger and replacing them with anecdotes of gratitude,” Tabrizi said. “Just having something simple to do in the morning, and all of the sudden having a thought process that’s going to help you manifest the rest of the day in a positive way.”

Dr. Tabrizi treats a wide range of patients, many of the patients are college students. College is one of the most stressful parts of life, therefore has experience in helping and understanding students who are dealing with a lot physically, mentally and emotionally. He touched on what he finds alarming from his experiences with college students and what they have to tell him.

“‘I’ve gotten used to it’ is the most dangerous thing I hear, especially from college students,” Tabrizi said.

“It means that they’ve developed a pattern of stress that their body has adapted to. If they’ve adapted to that level of stress, and their pain has maybe gone away or they’ve learned how to cope with the pain, then there’s a shutdown or a decrease in capability of productivity.”

Although Dr. Tabrizi is a chiropractor, his discussion was also about general wellness within the body and the mind. Part of being healthy means recognizing negative stressors and dealing with them in order to turn that stress into a positive thing for yourself. He explained how working on yourself as a whole and training the mind to think in positive manners can lead to personal growth and success in all areas of life.

“If we can educate people on how to think as far as their own body and health goes, and help them understand that the best doctor is the one that’s within you,” Tabrizi said. “If you can get to a place where you can be the best physical therapist, chiropractor, the best general primary care physician for yourself and you’re educated enough, it will help you towards living a better life.”

Dr. Tabrizi has two offices, one in Mission Viejo located at 28570 Marguerite Pkwy, and the other office is in Costa Mesa at 3140 Red Hill Ave. You can visit his website at www.tabrizi-chiropractic.com

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