The human body is an amazing machine.  It is designed to heal itself, with antibodies and fevers and pain and swelling all part of a master design.  With these tools, and more that I don’t know or recall, it can fight off tiny invaders, keep you from aggravating an injury, and get you back to normal.  I didn’t think of my body that way until I started seeing a chiropractor, a few decades ago.

Her job, as she explained it, was to see that the communication system in the body was working as it should.  Misalignment of the spine could put pressure on the nerves, and corrupt the signals going to different parts of my body.  Without the right information flow between the body and the mind, all those wonderful systems within the body couldn’t do their job.  Her job wasn’t to fix my symptoms, but to enable my body to heal itself.  She would adjust me, advise me about lifestyle choices I could make on my own, and send me on my way.

But what if the injury, the tiny invader, is a loss of confidence?  Can a broken spirit heal itself?   If you have a spiritual center, you may go to the well of faith for restoration, but what if the path to that well is lost or overgrown?  Times like those, it can take a mental chiropractor, someone to give your spirit that adjustment it needs, and take the kink out of your mind. I’ve had the opportunity to be such a chiropractor a few times in my life.

When my father-in-law experienced some unintended acceleration while driving, I could hear the loss of confidence over the transatlantic phone line.  Was he getting too old to be driving?  Perhaps so, but still, a little research on the internet found lots of other incidents like his.  Maybe it was his error, or maybe there was a technological cause.  A few printouts from the internet dropped in the mail, and the adjustment was made.

When my own father came home from bypass surgery, the setback in his spirit wasn’t audible, but visible.  Usually an active man, he wasn’t leaving the house.  He did laps indoors in his slippers, the only shoes that would fit after the surgery and long hospital stay.  A cheap pair of wide tennis shoes from Walmart, and soon he was walking to the shop, to the mailbox, and around the property, out in that restorative fresh air we all need. The chiropractor’s job was done.

Moonlighting as a chiropractor of the spirit isn’t steady work. Each situation presents its own symptoms and needs a custom solution.  That said, if your self-confidence is under the weather, I will offer one bit of advice before I send you on your way: watch Boundin’.  The Pixar short film’s catchy music and simple message about the “kink in your think” may be just the mental adjustment you need.