Tensegrity is one of my favorite concepts that applies to adjusting. It explains how an adjustment in one area can effect somewhere totally different. The term tensegrity is credited to American architect and systems theorist, Buckminster Fuller. It is a blend-word of tension and integrity. Unsurprisingly then, tensegrity is the quality of maintaining shape/form (integrity) by means of tension.
All tensegrity structures are by definition, preloaded with tension, triangulated (made of triangles), composed of a continuous network of tension bearing components and rigid struts, and finally dynamically interconnected so forces are transmitted immediately throughout the entirety of the structure. Hard things and stretchy things arranged in a really cool way.
Guess what else happens to be a tensegrity structure? Your body! It is under tension, has a continuous tension bearing network (muscle and most connective tissue) and discontinuous rigid struts (bones, fun fact: Bones don’t actually touch one another. They are separated by hyaline cartilage, ligaments, vasculature, and synovium). This is how it is possible for you to get your neck adjusted and have low back pain go away. Another of our favorite examples, babies often poop after getting adjusted (and yes, babies should be checked for subluxation and adjusted).
Tensegrity also explains how an adjustment can cause changes to your physiology (chemical reactions/processes in the body) through mechanotransduction (this can be an article on its own). Your body is a tensegrity matrix at the cellular level also. As the tension within the matrix shifts, cell shape and tension changes also. Change in shape changes which processes are active (e.g. stretched cells divide, compressed cells undergo apoptosis (programed cell death), receptor sites activate/deactivate.