Perfect Poise, Perfect Life
Bring your body into balance and revolutionise your life
By Noel Kingsley
Publisher Hodder Mobius
AVAILABLE HERE
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Developing a strong back
Many of us will be enjoying festivities with our family and friends over the next few days, with lots of eating, drinking, watching TV and generally having a lovely relaxing time.....hopefully! There will probably come a point when we really feel that some exercise is necessary and we just must get some fresh air. If we've been sitting around a lot then there's a likelihood that we may feel a bit stiff, our back may ache a little and we may also consider a few New Year Resolutions such as deciding to eat less, go on a diet and possibly sort out our posture. But in the meantime, let's have a great time!
However, thoughts about fitness and getting back into a trim shape will probably enter our minds at some point and resolutions such as getting more exercise will become a focus. Having realised our back may be a bit weak or stiff we may consider strengthening it up with appropriate training. But there are a number of aspects to this that we may not fully realise as we rush off to the gym,.....that while working out back muscles in exercise can make individual muscles stronger, it does not necessarily mean that they will work together in a co-ordinated way to support us in healthy poise. Far from it. We can still have a weak back.
Indeed, many of us may feel that our backs aren’t strong. In my experience this is often because our back muscles aren’t working together properly i.e. the teamwork of back muscles is not efficient. If we have a weak back it’s often recommended by the physiotherapist or trainers to strengthen the tummy muscles to support the back. But we don’t see any young children with strong tummy muscles; theirs are all soft and relaxed yet they demonstrate the healthiest natural poise in the world. I believe that to develop strong and ‘supportive’ tummy muscles can cause a lot of harm to our breathing, digestion, bowel movements and reproductive systems. This is because strongly worked muscles can have a shortening and compressing effect on our torso and stature, pulling us down, and restricting the expansive movement of our ribcage.
In my experience we can improve our posture by improving the co-ordination of our back muscles so that they start do their job properly without interfering with the tummy muscles. If we encourage the back muscles to work together efficiently to hold us upright in a natural way, they will become stronger to fulfil the task they’re being asked to perform. They will strengthen whilst performing their natural activity better than any gym work that isolates muscles. I have worked with some elderly people who have had stronger backs than many young people who work out regularly in a gym, simply because the muscles in their back are better co-ordinated and working more efficiently.
Just in the same way as the uncoordinated football team, our bodies have developed the tendency for some muscles to be working far too hard, getting stiff and wasting energy, whilst others have been allowed to be a little lazy and not do their fair share. So for example, some parts of us may be very stiff such as our necks and shoulders and hips, whilst our lower back may be rather collapsed and unsupported. But the problem need not be a permanent one. Just like any team, our muscles need good direction and to be retrained.
Muscles need to work together. They are encouraged to work to together when a quality of lengthening and widening in stature is restored. We had this as children, and we need it still. With the onset of postural habits from our early childhood we will have lost the instinct to ‘lead with our heads’ and lengthen in stature. It is therefore easy to see how we may think that lengthening and widening will require some effort. But this is not the case. We have evolved with a particular arrangement of muscles to bring this quality about without any ‘perceived’ effort. I say perceived, because obviously muscles are working to do the job, but we should not sense it as effort. It’s a natural process that will all work well if we encourage it.
The head should lead and the body will follow....it's bound to as it's all attached! But seriously if we 'think' our head up tall, then it will actually go there, the spine will lengthen and the appropriate muscles will be brought into play to provide this. It's the way other animals walk; they lead with their head which lengthens the back and activates the legs to move. We are vertebrates too and we function on similar lines. But being on two feet instead of four can be confusing. As bipeds, standing on two feet we need to lengthen upwards. No effort is required and actually must be avoided. Making effort to lengthen causes stiffness. But just 'thinking' tall will activate the muscles accordingly. Free your neck and 'think' your head upwards. Then think of your lower back widening. This is important to help your back muscles support you well. A child does this when she wants to be up......tall like Mummy and Daddy. We have a lot to learn from our children. But it's actually re-learning as we've had this quality before when we too were young. This is what the Alexander Technique helps us do, get rid of bad postural habits and regain our natural poise.
If your back is feeling stiff or achy after a lot of sitting and eating, get moving, go for a walk or other exercise, but you may also like to lie down in Semi-supine position on the floor for 5-10 minutes. It's a great way of letting those back muscles release tension and lengthen.
