The ego is located in our breathing function or more accurately in our breathing dysfunction. The diaphragm is a key structural muscle and our principal breathing muscle. My sense of the diaphragm in myself is that it is the muscular culprit behind my spinal scoliosis or my twisted spine a spinal curvature that was diagnosed while I was in junior high school.
With strong tendons attached to the lower thoracic and upper lumbar vertebrae, the crura in the diagram , it has yanked one or two of my vertebrae out of alignment. The spine adjusts, as best it can, to this kind of strain taking on all sorts of distortions and eventually suffering some real deterioration. The diaphragm is certainly one of the three or four key muscles in our body usually playing a part in creating and distorting structure.
And for most of us we have only the vaguest notion of where the diaphragm is located or how it works let alone that we have one or that it may be tight, short, and causing some real strains and distortions in both body and in mind.
The ten thousand creatures and all plants and trees while they are alive are soft and supple, but when they are dead they become brittle and dry.
Truly, what is stiff and hard is a 'companion of death'; what is soft and weak is a ' companion of life'. Therefore 'the weapon that is too hard will be broken, the tree that has the hardest wood will be cut down'. Truly the hard and mighty are cast down; the soft and weak set on high. Health centers, spas, and clubs proliferate. Books on exercise, diet and relaxation fill the shelves of bookstores and libraries. There is genuine concern about health, and yet we often have only the vaguest idea of what real health is.
Since disease in its many forms has been classified and studied extensively, we seem to know more about disease and understand it better than we do health.
However, certain trends are beginning to emerge that shed some light on what it means to be healthy. We are discovering that disease is very often psychosomatic in nature where stress, tension and emotional disturbances are frequently a factor. The body and mind work together, an attitude or a way of life can make us tense and physically sick. Most of us suffer from tension and yet few of us ever really feel the degree to which we are tense or where those tensions reside. Becoming aware of our tensions can come as a shock and a surprise.
Oriental medicine has the concept of tension as a cause of disease. Oriental medicine understands tension as blocked energy, tension can be experienced as a blocking or a dammed-up force. Tension can feel like a heavy weight pressing down on us or it can be a gripping or pinching sensation. There is a word for this sense of our internal state of tension. This is the kinesthetic sense. It is a deep awareness of the self and for many people it is a buried and lost sense.
The tensions that contribute to making us sick are usually more than a temporary condition. Our patterns of tension are often laid down at an early age and stay with us for a lifetime. This is not the way it has to be, but the way it usually is. These patterns of tension shape our character, our way of life, thoughts, feelings, and of course, our bodies. We are not in good shape as long as we remain chronically tense. Traditional exercise and diet will not in themselves make us much healthier as long as tension has us in its grip.
Deep muscle and organ relaxation are important components to really good health. Good health is characterized by a state of ease and relaxation.
The relaxed body breathes fully and has a sufficient supply of oxygen in the blood. Relaxation permits the blood and lymph to flow to all the tissues of the body and for toxins and waste to flow away. Tension limits this flow and so the tissues and organs affected have decreased vitality and greater susceptibility to breakdown and disease.
Excessive tension is a waste of energy. It is energy directed against oneself and against the natural course that life would take if unimpeded by chronic stiffness and tension. Tension twists our bodies out of shape to the point where many of us really have no idea what a body in good shape looks or feels like.
Chest up, stomach in, hard muscles, tight gut, shoulders back, are not the characteristics of a healthy body. There are three direct and related approaches to restoring natural equilibrium and good health to the body. Also limbering and loosening every joint, including those in the spine. Each method can be used separately to restore the organism's health and equilibrium, but used together they constitute a powerful tool for human growth and development.
Each method offers difficulty. A stiff, tight body does not want to stretch too much because it hurts to stretch very tight and short muscles. The pain of chronic tension, and the increased arousal that comes with stress, makes us restless and busy and so the stillness required in meditation and relaxation techniques can seen disturbing or uncomfortable for even a short period of time.
The pressure of fingers and thumbs on tense muscles can bring out the soreness in these muscles. A tight body is often a very sore and painful body and a little pressure can bring this soreness into awareness. These are probably the most effective means available to relax the body and to awaken us to our lost sense, our kinesthetic sense , a true gauge of health and well-being.
Once we are aware of ourselves as blocked and gripped, stiff and tense, we can begin to take responsibility for our own health. We cannot depend on doctors, chiropractors, physical therapists, or physical education instructors to make us healthy. Sensing the kinesthetic, we then have a better idea of what we must do and how to do it.
The kinesthetic sense becomes our guide, teacher, and inspiration. We have discovered what it is our bodies really want and need to do to become healthy, and may even find the time, the energy, and the self-discipline to do it. Posted by Allan Saltzman at AM 1 comment:. There is an optimal angle for placing the body in an inversion position for the traction and spinal lengthening that can benefit our spine and back. Discover for yourself what that angle may be.
A modest, but sufficient, amount of inversion can be attained by simply draping the ends of your legs over a bed or chair and then propping up the hips on a thick cushion or back roller. A roller is preferable because it allows for more freedom and movement of the back as it sinks towards the floor. Try different heights of support for the hips to test what positioning seems most comfortable and delivers some sense of traction and spinal lengthening.
Rest for a few minutes or more in this position. Let gravity work for you. Let gravity and not any muscular exertion be the force behind this inversion and traction technique. When we are past 35 or 40 years of age our spines often begin to show the effects of age. Disks dry up and shrink and the vertebrae may start spurring and deforming as gravity and the human posture begin to take their toll. Inversion techniques can give the entire spinal column a gentle stretch with a positive opening effect, a therapeutic expansion, to each vertebral joint and the structures in the joint and surrounding it.
Five minutes of inversion and gentle traction can have a powerful effect towards relieving the strain and the back pain that many of us live with in our daily lives. Feel the stretching and lengthening of the spine as you simply rest into the position and let gravity work for you.
You may feel some gentle pulling sensations in those areas of your spine that have become strained and distorted. Surrender to these sensations and allow the therapeutic stretching action and spinal lengthening to occur. Experiment with how high you wish to support the hips and where support is best located. Let your inner body sense, the kinesthetic sense, be your guide in this technique. You may be surprised at how powerful and therapeutic a simple position like this can be.
Support your head on the seat of a chair and use the roller against the middle and lower back. By supporting the head in this way, the spine can remain relatively straight while the roller is manipulating and massaging the middle back. Your own sense of what feels right and what works best should be your guide. Massage the ribs on either side and feel for any sense of ache or tightness. The diaphragm attaches all around the lower rib cage and to the spine in this area.
This technique can help free up the diaphragm, our major breathing muscle. Here is a complete Spinal Roller routine where the roller remains stationary and maintains a single position under the hips. This simple, gentle, and easy to execute routine opens the hips and pelvic area and gives effective traction to the entire spine.
Figure 1. Roller under the hips full extension. All of the above can be viewed as differing perspectives on the same process of rolling out the tension, stiffness and distortion that many of us find in our backs. A Spinal Roller can be any rolling pin like device with sufficient cushioning to avoid injury.
The hardness and firmness of the roller is of equal importance in order to be able to deliver a firm and strong pressure against the spine and between each separate vertebrae. A too soft roller will not apply the focused pressure necessary for the manipulations and adjustments. I've even named my business Yoga Tools with the roller in mind. As a yoga tool it can enhance both forward and backward bending movements. It gives increased focus and direction to spinal stretches and adds a whole new dimension to yoga practice.
The Spinal Roller is both a tool and a toy. It adds an element of movement and play to yoga practice. I have found it the ideal yoga tool. One of the many techniques found in the practice of yoga is rolling the back on the floor. Vertebra by vertebra we press the spine down against the floor to loosen and adjust it.
Cats and dogs also roll around on their backs. Most of us have probably watched a cat or dog do such things but we never gave it much thought. Sometimes our animals are trying to tell us how to move and how to use our bodies in the only way they can and that is by setting a good example for us.
Cats and dogs roll around on their backs and they do it because they enjoy it. It feels good; it is a perfectly natural thing to do.
Too many of us lose touch with the natural, easy and pleasurable ways of moving that our animals always seem in touch with. Spinal rolling is natural.
Spinal rolling is also a way to give oneself osteopathic and chiropractic adjustments. When you roll your back you discover your need for manipulation and adjustment and you find that you can give such treatments to yourself. There is no big mystery here. Get down and roll around on the floor long enough and you will feel the tension, stiffness and distortion in your back and you will also find a way to treat it.
In fact, the man who discovered and developed Osteopathy got his inspiration from using a simple tool to cure himself of headaches. After 20 years of using his simple headache tool he realized the importance of the technique and went on to develop the science of Osteopathy.
The following is a famous quote from his autobiography:. I made a swing of my father' s plow-line between two trees; but my head hurt too much to make swinging comfortable, so I let the rope down to about eight or ten inches off the ground, threw the end of a blanket on it and I lay down on the ground and used the rope for a swinging pillow.
Thus I lay stretched on my back with my neck across the rope. Soon I became easy and went to sleep and got up in a little while with the headache gone. As I knew nothing of anatomy at this time [he was ten years old], I took no thought of how a rope could stop a headache and the sick stomach which accompanied it. After the discovery I roped my neck whenever I felt those spells coming on. I followed that treatment for 20 years before the wedge of reason reached my brain and I could see that I had suspended the action of the great occipital nerves, and given harmony to the flow of the arterial blood to and through the veins, and ease was the effect His name was Andrew Taylor Still; he was a 19th century country doctor who found his inspiration for the whole science of Osteopathy in that simple tool.
Still developed a hands-on manipulative style of treatment that has grown into a worldwide and generally respected branch of medicine. Had he not been a physician his original inspiration may well have led him in a different direction.
His founding principle of pressure applied across the back and spine could just have easily led to the invention of a series of tools for individual self-treatment, the kind or treatment he applied to himself for 20 years before the "wedge of reason" reached his brain and he realized what he was doing and why. By using a Spinal Roller you can give yourself a strong acupressure treatment. This is the 4th way to understand the effects of using a Spinal Roller. A good roller will apply a cushioned but focused pressure directly between the vertebrae.
Right between many of our vertebrae are powerful acupressure points that lie on a meridian called the governing vessel meridian. When you use a roller you eventually discover these points in the spine. They are very often the focal points of distortion and blockage in the back.
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