Going Backwards, Going Into
The only mental to physical bridge I will use in this post is that when your movement and your life are aligned, when they reflect the same themes and sentiments, you cannot help but see application and connection to everywhere and everything.
In relation to your body the theme of “going backwards” and “going into” has to do with the ribs and pelvis via the spine. How does one fill the misshapen container of the torso? Another way to consider this is as if the torso was an actual frame covered in canvas (as a painting might be). In which direction does the canvas rest, and from there, where can it stretch?
My first foray into empty to fill came via walking. I realized that if I slid my head back I released tension in my neck and upper back. As I kept walking, I placed my hands on my occipitals as an anchor and pushed my ribs back. Even more relief and pleasant sensation. When I got back to my office, I filmed this, attempting to capture the essence:
A few days later, I found that pushing back agains the wall alleviated some lower back stiffness:
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I didn’t fully realize it in the moment, but the action was driving the femur back into the pelvis — a very foreign act of compression on this right or avoidant half. Take the wall away and provide space for the heel to drop and the pelvis to actually shift backwards, and you can see it actually lengthens that lower back:
Notice, though, that it happens via rotation. This will be important for a later post when I hone in on that hip.
When looking at the spine as a whole, it sits opposite of the gymnastics hollow, where the back of the ribs sits in front of the back of the pelvis. The only way I can manage to change that position is when I use the femurs (pulling hip flexors) to push the pelvis backwards:
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Another way to describe this is “my bow was inverted.”
This sunken in shape had things hanging inefficiently:
The cross line represents retracted scapula.
The more desired shape moves from concave to convex, better utilizing the ribs and upper back as an actor on the hips and pelvis:
Scapula are wider and more protracted.
The hips flailed forward/ upward in any type of bodyweight pulling:
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To help get the feel of this opposite bowing (or posterior base of the ribs back), I used a wrap to self-resist through the arms, trying to create a different point of flexion other than the thoracic spine AND a sense of compressing into this space:
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Lying perpendicular to the camera, you can see the gap between the spine and ground disappear in very deliberate places. The flexion points on the front change.
We can also start with the pelvis reaching and curving first. In the minimal floor crunch below, the pelvis lifts via the femurs pulling and the lower abs pushing. Once set, the ribs try to follow — maximally shortening through the front side AND maximally lengthening through the back side — along the same line:
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Taken vertical once more, you can see how the shape forms a confluence of two vectors: pressing horizontal with the arms and pushing vertically through the legs (lower leg and feet counter horizontal arms). Balanced, with pelvic ‘pull’ meeting the tension and position of rib ‘push’ the body effortlessly floats off the ground:
The sensation and experience made me think of a sail and how it functions.
Source: Wikipedia
Source: Wikipedia
We’ll revisit this visual in an upcoming physical post that redefines stretching as tissue expansion over the torso frame.