Tension Increases Pain

Make a tight fist with your dominant hand and hold it tight while you count slowly to 20. How does it feel now? How does it look? Nothing has changed except for the addition of physical tension.

Most tension is OPTIONAL, destructive and painful. Of course, there are times when you must tighten muscles briefly to accomplish a specific task. We run onto the rocks when a tension “knot” has been there for so long that the brain accepts the knot as normal.

Does the tension accomplish something or is it just hanging around? Chronic tension strangles veins, arteries and nerves and pulls your bones out of alignment. It doesn’t serve you to put up a tension dam that slows the river of oxygen that flows through your body. The hurt you feel is your brain sending you an alarm that you are doing something very wrong.

The length of an EXHALATION is an ideal time to let go of unnecessary tension as if you are letting air out of a balloon. Let’s play with your jaw-hinge muscles first. Sit up comfortably straight. Relax your belly so you can drop your breathing down into the lower lungs.

Imagine that during each exhalation some of the tension drains out from the jaw muscles leaving them soft and loose. This usually takes only three or four breaths. Experiment with dropping your shoulders with each outbreath. Work your way through the body, releasing tension as you go.

Be well. Breathe beautifully.

Breathing and Your Aging Spine

Our spines shorten and curl forward as we age, almost as if we were returning to our original fetal position. The loss of bone calcium (in men as well as women) coupled with years of careless posture and injury threaten the core architecture of the human body. And since we are now living so much longer, it is a challenge to stay out of permanent pretzel-posture until we make it to the finish line. It is difficult to breathe effectively when your back hurts.

Since the main support pillar of your torso is the stack of vertebrae at the rear of your ribcage, the breakdown of bone quality in those bones will certainly rob you of your youthful and functional carriage as well as your easy, free, rewarding breathing. Your lungs are only as good as the cage they are carried in.

Long years of straining forward at the computer, carrying a heavy purse on the same shoulder, bending over equipment, sitting like a wilted daisy, are finally written forever on one’s body and can no longer be erased in spite of all good efforts. As always, prevention is the best strategy.

Refuse to shrink with age. Stretch. Bend. Research your hormones and your nutrition. Discuss bone health with your doctor. Your body remains deaf to all your best intentions regardless of how frequently, loudly and eloquently you declare those intentions.

Be well. Breathe beautifully.

Shoulder Lift

We carry way too much stress in the small complicated muscles of the neck, jaw and shoulders. You might not notice this at first because tension creeps up on you so gradually that it begins to feel “normal.”

The Shoulder Lift is an easy relaxing exercise that can release much of that tension BEFORE you get smacked with a whopping tension headache.

As always, tend to your posture so your breathing doesn’t have to push against a “posture dam.”

1. As you inhale, float your LEFT shoulder smoothly upward as if it were riding on a well- oiled track toward the ceiling. Then let that left shoulder slide DOWN as you breathe out.
2. Inhale as you float your RIGHT shoulder upward. Exhale, sliding it down again.
3. A shoulder rises when you breathe in and comes down when you exhale.
4. Alternate sides. Keep all movement smooth and fluid. Your neck remains long and relaxed.

Establish a smooth easy breathing pattern BEFORE you begin to move. The breath always rules and the movement follows the rhythm of the breathing, not the other way around.

Be well. Breathe beautifully.

Breath-counting and Pain

It is natural to tense up when something hurts or even when you THINK something is going to hurt Eeeerp! He snapped on that disposable glove! That thing looks reeeeally sharp! When you’re hit with a shock of pain, your primitive fight-or-flight syndrome kicks in, but too often you are unable to EITHER fight OR flee so you lock down!

When you are in pain, notice how quickly you begin to shallow-breathe or worse yet, hold your breath until your ears ring. Unfortunately, tension obstructs blood flow and oxygen delivery and that, in turn, intensifies the pain.

Counting each exhalation is a simple and effective exercise that will help keep your mind and body relaxed. Our goal here is to keep the pain to an absolute minimum. The exhalation is the natural release and “letting go” phase of every breath cycle so it makes sense to work with your exhalation to ease your tension. A fair portion of your “hurt” is due to physical tension and psychological apprehension. The hurt is bad enough without embellishing it?!

COUNT TEN SLOW STEADY EXHALATIONS and then begin again with ten more. Continue counting in sets of ten until your body is as relaxed as possible.

Be well. Breathe beautifully.