WE IMAGINE RELAXING muscles and fascia, but relaxing
releases nerve responses, that then relax muscle and fascia. The first act—the “egg”—might be the
nerves, and the “chicken”—second, the muscles and fascia.
When we push muscles and ligaments, emphasizing strength,
balance or quick transitions, it is difficult to imagine how we do not excite
nerves rather than relax nerves (as well as provoke other agitated chemistry
that comes to us mentally and in lessened sport performance in a burn of lactic
acid buildup).
Pushing muscles and ligaments does have an effect. It is the core of the physicality of
much of the 20th Century yoga out of India into the West. But as yoga poses mature with a strong
nod to “flexibility” (really, still a “fitness” term), perhaps a revolutionary
leap out of a fitness mindset shift to, perhaps, a “suppleness” mindset that
attends not only to muscles and ligaments, but also to the fascial structure of
muscles, ligaments, sheets of fascia, organs and on-and-on ad infinitum.
Having been “physical” most of my life, there are other
approaches worth consideration, involving, for example, a new language of
“wellness,” (that is still quite heavily laden with “fitness” strategies) and
then, “optimal health/thriving” that is still in an embryonic state and in need
of new terminology.
Let’s imagine, for a moment, not pushing muscles and fascia,
but rather, trying to do the opposite.
Under anesthesia, muscles and ligaments are experienced to become
pliant/flexible to the point of bones being capable of dislocation. It’s not the muscle and ligament action
that is doing this. It is the
nerve channels. The nerves in
anesthesia are, metaphorically speaking, “turned either down or off.”
We can use this fact in deep stretching. Rather than “push to an edge to drive
out pain (“no pain, no gain”), we might just relax and “stretch” (inducing no
pain, gain). Rather than exciting
nerves to the point of discomfort, we might use whatever we have to use
[blocks, blankets, pillows, bolsters] to support and open to then follow the
release of spindles—micro-coils of nerve tissue in muscles and (under another
name) in fascia.
Something new here: “spindles,” and how they operate.
And then, given spindles, something new here because of how
spindles function:
Our focus on muscles and ligaments and sheets of fascia that
we push to stretch might dramatically shift to something new—to a focus on
nerves as the real interface.
In shifting the focus to nerves, we might aspire to relax
them rather than excite and agitate them.
Go to any gym in the world, and note how little time is
spent stretching. In the
hyper-flexibility gyms of acrobatics especially in rigid nation-states, find
workouts next to torture (usually of the most flexible youth, which they endure
to basically survive). Many people are engaged in “yoga,” but many more are turned away after their first session by a fitness strategy that suggests to them that when in pain, keep going
and it will eventually go away.
For the average person, stretching takes them back to gym
class where stretching was the key agony of gym class. “Stretching” back then and still now means
hurting until you decide to quit, and it is far less enjoyable than the hardest
physical workout.
But what if you could do some aerobics for “cardio” somewhere
in the plan, and then spend some real time, not minutes, stretching WITH THE
SENSE THAT THIS TIME WOULD BE ENJOYABLE? In this process, THE STRETCH MIGHT BE GRADUAL. And this process would REQUIRE that the
pose be comfortable/enjoyable. And
for purpose? To calm the nerves to
promote the release of spindles.
And what is the purpose of that?
Without analyzing an outcome, stretching for a time would
naturally “deepen,” which is to say, the pose would continue to change, wherein
the body “softens” rather than tenses.
Such a pose would occur across a small span of time or “come to us”
across a small span of time (after Vanda Scaravelli) rather than be something
static that we assume and hold.
So perhaps, not muscles or ligaments, but nerves, …and relax.
See additional posts in Islands Of Grace:
Holding Poses & Spindle Release 2/18/12
Releasing Vs. Conditioning 6/9/15
Soft 3/20/15
Allow The Pose To Come To You 12/3/13
Aruksita Yoga—The Supple Body 11/27/13
Suppleness 9/3/13
Slow Cookin’ 6/6/13
Stretch & Relax 10/2/12
