The Pressures We Put On Ourselves

About 2 years ago, I had a major breakthrough in my work with my body. I was finally able to understand how it feels to be truly aligned and released.

However, I was working in a static state, not dynamic - as in standing still vs. movements. The wonderful alignment cannot be sustained as I have yet to develop the necessary muscles to uphold that posture. To do so would take constant work of daily alignment and exercise. In addition to that, I have discovered some dormant muscle injury that was the result of an electro-acupuncture session gone wrong. It was an extremely challenging phase, not only physically, but also emotionally. Soon I slowly let it go, the old habits took over again and I lost that wonderful feeling.

2 years on, I find myself stuck at my performance level, and that there is no way to move forward other than to deal with my alignment again. This time, with a more prepared and positive mind set, and I opt to work more dynamically.

You see, the benefits of working dynamically (with movement) is that you are constantly building muscle and conditioning your movement habits as you work - rather than just "stacking" your joints and expect them to stay there.

So last week, during my dance sessions, as I was working on my body, I discovered 2 habits that was holding me back.

1. There is a sensation of pulling back/clawing down along my middle-lower back muscles.
My teacher commented about my habit of contracting that part of my back to develop an arch and to extend my legs backwards. Now I suddenly realised how dominant that sensation was in my overall body posture.

2. As I work to release that sensation, I found another, even more influential force that is holding me down - there is a pressure over the top of my head that is pressing me down.

Well, technically, it was me, putting that pressure on myself. But it did felt like an invisible hand pushing down on me. It's still me.

So what I did was, I mentally "opened up" this pressure over the top of my head, like opening a box and letting the sensation out.
The mantra I gave to myself was to "believe in the higher power," that is to trust the natural forces to hold up my body, instead of me trying do push myself up.

The counter force to that is also the ground. Dynamically speaking, the more force going downwards, the more counter force there is going upwards, which is how an extended, lengthened body comes about.

So the second mantra was to "believe in the ground I am stepping on." It is the sensation of developing trust, that all is fine.

This sensation extends the highly contracted muscles in my legs, especially my quadriceps and calves.

It is a wonderful load of pressure released from my body from these 2 exercises.

I hope that my sharing of my experiences can benefit your practices as well.

Until next time, warm regards...