Strength Training: Open vs. Closed Kinetic Chain Movement

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At Alignment Lab we always encourage our clients to move more and build strength, but it is common in our practice to see clients who have developed injuries from working out at the gym with certain machines or when doing isolated exercises with weights. Many of the exercises these clients are doing involve movements that fall under the category of open kinetic chain movement (OKCM). In the interest of maximizing the health benefits of exercise and minimizing the chances of injury, we generally try to steer our clients away from (OKCM) exercises and guide them towards exercises that feature closed kinetic chain movement (CKCM).

What is the difference? OKCM exercises involve isolating a particular muscle and then challenging it with weight and or resistance by shortening (concentrically loading) the muscle. A classic example is the biceps curl, which involves picking up a weight, say a dumbbell or kettle bell with the hand, and then bending the elbow to lift the weight toward the shoulder. This exercise can be done with one or both arms, and in either case the hands are not fixed, thus the “open” kinetic chain.

CKCM involves movement relative to a fixed point. This means that some part of the body, usually a hand or a foot, is brought in contact with a stable surface such as the floor or a wall. Typically there is some amount of weight bearing involved to keep that contact point stable. The stability provided by the fixed point and the weight bearing promotes stability in the body where needed so that the exercise can be done with greater safety an efficacy.

In the example of the biceps curl, there is no fixed point. Every part of the body has the potential to move in some way during the exercise, and thus there is a lack of stability and a greater chance of strain. This exercise not only increases the chances of straining the biceps, but also the shoulder joint. Without the added stability of a fixed point the body will have a harder time keeping the humerus stable in the shoulder socket, increasing the chances of exceeding the load bearing capacity of the joint. In the end, we may end up with bigger biceps, but likely more wear and tear on the shoulders.

One solution to this problem with the biceps curl that is often used to improve its efficacy is to stabilize body by sitting on a stable seat and then placing the elbow of the working arm on a support. These changes do serve to focus the action of the arm more effectively on the biceps, but they do not necessarily make it more safe. The reason is that even though to some degree stability has increased, it has not increased in a way that eliminates potential impact on the shoulder joint.

Because there is a greater amount of force on one isolated joint, in this case the shoulder joint, this movement can easily lead to strain in the tendon of the bicep attaching to the shoulder joint.  This is because mechanoreceptors in the shoulder are not well activated in this exercise. The mechanoreceptors help us feel joint position, and if they are not activated it will be more difficult to sense whether or not the shoulder joint maintains functional alignment. If the exercise is done without a functional alignment in the shoulder joint it may result in an injury.

It is important that we continue to challenge our muscles and their ability to bear weight, but preferably not at the expense of our joint health. Open kinetic chain movement (OKCM) exercises tend to increase this likelihood. Closed kinetic chain movement (CKCM) exercises on the other hand provide an opportunity to increase our strength with much less chance of injury.

While the primary difference between a CKCM exercises and an OKCM exercise is that CKCM exercises feature movement relative to a fixed point, another equally important difference is that CKCM typically feature some approximation of the joint due to the weight bearing on the fixed limb. This means that pressure, usually caused by the weight of the body, pushes the arm toward the shoulder joint, soliciting a stabilizing response in the joint. A great example would be a side plank. In this exercise one hand is fixed on the floor, and the shoulder on the same side gets approximated by the weight of the body. This helps stabilize the shoulder joint and facilitates healthy rotational movement (abduction) around the joint.

CKCM exercises have several features that account for their improved efficacy relative to OKCM exercises. First, the increased joint stability in CKCM allows for better eccentric loading of the involved muscles. Eccentric loading means that the muscles involved contract and lengthen at the same time. When a muscle contracts while lengthening, sliding motions are introduced into the fascial sheets that cover muscles groups and individual muscles. This sliding of the fascial sheets adds lubrication, nerve stimulation and a protective barrier against injury.

Another feature of CKCM is that it involves the motion of muscles across multiple joints. This means that these movements go beyond the isolation of one particular muscle, unlike many of the OCKM exercises commonly used in strength training (such as the biceps curl). Moving across multiple joints requires a complex synchronization of different muscle groups and therefore not only works more muscles but works them in tandem with one another, promoting strength in a functional way.

In addition, when movement occurs across multiple joints with many muscles involved it facilities co-contraction between muscles and this co-contraction, it turns out, is a more efficient way to to bear weight. When muscles co-contract with other muscles, the load is distributed across a broader area, preventing isolated muscle fatigue and decreasing shearing forces on the joints and tissues, ultimately decreasing the likelihood of strain and inflammation.

This alludes to the fact that CKCM’s are good for our tissue. These movements improve blood flow, flexibility, lymph drainage, muscle health, circulatory function and cardiovascular health in a far greater way than any open kinetic chain exercise. CKCM’s will have increased metabolic effects compared to OKCM’s, and they also promote joint health by helping to re-establish proprioception and our ability to sense joint position.

One further benefit of CKCM’s is that these movements improve function of the nervous system. This is because when more muscles and joints are moving in a complex closed-kinetic chain pattern, more nerves are firing. More nerves firing means more blood flow, better communication with the brain and thus a greater ability to dynamically move through space with intelligence.

Finally, closed kinetic chain movements are simply more functional than open kinetic chain movement in that CKCM’s are more often based on movement patterns that are innate to the human body. As babies and toddlers, each of us develops our physical function through a series of innately choreographed movements, and these movements manifest from the age of three months up to the point of walking without any instruction or mimicry taking place. This means that we don’t learn these movements from someone else, we just do them. These movements are innate in all babies, everywhere in the world, and they tell us a lot about functional motion and how the utilization of the hands and feet in a closed kinetic chain is the basis for all natural human motion.

Going back to our bicep curl exercise, let’s compare it with a closed kenetic chain movement involving the biceps and triceps using the example of a wall plank. A wall plank is basically a plank position where the head, shoulder girdle, rib cage, pelvis and legs are all in a stacked, vertical alignment with the hands on the wall standing at arm’s length. The movement involves pushing into the wall to fully extend the elbows.

In a wall plank, the triceps contract in order to extend the arm, but at the same time the biceps co-contract in conjunction with the triceps to stabilize the elbow joint. The biceps also must lengthen to increase pressure into the wall and bear the weight of the upper body. Because the hands are fixed, a whole chain of muscles from the hands into the shoulder joints on into the back and into the abdominal muscles and down into the pelvis and legs also co-contract to help support the body’s weight.

Once it becomes relatively easy to do a wall plank while maintaining good alignment, a full plank can be introduced involving the more challenging version of pushing up off the floor. In a full plank the biceps and triceps get worked but in a clearly functional way that facilitates our ability to lower ourselves down to the floor and lift ourselves up off the floor.

There’s a lot of press about strength training these days with ever growing evidence of its importance for human health and longevity. At Alignment Lab we’re big fans of strength training and we provide it daily with every one of our clients by teaching them mainly closed chain kinetic movements. We’ve found this approach to be ideal for promoting functional strength that is at once empowering, health promoting and practical.

Ojas and Agni: Essentials For Lasting Health

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Ojas is a concept in Ayurveda that refers to the purest essence of each of the tissues of the body. For those not familiar with Ayurveda, ojas is perhaps most relatable as expressed by the immune system and our body’s ability to resist and illness and recover from it when it manifests. More broadly, ojas is that aspect of each tissue that supports that tissue metabolically on the cellular level, enabling each of our cells and our tissue as a whole to resist the effects of stress and to maintain integrity and resilience.

Ojas supports our health by helping to support healthy agni. Agni means “fire” and is the word we use in Ayurveda to refer to our digestive fire or our digestive power and intelligence. Having a well functioning agni means that our ability to digest and assimilate our food is sound. We all know the expression “you are what you eat,” and in a certain sense this is literally true. The food we eat becomes the tissue that forms our body, but for this to happen our agni needs to be functioning well, and for a well functioning agni we need healthy ojas.

The feeling of having good ojas is easily relatable. When our ojas is good we feel strong, we feel well, our digestion works and our sleep is good. When ojas is insufficient our sleep can suffer, our digestion will have issues and we’ll feel vulnerable. The fact is, we ARE vulnerable when ojas is low, and it is important that we take steps to increase it or risk further depletion and possibly illness.

Maintaining healthy ojas can be done in several ways. First, we must keep our digestion working well. Ojas is manufactured in our bodies through the digestive process. It is the very refined end product of tissue production and thus not only does ojas support our agni and our digestive health, but our agni and digestive health also support our ojas. This symbiotic relationship between ojas and agni points to the fact that our primary means of maintaining good ojas is by seeing to it that our digestive system works well.

Of course to maintain healthy digestion, the right diet is important. I won’t be going into detail on diet in this post, but what I will say is that with diet, we need to learn to recognize how we respond to different foods and to use this recognition to make better choices. Too many people these days try to seek health through addition rather that subtraction. “I feel depleted so I’ll take supplements or eat more meat.” My experience is that its often better to start with “what can I eliminate?” Eliminating foods we don’t digest well or don’t respond well to takes pressure off our digestive system and helps our agni ignite. This in turn helps improve our ability to break down and assimilate our food, forming healthy tissue and making healthy ojas.

A second key to keeping our ojas at a a level sufficient for good health is making lifestyle choices that don’t deplete us. Avoiding depletion requires that we recognize the activities, thoughts and habits that lower our ojas and eliminate or reduce them whenever possible. For example exercise is generally a good thing and most of us need to do more of it, but like anything, there’s enough and there’s too much. Over exercising is a sure way to deplete ojas and invite illness and even chronic disease in very serious cases.

How do I know if I’m over exercising? This is just a matter of paying attention. While it’s not always easy to pay attention to the messages our bodies send us, learning to pay attention to our bodies is an important ability to cultivate. Yoga can be a powerful tool in this case as yoga, in its essence, is training the mind to be aware. Through yoga we develop the awareness and sensitivity to notice the signs that something we are doing is depleting us. Yoga provides us with asana (postures), pranayama (breath work) and ethical principles that help us to see ourselves more clearly, understand our tendencies and make the necessary changes to address them.

This brings us to the third way we can help maintain healthy ojas – awareness of our thoughts and managing mental and/or emotional stress. Stress is a big factor in lowering ojas. Without learning effective ways of managing stress we will struggle to maintain good ojas and good health. Again, yoga can be a big help with stress management as it trains us to keep things in perspective and cultivate a healthy perspective on life. Many people use mediation practice for stress management. I tend to lump mediation in with yoga because yoga is essentially a preparation for and cultivation of a meditative state, as are the many meditation techniques that are currently popular.

Considering ojas and forming an understanding and experience of it is a powerful way of dialing in our diet and lifestyle choices to best suit our constitution so that we may maintain resilience and optimal health on an ongoing basis. Understanding agni and learning to keep it in good working order is essential for building ojas. When we maintain healthy agni we begin to experience the positive effects of ojas and sense of well being it fosters. Whether it be through yoga or some other awareness based practice, it’s a worthwhile endeavor to develop the necessary skills and sensitivity to recognize when our agni and our ojas are compromised and to take steps to restore them.

 

 

 

 

Building Resilience and What I Did on My Christmas Vacation

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This past Christmas / New Years Tiffany and I traveled to New Zealand with some friends to see my mother and her husband and to do some traveling on the south island. The way that Air NZD runs their flights to and from, we basically had red eyes going in each direction. In an effort to be good citizens we declared our hiking shoes on the way into the country, only to be delayed in a long and inefficient customs line and missing our connection to Queenstown, then having to take an extra flight to Wellington to get there. When we completed the hour plus drive to Wanaka from Queenstown I was a bit tired, but overall not too much worse for wear.

Then on a warm, cloudless Christmas Day, just a couple of days after our arrival, we hiked Isthmus Peak near Wanaka. The hike took nearly 6 hours and involved climbing continuously up 4000 vertical feet on a completely exposed trail. I was physically tired from it, but again, felt pretty good the day after and going forward.

A day or so after that we splurged big and hired a plane to fly us from Wanaka to Milford Sound where we took a 2 hour cruise through the sound before hopping back on the plane and flying back to Wanaka. I am quite prone to motion sickness, and this was not a big stable commercial jet but a 6 seater prop plane that felt like flying in a yellow bucket with wings. The views were out of this world, but also dizzying. My friend seated behind me faired rather poorly, but I managed to walk away from the trip with relatively little impact.

After a 4 night stay in Wanaka we said goodbye to my mother and her husband David, and then Tiffany, our friends and I hit the road for another 10 days. In those days we spent countless hours in the car and never slept in the same strange bed for more than 2 nights. The balance of the trip included more hiking, quite a bit of sight seeing and a lot of restaurant food.

On the way home from Auckland after connecting from Nelson I watched 4 movies and semi-slept for a few hours before navigating customs and catching the airporter back to Marin. Oddly, when I got home from the near 24 hour return trip I felt almost as though I had never left and traveled 1/2 way around the globe and back again.

What I realized from this experience and the reason I’m telling you about it is that I had, without really focusing on it or explicitly trying to cultivate it, managed to build a fair bit of resilience. I can think of no other way I would have made such a big and involved trip with so little relative impact on my health and sense of wellbeing.

This got me thinking about resilience and how it manifests. Most of us can claim at least some degree of resilience in some areas of our lives. I might have good flexibility and enjoy the kind of resilience that affords by allowing me to occupy relatively small and cramped spaces for extended periods, like coach airplane seats for instance, and bounce back quickly from it. Or I might have good strength and can manage lugging heavy baggage through airports or charging up and down mountains in the hot sun without suffering an injury. Or I might have a digestive system that can handle all sorts of foods from all sorts of unfamiliar kitchens with very few digestive complaints. Or perhaps I have an immune system that can handle the stress of a lack of sound sleep and an excess of different environments and degrees of air quality without succumbing to bugs, respiratory or otherwise.

But it’s unusual, in my view, that each of us has all of the areas of our life that afford us resilience in optimal working order, and for most of us any deficiencies in resilience can be corrected with very doable changes in diet and lifestyle. This view has inspired me to write a series of posts on the subject. These posts will address several key areas where we can increase our resilience and they will offer suggestions on how to build and effective bulwark to the inevitable stresses that we all endure, voluntarily or otherwise.

I hope you’ll find these helpful.  As always, I welcome your feedback.

Applying DNS and Core Stabilization in Yoga

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Several years ago when I was deep into Katy Bowman’s bio-mechanical approach to postures and movement I began to better understand some of the postural habits and faulty mechanics that were impacting my health and the health of my clients. It became clear to me that it was these habits and their frequent repetition while standing, sitting, squatting, bending forward and walking that lead directly to the manifestation of the chronic injuries and pain patterns that are epidemic in our modern lives. I also understood that if we were to overcome our injuries we needed to address them at their root cause by changing the way we move.

As this understanding came into focus, I started to take a closer look at the yoga postures I was doing and teaching and I had a realization. Those of us who do yoga tend to bring the very same postural patterns and poor mechanical habits we use in our daily lives into our practice of yoga postures. Therefore going to a yoga class often amounts to simply finding new and interesting ways to reinforce our patterns and promote our injuries.

This opinion is partly based on the fact that yogasana or the practice of yoga postures is extremely difficult. The posture themselves are for the most part so complicated and demanding that anything approaching mastery may arguably remain elusive for most. Yet it is also this degree of challenge posed by yogaasana which is the very thing that makes it potentially so powerful. If I manage to master even one posture I will have overcome much of my habituation, physically and mentally.

With the manifestation of this view I began changing my approach to practice and to teaching. I started introducing simpler postures that were more accessible and less physically demanding. I also began to emphasize the development of movement skills that could be applied not just to yoga but to the movements we do all day long. After all, what good is my trikonasana if I can’t bend forward properly to pick something up or squat down to use the toilet.

I then reintroduced some of the classical postures, not so much as postures to be mastered but rather as opportunities to apply the skills learned in the simpler postures to decidedly more challenging ones. The classical postures put the skills we learn in the simpler postures to a strong test, and they provide an opportunity to apply multiple skills at the same time. I liked this approach and still do, but until recently I felt there was something missing.

With the addition of my DNS training I feel I’ve found that missing piece. It’s the skill that integrates all of the other skills and organizes them into a cohesive whole. It’s the skill that transforms a set of applied skills, movements and stretches into a true asana – a posture that expresses both stability and ease. That skill is the skill of stabilizing the pelvis and trunk in a way that not only allows but in fact facilitates free movement. This skill is true “core stabilization.”

The DNS approach to core stabilization is not something I ever learned in a yoga class, but it applies to yoga wonderfully! I feel strongly that it’s a skill that has the power to transform any yoga practice. And for those who don’t practice yoga, proper core stabilization will improve whatever movement practice or sport they choose to do, not to mention greatly improve the movements they do outside of any structured class or activity.

I’ve begun to post a series of short videos in which I offer an approach to setting up some of the more common classical yoga postures. The videos also include some voiceover cues for guidance. My approach to each of these postures emphasizes core stabilization as the foundation for each. I don’t necessarily use the term “core stabilization” in the video, but hopefully as you watch these you’ll begin to understand what I mean when I say “stabilize” or “stabilize the pelvis” or “stabilize the lower trunk,” and you’ll begin to apply this in your own postures.

Before watching these videos I recommend watching the more basic DNS videos that are already posted. It’s important that you understand how to breath diaphragmatically and to establish intra-abdominal pressure before you can do the kind of core stabilization I am referring to in the post and in the asana videos. Just click on the links above to view those videos before moving on to the others.

If you’re new to yoga, these videos are not meant for you. They are intended for students will some experience. If you’re an experienced yoga practitioner or teacher, I ask that you keep an open mind. The feedback I’ve been getting these days from the experienced yogis that find their way into my classes is that I’m doing something very different from what they’ve been taught before. Hopefully this makes for a great reason to take an interest and see what might be of value and not a reason to reject it simply because it doesn’t sync with past experiences or understanding.

Whatever your view, my practice and my teaching have always been and always will be a work in progress. Therefore I welcome your comments and look forward to hearing from you and getting your feedback. No doubt your input will help me refine and improve my practice and my teaching moving forward.

Namaste’

Dinacharya and the Fall Season

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Northern California is for the most part a pretty dry climate, but our fall season can be brutally so. By October we typically have not had any rain for several months and the heat of summer has dried up much of the moisture in the environment. When you add in the effects of our “Indian Summer” with it’s hot temperatures, dry winds and exceedingly low humidity you have a formula for serious vata derangement.

Even as I write this I can feel how much dryer my sinuses are compared to last week when we had that welcome, but unusually high humidity and tropical rain. I can feel the dryness right into the back of my throat, and I can’t seem to put enough lotion on my hands. My experience tells me that these are mild but significant early signs that excess vata is starting to weaken my tissue a little, and if I’m not careful I may succumb to a cold or begin having digestive issues.

Vata or vata dosta is a fundamental physical and psychological energy that helps to move anything that needs moving. Vata is responsible for the movement of our food through the digestive track, for moving the nourishment we receive from our food into and through our bloodstream to our tissues, for moving nerve impulses from our brains through our nervous system and into our muscles and skin and for moving our thoughts so as to enable thinking and conscious action. Vata dosha is light, dry, cool and lacking in it’s own source of stability.

When vata is elevated it acts like a dry wind, weakening tissues and making them more vulnerable to degradation and possible infection. Inappropriate diet or lifestyle choices or external factors such as the weather or season can disturb vata in us and this may begin to negatively affect our health. The effects of elevated vata dosa are subtle at first. Perhaps I’m having more gas than usual, or I’m a bit constipated. I might notice my skin is a bit dryer than usual or I feel a bit agitated mentally and am having trouble relaxing fully or sleeping restfully. Whatever the signs, it’s when these signs first appear that we have a chance to make choices that will offset this excess vata and prevent it from having a more significant impact on our health.

One of my favorite concepts from ayurveda is dinacharya or “the daily routine.” Outlined in the ancient ayurvedic texts, dinacharya is a way for each of us to begin each day in perfect balance with the natural world. Most of the elements prescribed in this daily routine are simple, practical and obvious. They include waking up early, washing our face, drinking water, using the toilet, brushing our teeth, bathing, dressing and exercising. Some activities prescribed in dinacharya are less obvious but no less practical, such as acknowledging the new day, however we may choose to do this.

One daily routine outlined in the classical texts that is not commonly practiced in the western world is the application of oil to the head and body. I call this self oil massage or self abhyanga. Self abhyanga is not complicated. It simply means covering the body from head to toe with a significant amount of oil, ideally one that is suited to our individual constitution. After the oil is applied, preferably in a warm environment, it should be left on for 10-15 minutes, if possible, to allow time for it to absorb through the skin and into other tissues in the body. After this time it should be cleaned off the body during a warm shower or bath.

Oil is frequently used in ayurveda because of the way in which it penetrates into tissues. If the oil has herbs cooked into it, then the oil acts as a carrying agent to deliver the herbs and their properties to specific tissues. More generally oil is used to add liquidity and stability to tissue that may be in need of it. One application of the use of oil that I find particularly helpful is nasya or the placing of oil into the nose. Nasya helps to keep sinus tissues moist, healthy and well functioning and when certain herbs are cooked into the oil the practice can also improve the voice, vision and enhance mental clarity. Placing oil in the nose is also one of the daily routines outlined in the classical ayurvedic texts.

Application of oil is also a simple and effective way of balancing vata dosa. The heavy, moist qualities of warm oil can help to balance the dry, light and cool qualities of vata. Therefore I feel that it is the dinacharya practices that involve the use of oil and which I’ve outlined above that can be particularly useful for us Californians during the fall season.

Here are some more details on how to do self abhyanga and self nasya. Since everyone’s constitution is different, contact me or another qualified ayurvedic practitioner for choosing the best oils for you.

Self Abhyanga

Fill a small plastic bottle such as a travel bottle for shampoo with a food grade oil appropriate for your constitution. If you’re not sure which oil to choose, contact me for help.

Boil some water to warm the oil. Meanwhile, place some old towels (that you don’t mind getting oily) on the floor of your bathroom. Warm the room up so that you not only won’t get cold being in there for 15-20 minutes, but may even have a chance to sweat a little.

Place your plastic bottle of oil into a large coffee mug or similar. When the water is at or near a boil, fill the mug most of the way up or until you’ve covered enough of the bottle to warm the oil well. Take your filled cup and warm oil into the bathroom and place it somewhere convenient.

Begin to apply the warm oil, starting at the crown of your head and working downward. Make sure you use enough oil on each part of the body that the skin there cannot absorb all of the oil you apply. If you have time, rub the oil in using longitudinal strokes on your bones and circular strokes on your joints. Don’t worry too much about getting this right.

When the body is completely covered with oil, leave it on for another 10-15 minutes. You might enjoy doing some yoga postures or other simple exercise, pranayama or breathing exercises or sitting for meditation. When you’re ready or running out of time, take a warm bath or shower and clean off all of the oil. You will likely need to shampoo your hair twice to get all of the oil out.

Self abhyanga can be thought of as an act of self love. The experience should be nurturing and not feel rushed or in any way an imposition. If you’re stressed and/or don’t have time to approach it in this way, leave it until you do.

Contraindications for self abhyana include: skin rash, menstruation, cold and flu

Self Nasya – applying oil to the nose

There are various medicated nasya oils in the marketplace. Typically these have nervine sedative and/or nervine tonic herbs cooked into them. The one that we sell at Alignment Lab and that we recommend is produced by Banyan Botanicals. If you are unsure of which medicated oil to use you can contact me for help. If you feel uncomfortable with using medicated oils you can also use plain sesame oil.

Self nasya works best if you’re lying down and have time to let the oil penetrate deeper into the sinus passages. Warm the oil to body temperature or slightly higher but NOT until it’s hot. Lie down on your back and place several drops of the warm nasya oil in each nostril as outlined in the product instructions. If you’re using plain sesame oil use 8-10 drops.

Remain in a reclining position for 1-5 minutes and relax, giving the oil a chance to penetrate deep into the sinus passages. If you’re using a medicated oil and wish to facilitate the nervine effects of the herbs in the oil, stay 5 or more minutes and give the oil a chance to penetrate even deeper.

*The nose is considered a direct pathway to the brain, and this can be an effective way of delivering the herbs and their properties to it.

For the quickie version, place some warm oil into the palm of your hand. This can be done, for example, during your self abhyanga. Dunk your pinkie finger into the oil and rub it gently into your nostrils. Repeat this 2-3 times for each nostril while “sniffing” the oil with moderate force to get it to move higher up into your sinus passages. Massage the inside of the sinuses to help the oil penetrate in.

*This quickie method can be helpful for keeping the sinus passages moist and enhancing their ability to resist environmental irritants.

The dinacharya are a wonderful way of making health and wellness a part of each and every day. Even if you don’t have time to do every one of the activities prescribed, just having these routines as a touchstone will be a powerful and supportive resource for you. I have learned a lot and received many benefits from practicing these daily routines and I’m confident you will too!

The Many Benefits of Orthopedic Massage

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At Alignment Lab we feature a massage technique known as The Hendrickson Method of Massage and Manual Therapy. This technique was developed by Dr. Tom Hendrickson, D.C. and has its roots in physical therapy and osteopathy. When Tiffany and I originally received our training from Dr. Hendrickson he called his method “Orthopedic Massage,” and we have continued to use that moniker since its rebranding.

Orthopedic Massage (OM) is outstanding for breaking up tissue adhesions, increasing blood flow, reducing pain, and improving range of motion and functionality in muscles and joints. OM does all of these wonderful things for our bodies by employing 3 key components in its methodology. These components are wave mobilization, joint mobilization and the application of MET’s or muscle energy techniques.

Wave mobilization refers to the way that the massage strokes are given in OM. Specifically, the practitioner applies the strokes with a wave like motion in a direction that is perpendicular to the muscle fibers. This cross-friction movement, modeled after waves in the ocean, is relaxing to receive and to give. By staying more relaxed ourselves as we give the massage, our clients enjoy more of the benefits of wave mobilization. These include greater fluid uptake in muscles and tissues, improved blood flow and a calming effect on the nervous system.

While wave mobilization targets the muscles are nervous system, low speed joint mobilization, a second key component to OM, helps to reduce stiffness and swelling in joints by gently moving them during the massage. Joint mobilization also helps improve the muscle firing patterns that actively move a given joint and help with the client’s neurological awareness of his/her joint and it’s function. And joint mobilization, like wave mobilization, feels good to give and to receive!

Despite the many benefits of wave and joint mobilization, sometimes the neurological patterns in a person’s body are resistant to change. MET’s, a third key component of OM, are a safe, comfortable and relatively easy way of affecting these patterns by helping a clients muscles, nervous system and brain recognize and release dysfunctional muscle tensions that are persisting unnecessarily and contributing to pain and discomfort. MET’s can also help restore more functional muscle firing patterns and remove or reduce chronic stress on the joints.

Because OM can be done without the use of oils or lotion, it can be easily incorporated into a Personal Alignment Training session. As I’ve begun to include OM as a complement to the active training, I’ve seen pain reduction and improved function accelerate. This has reinforced for me why we’ve called our work Personal Alignment Training for Health (P.A.T.H.). While Personal Alignment Training can be applied for any purpose, including performance training, our ultimate goal with every client is a positive health related outcome.

Study Highlights Advantages of Movement Based Training

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In 2015 several members of the kinesiology faculty at The Universe of Waterloo and The University of Toronto in Ontario, Canada performed a study using 52 firefighters comparing the impact of 2 different forms of fitness training to a control group. One group did 12 weeks of “movement-guided fitness” and the other did 12 weeks of “conventional fitness” training. The control group did no training at all.

Both groups that received training showed improved fitness over the control group, but the study found that the “movement-guided” (MOV) group showed greater joint stability in the knees and spine as compared to the “conventional fitness” (FIT) group. The study suggests that the the MOV group got results from the training that carried over to their work as firefighters, making them more effective and safer.

In a bit more detail, here are 3 important takeaways from this study:

1 – Practicing how to move with alignment in their training improved the quality of the firefighters movement outside the gym and made them more effective at their work.

The firefighters in this study depend upon their strength and agility to perform well. The firefighters who practiced exercises that emphasized correct alignment and movement based training improved their overall fitness in squats, lunges, pushing and pulling, and this improvement carried over into the tasks required in their work.

Most of us do not have as taxing a job as a firefighter, but at Alignment Lab we regularly see that improving the quality of movement directly contributes to improved function and greater longevity. How we stack our joints, having awareness of our body in space and improving the quality of our breathing are all key in having a healthy and strong body and mind.

2 – Firefighters who trained functional movement patterns (MOV group) had fewer injuries when compared to the traditional fitness exercises (FIT) group.

The fact that the firefighters who practiced a movement based training program had more control in frontal spinal and knee plane motions is huge! This means that the stress on their backs and knees was greatly reduced compared to the other firefighters doing both high-intensity training or no training. Reducing stresss on joints means less likelihood of wearing out joints and reducing the chances of a serious and potentially debilitating injury.

3 – Lower injury rate = Higher safety on the job

The improved performance and fewer injuries of the firefighters in the MOV group translates directly into improved safety on the job. This is by no means an insignificant outcome for someone who is employed in such a physically challenging and potentially dangerous line of work.

So what does this study mean for those of us who are not firefighters? Basically this:

*Movement based training produces the same fitness based results as conventional training but ALSO provides benefits that extend beyond the training environment.

*Movement based training regimens like the Personal Alignment Training we do at Alignment Lab train us not just to become good at specific exercises but also to become better at any movement based activity that we choose to do.

*Improvements in our movement come with less chance of injury and therefore less chance of down time when we’re not able to do the things we need to do or love to do.

This study highlights a central tenet of the approach we take to personal training at Alignment Lab, what we call Personal Alignment Training for Health or P.A.T.H.. P.A.T.H. emphasizes the quality of our movement over its intensity because we’ve found again and again that this approach leads to better health and more functional outcomes. Moreover, improving the quality of our movement while training with P.A.T.H. translates directly into desirable movement patterns in our everyday lives.

Flexibility vs. Mobility of the Hips

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The first yoga class I ever took was a Bikram Yoga class at The Yoga College of India in North Beach San Francisco. It was a 6 pm class held in a heated room that followed a 4:30 class full of tired, sweaty bodies. The room was ridiculously hot and wet even before I’d even taken my first pose, and I’m certain that I have never struggled and sweat that much before or since.

Besides a sore back and a wounded ego, I came away from that class with the discovery that I was, in fact, pretty flexible. I had no idea I was capable of bending my body in the ways I did in my early days of taking yoga classes. Years later a client came to me who’d been taking Bikram Yoga classes and was recently diagnosed with a disc herniation. She told me that what she really enjoyed most about her experience in Bikram classes was the “noodly bendy” feeling. Her body was already very flexible and therefore being even more “bendy” was the last thing she needed, but I understood where she was coming from. Flexibility is desirable not just because it can be an indicator of good health, but also because it just plain feels good.

After suffering for several years with my own back issues I’ve come to see flexibility in a different way. It’s clear to me now that for myself and the many others who have or have had chronic pain, flexibility is part of the problem. At least the “bendy” kind of flexibility that lacks a stable foundation. People with bendy bodies are often drawn to yoga classes, especially Bikram or other “Hot” yoga classes because bendiness comes easy to them. It can be very challenging for these very “flexible” students to improve their stability doing yoga, and they often manifest injuries that begin to limit their mobility, sometimes dramatically so.

When my “noodly” client first came to me she could barley bend forward, despite her natural flexibility. As I helped her improve her mechanics she gradually became more stable and her mobility improved dramatically without the back pain returning.

When I work with a client who lacks flexibility, I try to help them find ways to improve their mobility rather than just giving them stretches to make them more flexible. It can feel good to be “flexible,” but ultimately it is the quality of our movement that counts. And that quality of movement depends a great deal on stabilization.

Stabilization means that I am able to maintain stability in one part of my body while I move another. If for example I am bending forward, I want to stabilize my spine so that I can generate more of the movement from my legs and hips. Stabilizing the spine is essential for increasing range of motion in the hips. Stabilizing the hips is essential for the long term health and function of these very important joints.

Stabilizing my hip joint requires that I stabilize the femur (thigh bone). This demands a good balance between the strength and responsiveness of my lateral hips and the flexibility and freedom of movement from my medial hip. If the muscles on my lateral hip don’t respond well to loads (ie-lack strength), the medial hip muscles will shorten and pull one femur toward the other. This can compromise the stability of the hip joint and will eventually damage it.

Conversely if I do have good balance between my later and medial hip then I am able to stabilize the femur effectively and this will allow for better mobility of my hip. Better hip mobility improves the health of the hip joint and greater stability through a larger range of motion.

I’ve found stabilizing the hip to be a very effective way to improve hip mobility and resolve hip related pain patterns. In my view mobility is the kind of flexibility we want. That is, not the “noodly bendy” kind but the kind that makes us stronger and affords us more range of motion and freer movement while minimizing wear and tear on our joints.

For a demonstration of one of my favorite posture for improving hip stabilization and mobility, check out this video.

Aligning Ourselves with a Better Diet and a Healthier Lifestyle

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This past spring I offered a cleanse program and there was quite a bit of interest. I guided several clients through the program and there were several others who expressed interest but never followed through. It’s easy to understand why. For some people the changes in diet and lifestyle necessary to participate fully in our cleanse program, even for a short period of time, are a bit far from where they’re at to make the journey.

So I started thinking about how to meet more folks half way (or even 3/4 of the way!). After all, making changes to our diet and lifestyle is not easy. When taking clients through the cleanse I always remind them – “it’s only temporary,” but of course if we’re going to undertake making significant changes, even temporarily, we’d likely want to see some of those changes last, especially if they’re working for us.

If I want to make changes to my diet but I don’t want to bite off more than I can chew, it may work better for me to make smaller changes and to set targets closer to where I’m starting from. In this way I can begin to establish a direction of change that helps me align with my intentions and improves my ability to stay on the path on which I’ve started.

For instance, one of my clients asked me to give him some advice about changing his diet. Before I could do that, I needed to see where he was at, so I asked him to keep a food journal for a week or so and then give it to me to look over. After seeing what he was eating I had several recommendations in mind, but based on his age and his food journal I could tell that he had some long standing habits that were going to be a little tough to break.

I suggested he just do one thing – give up refined sugar, just temporarily, for a two week period. My guess is that he was seeking a bit more than this, but I saw the refined sugar in his diet as the low hanging fruit that would offer the most bang for his buck, or so to speak. If he wasn’t eating sugar he would immediately see the benefits in how he felt and that would encourage him to make other changes leading to further benefits and providing further encouragement. Before long he would have made some pretty significant changes with some pretty substantial results to show for it. In other words it was this one change that I saw as the key first step on his journey toward a better diet.

I wish I could say now that it was a huge success and that he’s eating better and he’s healthier than he has ever been, but alas it’s only partly true. That first step turned out to be one that he wasn’t prepared to make at that time. Nonetheless, my recommendation did seem to plant an important seed in his consciousness. Currently he’s following a different cleanse from a book he purchased recently and he is in fact eating healthier than he has in a long time, maybe ever.

So while I realize I can’t take full credit for the change in my client’s diet (maybe not much credit at all!), his story does illustrate my point. We all have to get started somewhere on the path to better health, and we need a doable plan to get us started. But more than anything we need a first step that points us in the right direction.

 

 

Wall Plank

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Tiffany teaches a wall plank in this video and talks about how it can be a useful tool for correcting dysfunction of the shoulder girdle.