Embodied Yoga, Movement & Politics with Mark Walsh — Ep 29 — is live

1. "It's all good. Whatever your practice is, as long as you enjoy it, is great."

2. "Nope. Some practices are better than others. There are right ways and wrong ways to do things."

So, which is right: 1 or 2?

If those are two ends of a spectrum — and we're not going to take the easy way out and say "it's both!" or "it's in the middle!" — what do we do with that question?

That is, indeed, where Mark Walsh and I start our conversation — The Body Awake's latest episode — and what he has to say around this really got me thinking.

Listen right here, or on your favorite podcast app, or download this episode directly here.

Ruminations on Alignment, Pt 2

Video 2 in a little series about "alignment" as it relates to a body in posture in movement. Specifically, this series is about putting alignment — and thus concepts like "in alignment," "out of alignment" and even "neutral" — in a context that is useful, i.e. what questions it's asking, and thus answering, and what falls outside of alignment's jurisdiction.

The gist of this one: alignment doesn't speak very well to tone. It does address it somewhat, but only very peripherally. It's not the right tool.

What's tone, and who cares? Consider the difference between hovering above a chair and sitting in it, or of having your arm actively extending overhead, like you're reaching for the ceiling, versus just straightening your arm overhead.

Both examples yield very different experiences for the mover, with very little if any change in "alignment."

This is a concept that — I think — not in enough of our dialogue as movement teachers and practitioners.

Neutral … in relation to what?

A few days ago, I made a video about the beginnings of understanding the context of alignment. And any conversation about alignment has to start with an understanding of neutral. What’s neutral?*

It’s a living process, an ever-moving target.

It is not a position; it is not a particular arrangement of bony parts.

It is only what it is in context. Outside of the context of oppositional forces, there is no valid concept of neutrality.

It is different for you today than it was four seconds ago, much less last week or year.

It is different for you standing than it is sitting, different standing at the bus stop than standing as you wait for a first date to arrive.

Likewise, a "normal" or neutral breath whilst under duress — say at your parents' house for the holidays — is different than a normal breath while on vacation. Your normal breath will be different if you experienced this or that trauma as a child versus if you didn't, and on and on.

Neutral — also called homeostasis — has been with you since you were a zygote: a perfect balance of pressures.

It’s something you can’t escape. That’s the irony.

You are never *not* in neutral in a certain respect. If “part” of you zigs, another “part” of you zags. It’s perfect balance.

And yet, it’s a good conversation to have. “How goes that zigging and zagging? How’s it feeling? How’s it working for you?”

🌔

*You hear it all the time in movement and fitness world type stuff. “Neutral spine” or “neutral pelvis” … as part of the “have good alignment in your shoulders” or whatever conversation.

I, too, say stuff like this a lot! I think it’s very helpful.

I also think it’s very, very important to put these concepts in their place so they — the words pointing to concepts pointing to actual, lived experiences — serve that lived experience, and are not in place so that our lived experience conforms to the idea. That’s a pretty classic recipe for suffering.

Tom Myers on Being in the Body Business, Movement and the Disease of Feeling "Other" — ep 28 — is live

Dearest Friends and Listeners ~

Tom Myers returns to The Body Awake for our third interview. And like the other two but with new territory, Tom's experience and wisdom that came through this chat were really good nutrition for me, and now hopefully for you too.

Tom and I talk, among other things, about:

• making one's living as a bodyworker or movement teacher; the graces and pitfalls of the commercial vs academic spheres
• the full flowering, or "five fingers," of a fully integrated bodywork practice
• the disease of feeling "other," of alienation from ourselves, and what we can do about it

It's a good one.

Listen in on the show page, download here or find The Body Awake on iTunes, Stitcher, etc.

Links for this show: Tom's "Anatomy 101 For Yoga Teachers and Students" / TBA listeners use discount code TMYERS100 to save $100 off tuition

Bringing Aristotle Into the Heart

I think we are being asked, right now in our current politics and daily conversations alike, to bring the Greek revolution of the mind down into the heart.

There is one principal in particular, of Aristotle and the sophists, that we should be able to argue both sides of an argument,* that highlights this radical shift in perspective that's being asked of us.

It seems to me that, over the millennia since the ancient Greeks, we both:

a) in some cases, got quite good at this kind of argumentation

b) more recently, as seen on playgrounds and halls of congress alike, got quite good at just turning an entire argument on its head within moments

Remember that from the playground? Like all of a sudden some kid would say "nope, well now I have an shield that just deflects all your shots back onto you and now I WIN!" and you're like "no man, c'mon, that's not the rules ... !" Doesn't seem much different out there, honestly. And, to bring this in even closer, do you know that temptation? I certainly do. To be right! To win! When it's just a fake rule away, it's so seductive to begin that one-up game.

With so much rule-turning turning an issue on its head, I feel like it's forcing the point:

We must learn to feel being the "other side."

One step deeper than just thinking about it for the sake or argumentation. One step more vulnerable. One step more dangerous, for the waters you can get lost in.

Are we up for it?

This isn't an answer one proclaims — yes or no — but lives her answer to.

See you out there :)

*Aristotle's words, verbatim: "We must be able to employ persuasion, just as strict reasoning can be employed, on opposite sides of a question, not in order that we may in practice employ it in both ways (for we must not make people believe what is wrong), but in order that we may see clearly what the facts are, and that, if another man argues unfairly, we on our part may be able to confute him."

I love that line of "not in order that we may in practice employ it both ways ..." I reckon the same is true of this heart-level awakening, the feeling of both sides ... It's not that you suddenly don't care about what you care about; it's just that you can actually feel the other side "in order that we may see clearly."

Ruminations on Alignment, Pt 1

Learning “good alignment” can be a helpful, liberating teaching. It can also become a cage, reinforcing neuroses and fragility.

These two seemingly opposite truths — that alignment-based work can be both liberating and enslaving — share a common root.

That root is hard to put into words, though even incremental deepening in one’s understanding of that can be quite liberating.

This “alignment conversation” happening within a person is something I’ve been investigating deeply for many years — in my own body and the bodies in my care. It’s an ongoing question for me.

This is the first video of a series, each progressively more refine, nuanced and subtle. So we’ll start here, at the most gross and overt: the meta bony relationships (which is, indeed, what most people think of when they say the word “alignment”).

The gist: When we say “alignment,” we are really referring to a body in relation to itself. This can be a change in thinking because we often use objects outside the body as reference points — i.e. stand up straight, bring your hand up to the ceiling, open your chest forward.**

Emotional flavor: humility (to back off and find what’s being glossed over), and clear seeing / feeling.

** Note: this isn’t about changing your cues per se; it’s about clear seeing. “How to teach” is another topic altogether.

I Held a Handstand Yesterday

For about 15 seconds. I'm sharing because this was a huge deal for me, and not because of why you might think. And it's that "why" that I think might be helpful to you, dear reader, listener, mover, be-er.

This may help you navigate your personal waters of unfolding in a body, especially if you are at all like me and don't vibe with a lot of contemporary fitness models of "just try harder," but also enjoy the joy of effort and like to try things you're not good at.

Why this was amazing for me is all about the backstory.

About 15 years ago, two climbing accidents in the same year, one on a face in Joshua Tree and one on a steep left leaning finger crack in Yosemite, where I was in way over my head ... in both cases, I was super gripped and my feet popped off, and I heard a loud pop in my left shoulder.

On the crack in Yosemite, I felt popping and tearing. It hurt like hell. We rappelled down — didn't finish the route as I couldn't lift my throbbing arm really — and I proceeded to "rehab" my arm by ... ahem: drinking beer and popping ibuprofen.

(I used to take 400 - 1200mg ibuprofen daily just to keep climbing, a momentary route around my extensor-tendons-on-fire forearms. For years.)

This injury, and how I didn't rehab it at all = very limited, loose joint capsule, tenuous, nerve-pain-prone left shoulder, and quite stiff, painful and tendinosis-y elbows.

---

I had a huge life change at age 28, moved out of my van and into a house in Seattle with my girlfriend, was deeply depressed for a year and then signed up for massage school, as I often joke, out of part motivation but mostly desperation for something different.

---

In my "new life" of bodywork — which left massage awhile ago and has taken me on a path I never would've dreamed of, out of sheer dumb luck — I started moving in a new way.

Bits of yoga, feldenkrais, tai chi, acro yoga, crossfit ... lots of dabbling ...

And in some of the more overtly strength and mobility-based stuff, I tried handstands.

I was shaky.

"Engage your core." "Squeeze your glutes."

Didn't work, and mostly, it didn't feel good; it was painful. My left arm.

Pretty much all of it aggravated my shoulder like crazy, as did any pulling like in climbing, or pushing up like in overhead presses.

So, I decided to drop out of that game altogether.

I could see where it was going, which in my mind was: best case scenario, you find a way to "trick" your body into a shape by squeezing tension and making the form fit. Which is really worse case scenario, because now you're "doing it right" only with shitty internal architecture.

(That's how I saw it — and still do in certain contexts.)

I backed way, way off of all my training. I dropped out.

I went on sabbatical. My father had passed away, and I left Seattle after 7 years. I went to Mexico, and was experience a significant shift/break in my psyche, twice, and went through several dark psychological periods.

It was here I met a friend with whom I spent a month, and who introduced me to hanging and finding my scapulae that way via the Ido Portal method, and that was a game changer.

My shoulder began to heal.

---

It's worth noting that bodywork, up until this point, had also played a huge part: many, many layers of pain and tension and fear released in my body thanks to massage, and Structural Integration, craniosacral and visceral manipulation: the latter three which I practice to this day.

---

I could go on and on about the training I've done the past couple years since Mexico but the gist of it is ...

I was done with pain, or most importantly done trying to navigate around myself to try to get somewhere, in training. Even tiny little nagging things: okay, I'm going to do this pose or hold or whatever only to the point where I'm continuing to be really honest in my body.

It's a funny thing to try to explain over written word, but that's my best go.

And so, at long last, back to the handstand ...

I hadn't tried to just kick up into a handstand, more than just in passing (which was always a quick flop-and-fail) for years. Because it always hurt my shoulder, and I hated the "squeeze your glutes" and "engage your core" that seems to be some people's answer to every f'ing movement problem that exists these days ;)

(But really: I didn't like it, philosophically, the squeezing so much; so I didn't take that path.)

Yesterday, the wind blew just right and I thought: hmmmm, I can feel my back in such a different way these days. I wonder what it'd be like to try ...

I kicked up, and suddenly ... Wow. I'm looking at the ground. I am standing on my hands. My body is in a relatively straight line, i.e. I can press length through my lower back (the yin to engage-your-core's yang). I can think. I can breathe.

It seemed like eternity. It was probably 15 seconds.

I came down.

And here we are.

---

Thanks for reading.

If this resonated with you and you'd care to share, I'd love to hear from you.

Thanks, love, LB

Advice On Finding a Movement Teacher

I

I would not trust a teacher

Who is not willing to run 'til exhausted

Through the streets

as if chasing and being chased both,

To make a fool of himself in such a fashion

That his audience may actually find him a fool,

Or a traitor or a blasphemer,

And not, clearly, a deep-thinking poet

Cloaked in the fashionable garment

     of risk.

No, I would not trust anyone for advice

Who has not been lost, and afraid,

In the woods behind her own home.

Who knows a storm — and its passing —

Like either a mad man or

Someone who's bound herself

in some very unlucky predicaments?

(And good luck talking to the former.)

II

A fool will act without consideration.

An intellectual will make guesses with firm foundations.

A spiritual person will disguise her real desires

     and intentions.

A true sage will stand with you in the fire

And not try to talk you out of it

     one inch,

Nor speculate on the nature of ash

     or even the water

     or what will quench what.

=====

#poetry

Inspired very much by a recent interview I heard — and really resonated with, loved — with Ido Portal: http://www.thehumanxp.com/episode-105-ido-portal/

Housekeeping with LB — ep 27 — is live

Episode 27 of The Body Awake is up. Find it here.

This episode, a little fireside chat with yours truly, housekeeping to the tune of ...

💛  a new home for my writing: the written word right here at TBA
💛  notes on my physical training, and follow up from the 50K race
💛  the trajectory of the show, both big picture and a list of future interviewees! weeeeeeee!

Links for this show ...

• download this episode (or as always, listen above or on iTunes or other podcast apps)
• my now-old blog at Dynamic Alignment Bodywork
• my now-new blog right here
• seth godin's phenom daily blog
  
  *Of note: if you're someone on the email list, you're now signed up to get fresh to your inbox each time I post a blog here. I hope you and enjoy and find useful most, if not all, of these posts. If not, please unsubscribe, as is always an option. As of now, there's no option to just get the "when a new show goes up" post without signing onto the whole blog RSS feed. Again, I hope you love it.

Q: “How Do I Stay Motivated?”

A: Don’t.

“But then I will just sit on the couch and nothing will happen.”

Are you sure?

“Well, pretty damn sure because that’s what I was doing before I started exercising and I was so depressed then, nothing could get me up.”

And what did, finally, get you up?

“I saw something really motivational and something inside me just clicked.”

Had you tried to get a self-improvement program going before, to no avail?

“Of course. Many times.”

Me too. So, for you, what was the final straw with this go around? Why this time and not a day before?

“I don’t know.”

That feels like a very honest answer to me.

“So what do I do … Just sit around not knowing and waiting for motivation to strike?”

No. Making a plan like that is a not-knowing imposter, a wolf in sheep’s clothing. Now you’re trying to project onto an empty canvas what ‘not knowing’ is going to look like. It’s empty.

“So what do I do?”

You see that the question itself — ‘how do I stay motivated?’ — is already off in a funny direction. You can keep that motivation around just about as well as you conjured it in the first place. Do you have to remind yourself to stay in love with your beloved old dog? Do you have to get motivated to listen to a song you adore?

“But it seems like if I just went off what I want to do all the time, I’d just sit around and smoke weed and eat cupcakes.”

I’m just wanting to bring your attention to this fact: you also want something else. (Otherwise we wouldn’t be talking.)

“So … what do I do?”

Perhaps a better question is: “What do I most want? What do I really, truly love?”

Let that be your guide.

First Post

Hello Dear Friends, Listeners ~

In my best efforts to share what's relevant and useful, I believe I have outgrown my old blog at Dynamic Alignment Bodywork, and am moving my writings here.

This is post one. More to come.

With love, LB