Notes from the Workshop: Breathing for Health - Flexibility & Mobility

We had our first Breathing for Health workshop on October 22.  The topic was "Flexibility & Mobility".  I would like to share a couple notes from the evening.

RELAXING INSTEAD OF STRETCHING
We hold unnecessary tension in our joints and muscles, sometimes unconsciously.  By relaxing and letting go the tension, we can gain flexibility without holding a stretch.  At the workshop, we combined breathing and rhythmic, repetitive movements.  Each time the breath changed (inhale to exhale, exhale to inhale), the movement changed as well.  Artificially taking "deep breath" often causes its own type of tension.  Instead, the breathing pattern should be casual.  The breath should not be held and there should be no pause in the movement.   Sometimes, we can tap the tense spots with our fingers, reminding the area to release.

ONE THING AT A TIME
Often when we were taught a stretch, we were given a goal (e.g. touch you toe).  Then we contort the body to achieve the perceived desired shape.  But in order to obtain "the goal", we move multiple parts of the body (e.g.  round the spine, turn the shoulder, crank the neck), reducing the effectiveness of the stretch, or worse, creating new tension or injuring ourselves.  At the workshop, we asked the participants to focus on how they feel internally and try to move one thing at a time.  So, instead of "touching the toe", we want to keep the body square, back straight and just simply "fold at the hip joint".  Also, we tried to isolate each types of movement (e.g. turn first, then extend).  Many were surprised by how much easier it was when they only needed to do one thing at a time.

TENSION AS A TOOL

Towards the end of the workshop, we used conscious, intentional tension to help the body relax further. Lying on the floor, we tensed up the body lightly with inhalation, then relaxed with exhalation.  Then we proceeded to pass the tension from one part of the body to another part, then release the tension from different body parts separately.  Tension as a training tool can heightened body awareness and teach us how to control our own body.

It's difficult to cover everything we did in the workshop but I hope my notes gave a glimpse of our breathing work.  Next workshop is November 19, 6:00 - 7:30 pm.  The focus next time will be "strength & movement".  Speaking as a person who had been physically weak and inactive for most of her life, I found this approach to strength and conditioning to be very effective and surprisingly easy.  So I highly recommend people to come and try it out.

Movement is Joy

I wasn't a very physical child. I was clumsy, slow, uncoordinated, and I disliked all team activities. My memory of gym classes are filled with frustrations, physical and emotional. I equate sports with rage and fear. I associate fitness with tedium and misery. In addition, my Taiwanese childhood was academically competitive and physical education was simply considered secondary. As a result, I grew up cerebral, detached from my own physical existence.

I was a stranger in my own body. I looked down on it as a collection of base instincts with nothing to offer. I resented my dependence on having a body. I struggled to rule over my body like a master driving her stubborn mule, and found it incompetent.

Obviously, this was not a good way to be, nor was it healthy or natural. It took me awhile to become ONE person. I am my body. My body is me. There is no struggle. There is nothing to struggle with.

It all started with the joy of movement.  

Impressed by Broadway musical, I took tap dancing lessons. Moved by the winter Olympic, I enrolled in ski camp. As I tapped across the dance floor and glided down the snowy slopes, I thought:  hmm...this...is...actually...FUN!

There is an innate pleasure in movements. Try this in the morning: wiggle your toes when you wake up in bed. Strangely, even the simplest movement tugged on something deep inside. It’s good to have toes. It’s good to move. It’s good to be alive.

Then I tried other things: tango, rock climbing, contact improv, taijiquan, systema. With each activity I learned, my competency grew, so did my confidence. But it wasn't just the better use of the body that kept me going. It wasn’t just the fun either. It was something deeper and simpler. It was to experience the world through my body. Some of you might say: umm, isn’t that called “living”?  

Let me explain what I mean. Different activities make me interact differently with my environment, with other people, with myself. My perception changes. My senses open. The line between body and mind ceases to be. Through movements I come to experience the world anew. Such is the joy of movement. And as such I would like to continue to move, to climb, to dance, to swim, to run, to live.

Maybe for me it is not about “Faster, Higher, Stronger”, or even “Be the best you can be.” Maybe it’s simply that “Movement is Joy”.