The longer I go, the less I know…or perhaps, the more I question what I think I know. Either way, it’s a rather interesting life when one allows self to visit and revisit ideas that have been held for years, then actually find a slightly new way of thinking. This happened for me yesterday.
I’ve long been a fan of what I call my ‘rubber band’ or elastic image; that like Tom Myers’ myofascial meridians, I see lines of transmission through the body. While for me Tom’s lines are sometimes a bit generic and I think in terms of the personal lines of each patron who finds me, I continue to focus on the idea that stretching that line, that rubber band, from only one place doesn’t produce nearly as much value as stretching from two directions. And I ‘stretch’ this idea even further by wondering what happens when we hold both ends of the elastic and stretch, then stretch AND twist, then stretch and twist AND put even more pressure in the middle of the band. In other words, what happens when we stretch our deep lines in as many directions as possible? Won’t that cause a shift, a loosening, of that deep line that we don’t get by simply applying pressure somewhere?
Well, yesterday’s speculation centered on the pelvic floor. I’ve long thought most of us hold on too tightly in the pelvic region; whether from early conditioning about what ‘nice girls’ do, or resulting from some inapprorpriate touch, a tight stomach because of emotional issues, etc. It seems that most of us simply don’t allow energy to move through that pelvic area easily.
But I began thinking how certain tensions in certain personal lines anchored in that pelvic floor region could perhaps create certain conditions…scoliosis jumped into my head right away. What if a personal line has tension in one adductor compartment, or adductor/hamstring septum that tugged that pelvic floor in one direction? What if, due to emotional concerns, a pulled groin muscle, improper touch, or any other causation, one has developed a scoliosis due to the need to tighten and hold onto that tension in a specific spot?
If we consider my model of head, heart, gut and groin as the four main centers of the body, it seems that far too many of us remain tightened in the groin area. If we’re tight in the groin, it’s harder to let energy enter into the gut area; if we’re tight in groin and gut, it gets harder to move energy from those centers into heart, and head. Thus, in my thinking, many of us accept this shutting-down of the groin center, ignore our guts, and either focus more specifically on the heart center or head center as the place we feel safe. We ignore what may or may not happen in the guts and groin. I still think in terms of getting my energy elevator to stop at all four levels…to be able to live happily in my head, but to move freely into my heart, into my guts, and into my groin. Sadly, I don’t think many of us can do this. Still, I explore.
Now, if indeed the pelvic floor may be the basis for tension through the entire body (it is, after all, the survival chakra, and many of us don’t survive happily and aren’t that great at surviving) how can we identify and release our personal ‘rubber band’ that holds everything through the body too tightly? This was the focus of my mental ramblings yesterday, and here are suggestions that make sense to me:
I think many of us are too tight in a line between our most distal genitals and coccyx, climbing into either the back side of our belly button or the back side of our dorsal spinal bones. One could see a line that either travels from genitals to front of spine in belly region, or from coccyx to front of spine, or from back of coccyx to back of back around L1, and for me, this could well be the true cause of much that goes wrong in a body—that tightening of the root of the deep line that most of us seem to share.
Thinking back to Emmett Hutchins, my mentor at Rolf Institute and Guild for Structural Integration many years ago, Emmett used to talk about his X, Y and Z axes. He believed we have three directions to each of our movement and our body; length, breadth and depth if you will. In my thinking we can expand on that model and realize that there aren’t just three directions, but an infinity of directions as we allow our movements to be more fluid.
If this is true, does it make sense that while the lines I describe above may be the most generic, each of us has a history in our body that causes our own deep lines to be pulled, torqued, and held in our own personal way? So for example, could that scoliosis be connected to that tightened adductor; or a sprained ankle, stubbed or broken toe, sexual abuse, emotional abuse, a back injury, a tight emotionally charged stomach, or even a damaged shoulder? Couldn’t any of those conditions/triggers cause that tension in pelvic floor?
Now, the application: can we choose to look at folks in a new way that asks which of the pathways through their deep line is most interrupted/tightened/on guard? Can we begin to work as though we’re never touching just the spot we think is ‘held’, but always remembering to look up and down the entire body while staying focused on that deep pelvis to low and middle spine, and try to determine just how they’ve created the glitch and how we can help them unwind?
If we allow ourselves to continue with this speculation, here’s a list of conditions that might be enhanced simply by thinking more fully of relaxing that deep line, pulling the various ends of the rubber band, and creating movement in more directions as we work:
sexual and fertility issues
stomach disorders
back pain
scoliosis
feet problems, bunions, high arches
TMJ and jaw issues
sciatic issues
prevention of hip and knee replacements
shoulder problems
Can you see how any of these conditions might be remedied by attention to this deep line that’s most held at the pelvic floor? Let’s go back to the idea that the survival area of our bodies, the pelvis, which both asks us to brace and survive but also is responsible for procreation is the deepest place we must unwind in order to get the entire body to unwind. If we can do this I believe we’re going to have a new way to look at bodies and a new way to treat our patrons.
Again, speculation! But as I consider, I find in some ways this is part of what I’ve been doing in my work for years…yesterday, words came to me a bit clearer. I invite you to consider the speculation, try it on and see if perhaps this gives you a new way to think and work with clients and patrons.