An Emerging Practice

An Emerging Practice, Ch. 2

When you find joy, aliveness and presence again through movement 

play naturally becomes a practice.  

A natural desire to go deeper for greater understanding, 

more skillful and free expression of Self will emerge without force. 

When your cup is full with expectation, achievement, and the need for external validation from others’ value system you leave no room for personal joy and curiosity.

Without enjoyment a budding practice either dies naturally to make way for something alive, 

or it’s nurtured by conditioning and external validation, which grow a synthetic practice with shallow roots, always thirsty for aliveness regardless of how much “knowledge” they drink, and rigid branches that break rather than bend in winds of change and challenge.

Without curiosity there can be no captivation.  

Without captivation dedication wanes under the burdens of discipline and task.  

When dedication wanes there’s no longevity.  

Without longevity there isn’t the necessary time to explore the depth required to evolve understanding and reveal the nature of the Self.  

The depth where change occurs and personal style emerges.

Digression:

That’s right!  I’m talking about practice!  

When an activity gives you joy and the feeling of aliveness a natural desire emerges to develop your ability.  You become curious in your exploration for understanding and expression.  A natural desire to develop and refine your ability fuels you to not just engage in the activity, but to practice it!  

And why?  Because there’s an innate understanding that developing and refining your ability peels away layers of the onion that reveal more enjoyment, challenge and freedom of expression!  You realize the deeper you go the more there is.

This doesn’t mean you’ll never experience frustration.  Of course you will! That’s part of what keeps you coming back for more.  The easiest video games weren’t the ones we kept playing for years when we were kids, right? (Did anyone ever beat Zelda?).

A worthy challenge to overcome and a puzzle to solve engages the whole being - mind, body and spirit.  It captivates you!  Now you’re on to something special because there’s an internal motivation expressing itself and you’re riding the wave.  

When you don’t have a joyful foundation you’re left with physical training motivated by illusion from the daily barrage of avatars of who we should be, how we should look, and how we should go about manifesting someone else’s vision of a successful and fulfilling life.  (If I just had a six-pack my life would be complete).  That’s the point at which you shoulder the burdens of discipline and task.  

Something that should be alive is an item on your todo list.  Without curiosity you have to fuel action with self-discipline; an exhaustible fuel supply.  When discipline runs out you’re left with guilt about not being enough to live up to the illusion.  We know what happens next because we’ve all been in that vicious cycle.   

Open yourself to joyful movement; the gift that keeps on giving.  

Be curious for a curious spirit is a young one.  Age is both a number and an internal state.   

In joy,

Tanner

The Tao of Creating a Movement Practice

The Tao of Creating a Movement Practice, 1

Enjoy movement like you did when you were a kid.  

Don’t overcomplicate things, 

especially creating a movement practice.  

Most of your “practice” should feel like play.  

Start by asking, “what makes me want to move?”

Don’t judge your answer.  Don’t analyze its value.  

Its value is derived from your enjoyment.

Then ask, “what activities bring me into the flow of the present moment?”

Transcending the illusion of time is when deep healing and change occur.  

Finally, ask yourself, “what makes me feel alive?”

Don’t compare your answer to anyone else’s.

Your movement practice is your own personal masterpiece.

Answering these questions will paint most of the picture.  

Complete your masterpiece with accent colors 

that provide support, balance, and longevity to the things you love.  

Digression:

When we were kids we enjoyed moving our bodies for no other reason than it felt good and it was fun.  Moving for the sake of exercise is a concept that gets introduced when we become adults and the child in us has been ignored, beaten down or pushed into a corner.  

I was blessed as a child to have lived in places that offered an abundance of the outdoors, playmates and safety to roam.  We played capture-the-flag in the woods and street hockey in the cul-de-sac.  We rode our bikes all over town, jumped on trampolines, climbed trees, and swam in any pool we could get into.  

Time melted away; the experience of a moment lasting hours and hours slipping by in a moment.  Our only concerns were avoiding older bullies, but even that offered a sense of adventure and excitement.  Sometimes we poked the bear because there’s nothing like the feeling of running from something to make you feel alive.  

As I let go of my attachments to how I should be training I was able to start enjoying movement like I did when I was a child.  For most of my adult life I’ve felt like I needed to do a certain amount of structured strength/mobility/conditioning/bulletproofing before I could get to the things I enjoy.  Think about the absurdity of not playing in the game because you have to go to practice!!

Setting that burden down is giving me the freedom to enjoy Life, which for me is greater than any “fitness” benefit.  

Will you enjoy life more when you have a better body, can lift more, or do a muscle-up?  

Do you hold yourself back from enjoying movement?  

Is there a voice in your head, perhaps the avatar of some “fitness influencer”, making you feel guilty about all the exercises and training routines you should be doing?      

There will always be a greater achievement just out of reach if you think this way.  I know from experience.  Having goals to orient your direction are great, however, observe yourself carefully to see if you’ve lost sight of The Now during your perpetual chasing after future phantoms.  

Consider enjoying the journey and seeing where it leads.  Be fluid with the course you take.  

Next time I’ll share my movement practice and Lo’s.  Perhaps it will inspire and inform your own.  I’ll spend some time explaining how I support and balance what I enjoy with structured training; the accent colors of my personal masterpiece.  But, before I tell you what I’m doing I want you to go inward to find your own answers.  

Be Strong, Move Beautifully,

Tanner

5 Reasons to Train Thoracic Extension

We recently introduced the Perfect Pull-up into the new 6-week phase of training in the Fluxio & Upper body class and with PT clients for whom it was appropriate.  As a group the instructors agreed that the community could benefit from more of both thoracic extension and scapular retraction work, so the Perfect Pull-up was a natural fit.  After spending large portions of the last two phases on hollow body pull-ups we also thought everyone could benefit from some variety.  

So this begs the question; what are the benefits of training thoracic extension?

1. Improving posture from long hours spent working behind a desk.  Lots of ripple effects here…
   

2. Increased performance & Injury prevention - Better thoracic posture and mobility makes you stronger and safer during intense strength and conditioning, specifically with deadlifting, squat variations and KB work.    
   

3. Improve breathing -  by improving thoracic posture you also allow the rib cage more freedom of movement so it can expand more when you inhale.  When you can take deeper breaths you take in more oxygen which not only improves conditioning and recovery within your workouts, but also saturates your brain and muscle tissue with more oxygen throughout the day so you’re more focused for longer periods of time and so you recover better between workouts.  
   

4. To spare the lower back - When your thoracic spine is locked up and immobile your body will recruit your lower back to do what the thoracic spine should be doing.  For example, the thoracic spine is meant to rotate 35° while the lumbar only 12°, but when the thoracic is locked up your body will make the lumbar do more than it’s designed to do which can create sheering and stress that leads to degeneration and pain.
   

5. Improve head position and spare your neck all that additional lifting - Ideally the ear canal should be aligned with the midline of your torso.  For every inch your head juts forward its weight increases by 10 lbs for the muscles of your neck and upper back.  For those of you with big domes it might be more like 12 to 15 lbs (you know who you are, we love you and we’re trying to help).

Clearly there are ample reasons to train scapular retraction, especially if you spend lots of time sitting behind a desk every day. And, I didn’t even cover the ripple effect benefits to shoulder health here because I want to do that in a separate blog that I’m going to write through the context of the discussion of doing Arch body pull-ups (aka “perfect pull-ups”) versus traditional hollow body pull-ups.

Be Strong, Move Beautifully,

Tanner