key points spinal traction

7.5. Key Points: Spinal Traction — Transcript (English)

Summary:

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Transcript

Welcome to another Key Points lesson.

Here we’re going to look at another pattern in our Assimilations, where we lie down and we have stillness in a supine position, and we do this neck extension that I’m going to explain in detail in this lesson.

So let’s take a look.

We will sit somehow on the floor and then from there what we’ll do is that we first come into this position where we sit with the legs kind of close together, maybe just a little bit spread, and they are extended in front of us.

Then from here, we bring the arms like this in front of our shoulders - shoulder height - and we engage the ankles, push the balls of the feet, press the palms forward, so it’s a very active position here.

And then in this active position, very slowly we are going to try to lie down.

But not completely.

See, so we come in this position, so the legs are slightly out, and the head is still lifted, and the arms are still extended forward like this.

So it’s a very active position, right?

And then we begin to move like this from side to side.

So we move the legs, we push the arms from the shoulders.

The goal here is to flatten the spine as much as possible.

So the pelvis - we want to flatten it, and the back of the ribcage - we want to flatten.

The lower back will almost touch the floor.

I mean, it will really never fully touch the floor.

But rather than having this back arch, which will normally happen if you just try to lie down on the floor, we want to flatten it more, so that the pelvis and the ribcage, they will create traction and they will be pulling lower back in this position.

The head is still lifted.

See, so the neck is kind of working here.

So then from here we’ll bring the palms up.

The legs will be maybe slightly wider than hip-width apart here.

And then very, very actively we will first lower our arms so that the back of the palms are going to touch the floor.

The head is still lifted, the chin in.

And then from here we keep the chin in as much as we can and we begin to lower the head.

Again, the goal is to elongate the back of the neck as much as possible.

So it’s not just, you know, you drop the head because if you drop the head, you know, we’ve just wasted all our efforts.

It’s very important that you keep the chin in and slowly lower the hand.

Look what happens.

It also results in the back of the neck been very, very, very long.

And then when the head touches the floor, again, it creates traction between the ribcage, the back of the head.

They are kind of pulling on our neck, and our neck is being pulled in both directions.

Sometimes if you feel like it didn’t really fully happen, what you can do is that you can take your own hand and hold the back of your head, lift your head, and then pull at the back of the head and then lower your head on to the floor.

Sometimes this helps to add a little bit more of this traction.

Really try to feel how your lower back and your neck feel like they’re being pulled apart.

And this type of treatment sometimes you may experience when you go to massage, physiotherapy, you know, osteopathy.

But this technique allows you to do it yourself and it allows you to decompress your lower back and your neck, and it is a very effective technique to reduce the tension between the vertebra and also to relieve muscular tension.

So give it a try.

And then once we’re here we let completely go off all the muscular tension.

We will instruct also a short body scan which will bring the attention to the points of contact with the floor.

So the back of the head, the back of the shoulders, the space between the shoulder blades, the back of your arms, your sit bones, your calves, your heels, they’re touching the floor.

What also helps sometimes is that you can try to feel the weight of your body and you can imagine that the body is falling through the floor.

Sometimes it helps to additionally release all the muscular tension.

So the goal is to let the muscles go completely loose.

And then we spend some time in stillness here.

Ideally, don’t fall asleep.

Try to keep focused on the body while you are performing this stillness exercise.

And then after we spend some time in stillness, we need to return back to our daily activities.

So the way that we do it in Baseworks is that we first instruct to move the fingers and the toes.

And then on the next inhalation, you will extend the arms above your head and then stretch really, really comfortably, like when you wake up.

And then as you exhale, you completely relax, you let go of full tension one more time.

And then on your next inhalation, you will bend the knees and you will bring them close to the chest.

And then as you exhale, you will tilt to one side of the body.

Usually you will be instructed either right or left.

And then again, you will completely relax.

And then from that moment at your own pace, you can somehow come up, sit up, and that will be the end of the session.

So normally we will be performing the Assimilation at the end of the practice session.

But again, in the next practice lesson, you will try to perform it as is.

Just to get familiar with the dynamic, so that when you encounter it in the practice session, you know what to expect.

And of course, it feels very different when you do it on its own or you do it after physical activity.

So if you need to review this Key points lesson again to see all the details about what you’re supposed to do with your neck, please feel free to do so.

Or otherwise, you can transition to the next practice lesson and try this Assimilation pattern with spinal traction.