Greetings from San Francisco! We've been in California for a week and a half now, driving from Los Angeles up the coast on Highway 1, pausing here for a few days before we travel on to Yosemite National Park. It has been a week of contrasts: from sunshine and blue skies in LA to chilly cloud and fog in San Francisco, and the ocean and beautiful beaches to the left, with sun scorched hills to the right. There's so much to see everywhere I look and many, many things I've never seen before - it's been new experiences all the way.
52 @ 50 no. 7 - Running Over Golden Gate Bridge
Well that was an early morning run with a difference! San Francisco is often cold and cloudy in the mornings and long-sleeved tops were required. Gideon (hubbie) and I ran around the coastal path and then over Golden Gate Bridge into Marin County, pausing at the viewpoint to look across the Bay before crossing back to the City and adding on a few more kilometers in Presidio Park to finish the run. The towers of the bridge were covered in cloud and looking out to sea there was hardly any visibility at all. The other way, looking inland, was clear and there was a great view of the city. It would have been really easy to stay in bed but I'm so glad I didn't - running across the Golden Gate Bridge was a real experience.
So I invite you now to look at your surroundings, wherever you are, a little more closely. What do you see? What do you notice? Look up - what is above you? And look down too and take this moment to change your perspective.
When we are looking up and down, whether on or off the mat, it pays to take care of your neck. It's a delicate structure and the health of it is precious. Here's a great article which explains the muscles of the neck and how to keep it safe as you do your yoga:
Save Your Neck: Practice Wisely to Prevent Pain
By Julie Gudmestad via Yoga Journal
Judging from the complaints of my physical therapy clients, chronic neck tension is a modern American epidemic. Even the more benign consequences—the painful crick in your neck, the dull headache radiating from the back of your skull—can be mighty annoying. The more serious ones, like pinched nerves, arthritis, and damaged discs, can be debilitating.
Fortunately, yoga can do wonders for neck problems while simultaneously teaching safer, healthier posture habits. But some of the poses that can help you, like Sirsasana (Headstand) and Sarvangasana (Shoulderstand), can also do harm if performed incorrectly. It’s important to approach them with knowledge of proper alignment.
Let’s take a look at the muscles of the back of the neck. Why do they cause so much trouble, and how can we use yoga to help them function better? The primary muscles of the back of the neck are the levator scapulae, which extend from the cervical (neck) vertebrae to each inner upper scapula (shoulder blade). Lying on top of the levators and also inserting on the shoulder blades are the upper trapezius muscles, which originate on the base of the skull and the neck vertebrae. Together, these muscles lift the scapula and backbend the neck. The levators and trapezius muscles also help to turn the head and sidebend the neck.
The stress of a busy lifestyle with deadlines, difficult people, and lack of sleep certainly tightens neck and jaw muscles. A forward head posture is also a factor for many people. An average head weighs 12 to 15 pounds; when that weight sits forward of the central line of the spine, the muscles on the back of the neck have to work very hard to hold the head up against the pull of gravity.
Whether due to stress or poor head-neck alignment, chronic tightness in the levator scapulae and the upper trapezius can lead to significant neck pain. As the muscles pull down on the base of the skull and upper neck, they also pull up on the scapula. All this adds up to compression on the cervical vertebra. Such tightness and compression can lead to arthritis, cause nerve pressure that makes pain radiate down the arm, and increase the likelihood of neck muscle injuries.
Do No Harm On the Mat
Just as in medicine, a key rule in hatha yoga is “First, do no harm.” It’s crucial to avoid common yoga mistakes that can result in neck injury. If you come to yoga after years of neck tension, the muscles at the back of your neck will probably be quite short and tight, limiting your ability to bring your head toward your chest. Since you need a great deal of this neck flexion to do Shoulderstand, forcing a tight neck into the pose can strain the muscles and ligaments. Even worse, forced flexion can cause cervical vertebrae discs to bulge or herniate, serious injuries that may take many months to heal.
Many people habitually tighten their neck and shoulder muscles when they concentrate, and it’s easy to carry that habit over into yoga. This can be especially true in backbends. Students tend to overcontract the neck, sticking the chin out and up and compressing the back of the neck. This action can result in anunpleasant headache after backbends such as Bhujangasana (Cobra Pose), Salabhasana (Locust), and Urdhva Dhanurasana (Upward-Facing Bow). Fortunately, one backbend actually lengthens the back of the neck. Doing Bridge Pose supported on bolsters for a few minutes three or four times a week can help prepare you for Shoulderstand.
Decompress Your Neck
It’s helpful to learn how to relax, lengthen, and decompress your neck before you try to do it in a pose. Here’s a simple exercise to prepare you for keeping your shoulders down and neck relaxed in yoga poses. Hold an object weighing one to two pounds in each hand, letting the weight of the objects pull the shoulder blades down. Make sure that you keep the breastbone lifting up so that the tops of the shoulders don’t pull down and forward, collapsing the chest. Now set the objects down and see if you can find the muscles you need to pull your shoulder blades down just as the weights did.
These muscles are called the lower trapezius. They attach to the vertebrae of the midback and insert on the inner border of the shoulder blades. They are the antagonist muscles to the upper trapezius—in other words, they perform the opposite action—and are very important posture muscles, helping support the spine in the midback. Unfortunately, when the lower traps are too weak to counteract the pull of the stronger and tighter upper traps, the scapulae will tend to ride up, compressing your neck.
Now let’s take these lessons and apply them in an asana. Stand with your legs ready for Virabhadrasana II (Warrior II). Lift your breastbone up and pull the scapula down: This action requires release and lengthening in the upper traps and contraction and firmness in the lower traps. Next, lift your arms out to the sides to shoulder height, turning your palms up. Feel how turning the palms up helps bring the shoulders down and activates the lower traps. Keeping that action and position of the shoulder blades, turn the palms back down; you now have the correct shoulder and arm position for Warrior II and many of the other standing poses.
It is also important to incorporate this action into Headstand, so that you can protect your neck from compression. When you’re upside down, gravity pulls the shoulders toward the ears, so you need extra awareness and strength in the lower traps. While in Headstand, have a helper put a finger on each shoulder blade at the base of the neck and gently draw the fingers away from the floor, lifting your scapulae toward your hips. At first you may get disoriented while upside down, but once you’ve felt the proper direction of lift, you should find it easier to engage your lower traps.
Before you begin working on Headstand, you should probably spend at least several months working on a variety of other poses to strengthen your back and neck muscles and improve the alignment of your spine. It’s also a good idea to be strong in all of the arm and shoulder muscles before trying Headstand. The small cervical vertebrae are designed to support only the weight of the head, but when we do Headstand, they are supporting nearly the full weight of your body. Unless you have developed enough strength in the arm and shoulder muscles to take a little of the weight off your head and to balance the body if it shifts around slightly in Headstand, you can injure your neck. Work often on Downward-Facing Dog and Handstand to build the strength and endurance that will help prepare you for a safer Headstand.
One final thought about Headstand: A normally curved neck will bear the weight of Headstand much more easily and safely than an overly curved or overly flattened neck. To check your own neck curve, stand in front of a mirror. With a normal curve, your chin should be level and you should be looking into your own eyes in the mirror. Put several fingers of one hand across the back of the neck. The tissues there should feel soft, and the neck should curve slightly forward. Now drop your chin and feel how the tissues become hard and the curve flattens. Then lift the chin and feel how the back of the neck compresses.
In Headstand, if your head contacts the floor toward the forehead, your neck curve increases and the back of the neck compresses. If your contact point is toward the back of the head, your neck flattens. When you do Headstand, make sure you are centered on the very middle of your head. Look in a mirror while you’re in Headstand—or have a teacher look at you—and make sure that your eyes look straight ahead, your neck curve is normal, and the back of your neck is soft.
Practicing yoga poses with conscious awareness of your head, neck, and shoulder alignment will help you gradually break the habit of chronic neck tension. The benefits to your health and well-being will be many—and you probably won’t be seeking an appointment with me for a yoga-related neck injury.
52 @ 50 no. 7 - Running Over Golden Gate Bridge
Well that was an early morning run with a difference! San Francisco is often cold and cloudy in the mornings and long-sleeved tops were required. Gideon (hubbie) and I ran around the coastal path and then over Golden Gate Bridge into Marin County, pausing at the viewpoint to look across the Bay before crossing back to the City and adding on a few more kilometers in Presidio Park to finish the run. The towers of the bridge were covered in cloud and looking out to sea there was hardly any visibility at all. The other way, looking inland, was clear and there was a great view of the city. It would have been really easy to stay in bed but I'm so glad I didn't - running across the Golden Gate Bridge was a real experience.
Look Up and Look Down
It's easy to get stuck on "autopilot" in our everyday lives. Through necessity we go through our routines in order to make the most efficient use of our time and get things done. We have rituals in yoga too - clearing a space in our day to practice, clearing a space literally to unroll the mat, the flow of Sun Salutations and pausing at the beginning and the end for centering are all sequences that we repeat regularly. They are soothing and reassuring and help the busy mind to quieten down. But sometimes our routines can feel more like drudgery - the laundry, the commute, work itself - and life can feel a bit dull and uninteresting.
Yoga, meditation and mindfulness remind us to to be present and notice what's around us. To stay curious and interested in life and not to lose the 'joie de vivre'. It's easy to do this when we are on holiday - there are brand new views, time to sit and relax, and no chores to do - but how to bring this into everyday life? We can do it by paying attention, by looking more closely at familiar things, by looking up at the clouds, the changing light, the stars, and the vastness of the sky above us and by looking down at the earth too, noticing the things that live and grow upon it, noticing the landscapes and how they change with the seasons. In this way we don't take the little things for granted, we appreciate it all. We learn to make a conscious choice of where we place our awareness - on the breath or a mantra in our meditation practice, on the person who is talking to us, on the food we are preparing for our meals, on the natural world outside our front doors,... In this way we become less caught up in the stream of random thoughts that constantly pass through our minds and more deliberate about directing our attention to real life which is unfolding in front of us.
Here are some of my holiday photos so far. There are so many things to look at, so much to take in ....
Looking Up
The moon and a palm tree just after sunset
Los Angeles roof structure
Looking up at an Abutilon flower
My view in Shoulderstand
Interesting architectural design at
Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art
Look Down
Looking down on Hollywood Boulevard
Jellyfish at Monterey Aquarium (completely mesmerising and very
relaxing to watch - this could be a stress relief therapy ...)
Looking down on the very top of a conifer tree
(I was standing on a flight of stairs)
Looking down into the centre of a flower.
- it looks like a Protea but I'm not sure...
A different view of the world in Handstand
- by Golden Gate Bridge
So I invite you now to look at your surroundings, wherever you are, a little more closely. What do you see? What do you notice? Look up - what is above you? And look down too and take this moment to change your perspective.
Save Your Neck: Practice Wisely to Prevent Pain
By Julie Gudmestad via Yoga Journal
Judging from the complaints of my physical therapy clients, chronic neck tension is a modern American epidemic. Even the more benign consequences—the painful crick in your neck, the dull headache radiating from the back of your skull—can be mighty annoying. The more serious ones, like pinched nerves, arthritis, and damaged discs, can be debilitating.
Fortunately, yoga can do wonders for neck problems while simultaneously teaching safer, healthier posture habits. But some of the poses that can help you, like Sirsasana (Headstand) and Sarvangasana (Shoulderstand), can also do harm if performed incorrectly. It’s important to approach them with knowledge of proper alignment.
Let’s take a look at the muscles of the back of the neck. Why do they cause so much trouble, and how can we use yoga to help them function better? The primary muscles of the back of the neck are the levator scapulae, which extend from the cervical (neck) vertebrae to each inner upper scapula (shoulder blade). Lying on top of the levators and also inserting on the shoulder blades are the upper trapezius muscles, which originate on the base of the skull and the neck vertebrae. Together, these muscles lift the scapula and backbend the neck. The levators and trapezius muscles also help to turn the head and sidebend the neck.
The stress of a busy lifestyle with deadlines, difficult people, and lack of sleep certainly tightens neck and jaw muscles. A forward head posture is also a factor for many people. An average head weighs 12 to 15 pounds; when that weight sits forward of the central line of the spine, the muscles on the back of the neck have to work very hard to hold the head up against the pull of gravity.
Whether due to stress or poor head-neck alignment, chronic tightness in the levator scapulae and the upper trapezius can lead to significant neck pain. As the muscles pull down on the base of the skull and upper neck, they also pull up on the scapula. All this adds up to compression on the cervical vertebra. Such tightness and compression can lead to arthritis, cause nerve pressure that makes pain radiate down the arm, and increase the likelihood of neck muscle injuries.
Do No Harm On the Mat
Just as in medicine, a key rule in hatha yoga is “First, do no harm.” It’s crucial to avoid common yoga mistakes that can result in neck injury. If you come to yoga after years of neck tension, the muscles at the back of your neck will probably be quite short and tight, limiting your ability to bring your head toward your chest. Since you need a great deal of this neck flexion to do Shoulderstand, forcing a tight neck into the pose can strain the muscles and ligaments. Even worse, forced flexion can cause cervical vertebrae discs to bulge or herniate, serious injuries that may take many months to heal.
Many people habitually tighten their neck and shoulder muscles when they concentrate, and it’s easy to carry that habit over into yoga. This can be especially true in backbends. Students tend to overcontract the neck, sticking the chin out and up and compressing the back of the neck. This action can result in anunpleasant headache after backbends such as Bhujangasana (Cobra Pose), Salabhasana (Locust), and Urdhva Dhanurasana (Upward-Facing Bow). Fortunately, one backbend actually lengthens the back of the neck. Doing Bridge Pose supported on bolsters for a few minutes three or four times a week can help prepare you for Shoulderstand.
Decompress Your Neck
It’s helpful to learn how to relax, lengthen, and decompress your neck before you try to do it in a pose. Here’s a simple exercise to prepare you for keeping your shoulders down and neck relaxed in yoga poses. Hold an object weighing one to two pounds in each hand, letting the weight of the objects pull the shoulder blades down. Make sure that you keep the breastbone lifting up so that the tops of the shoulders don’t pull down and forward, collapsing the chest. Now set the objects down and see if you can find the muscles you need to pull your shoulder blades down just as the weights did.
These muscles are called the lower trapezius. They attach to the vertebrae of the midback and insert on the inner border of the shoulder blades. They are the antagonist muscles to the upper trapezius—in other words, they perform the opposite action—and are very important posture muscles, helping support the spine in the midback. Unfortunately, when the lower traps are too weak to counteract the pull of the stronger and tighter upper traps, the scapulae will tend to ride up, compressing your neck.
Now let’s take these lessons and apply them in an asana. Stand with your legs ready for Virabhadrasana II (Warrior II). Lift your breastbone up and pull the scapula down: This action requires release and lengthening in the upper traps and contraction and firmness in the lower traps. Next, lift your arms out to the sides to shoulder height, turning your palms up. Feel how turning the palms up helps bring the shoulders down and activates the lower traps. Keeping that action and position of the shoulder blades, turn the palms back down; you now have the correct shoulder and arm position for Warrior II and many of the other standing poses.
It is also important to incorporate this action into Headstand, so that you can protect your neck from compression. When you’re upside down, gravity pulls the shoulders toward the ears, so you need extra awareness and strength in the lower traps. While in Headstand, have a helper put a finger on each shoulder blade at the base of the neck and gently draw the fingers away from the floor, lifting your scapulae toward your hips. At first you may get disoriented while upside down, but once you’ve felt the proper direction of lift, you should find it easier to engage your lower traps.
Before you begin working on Headstand, you should probably spend at least several months working on a variety of other poses to strengthen your back and neck muscles and improve the alignment of your spine. It’s also a good idea to be strong in all of the arm and shoulder muscles before trying Headstand. The small cervical vertebrae are designed to support only the weight of the head, but when we do Headstand, they are supporting nearly the full weight of your body. Unless you have developed enough strength in the arm and shoulder muscles to take a little of the weight off your head and to balance the body if it shifts around slightly in Headstand, you can injure your neck. Work often on Downward-Facing Dog and Handstand to build the strength and endurance that will help prepare you for a safer Headstand.
One final thought about Headstand: A normally curved neck will bear the weight of Headstand much more easily and safely than an overly curved or overly flattened neck. To check your own neck curve, stand in front of a mirror. With a normal curve, your chin should be level and you should be looking into your own eyes in the mirror. Put several fingers of one hand across the back of the neck. The tissues there should feel soft, and the neck should curve slightly forward. Now drop your chin and feel how the tissues become hard and the curve flattens. Then lift the chin and feel how the back of the neck compresses.
In Headstand, if your head contacts the floor toward the forehead, your neck curve increases and the back of the neck compresses. If your contact point is toward the back of the head, your neck flattens. When you do Headstand, make sure you are centered on the very middle of your head. Look in a mirror while you’re in Headstand—or have a teacher look at you—and make sure that your eyes look straight ahead, your neck curve is normal, and the back of your neck is soft.
Practicing yoga poses with conscious awareness of your head, neck, and shoulder alignment will help you gradually break the habit of chronic neck tension. The benefits to your health and well-being will be many—and you probably won’t be seeking an appointment with me for a yoga-related neck injury.
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