Coordinate hips and spine for walking
I was talking to a friend about how our lives are punctuated, the moments that define us. It could be having kids, getting a new job, leaving an old one, moving across the country, or moving across the world.
The fact is that we are always moving. It just depends how we want to experience it: with tension or with ease.
I’ve been obsessed with the way we walk, how we swivel and connect through the spine to the hips, and how the head shifts at the top of the spine as a gentle counter-balance.
I love this lesson for ease of walking, and it’s good to do when I want to unwind. The timing is important here, and when I smooth out the timing to eliminate all the jagged edges and starts and stops and misjudged distances, I feel as if my life gets smoother.
It’s not like the lesson is complicated. What’s complicated is the use of my attention, the tracking.
In the beginning, I always find I’m holding my jaw. Then it lets go as my attention widens to include the pelvis, legs, hips, and spine.
If my focus is too narrow, the tension sets in.
Hmm, food for thought.
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Thought for the day: You've been training your whole life to become the person you are now. Who do you want to become next?
When you train in sensing yourself differently, you also sense new choices.
Use these lessons to imagine possibilities.
Download the “Free Your Hips” series: five lessons on freeing the hips for easier walking. $39 for five lessons. All new!
Play the gentle hips lessons in the Treasury. (This lesson is #6.)
“I think it’s much more interesting to live not knowing than to have answers which might be wrong.”