Day Seven: Upper

READING

Wow. This was a lage chunk of reading! At least it was only half of the chapter this time. There were lots of things I highlighted! I'll just talk about a couple. Firstly, right at the beginning of the chapter, it talks about how each part of the body fulfills a certain need or specific funtion. For instance, "A spine is important, but without legs and arms, it is hard to travel through space or reach out and realize our intentions in action." It's important to work on each individual part so they can all begin to contribute to the whole in the most efficient way possible.

Another section I found quite profound was the one about ineffective patterning. It says, "Many people in our Western culture reach for goals but do not support their reach with the push which will get them there...on the other hand, some people learn to push but never to really reach out into space." It's all just sort of a half-hearted effort. We have enough desire to accomplish things to go halfway, but are still too lazy/uneducated/scared to follow through completely.

CLASS

One of the most helpful things for myself that we talked about today was how to use your psoas. Someone asked that question, and Sister Hoopes said you don't generally feel anything when you're actually using the psoas. It's more of a matter of not feeling the rest of your muscles being used. That made much more sense to me than trying to "feel" my deep psoas. I'm really hoping for this to cross over in my technique class.

I also loved when we talked about how our body is built to support itself. I don't need to be holding any extra tension to try to keep myself up! My body itself is plenty sufficient.