Hey guys, good morning. It’s Stephen Dunn from CORE Therapy and Pilates, I’m out on my back porch, it’s a little humid, starting to rain a little bit…
I just got back from a quick walk with the dogs and it started raining on us and Dudley got all excited and spunky and going crazy… so… I wanted to come back today and do a quick little live video because the other day I was teaching a little 10-minute class, our #MindfulMovementMonday class and I mentioned the slinky effect of the spine.
When I mentioned the slinky affect and the spine, I said oh man I got to go home and look for a slinky and I realized that we didn’t have a slinky at home. So I said, I need to get my boys to go get a slinky and I’m thinking this in my head while I’m teaching this class when I used the reference of a slinky. This was Monday and the boys were off school and when I got home that night around 5:30 my son came up to me and said hey dad look what I bought today at the mall, a slinky… So it was just kind of crazy that the day I had mentioned it, the day I thought man I need to get a slinky… my kid, the universe spoke and he went and got a slinky.
So then yesterday I was in the clinic and someone that had watched the video had asked me, could you explain what you mentioned about the slinky, they weren’t quite sure what I was referencing. So I’m going to go over that today with the slinky…
I grew up in the 70s and 80s, I was born in the 70s, grew up in the 80s and we had slinky’s all the time and it was really a fun thing. My kids have had a few of them but they’ve been the plastic crappy ones… So now he actually bought a good nice metal one and I’m very excited about it… but anyway…
What does this slinky have to do with a spine and what does all this mean? Basically we tend to live our life compressed… compressed in our spine and forward and as that happens we end up with a whole bunch of mechanical problems. We end up with a lot of shortness in the neck, shortness in the chest, shortness in the psoas, the hip flexors, shortness in the quads and then all of a sudden you try to stand up straight and you can’t stand up straight. There’s no space, there’s no space in between your vertebrae, there’s no space in your muscles to actually stand erect…
What we try to teach people at CORE and what we try to really emphasize is how can we take your spine from that compressed position, which is this and we create a little bit of some length, like a slinky… Okay… because this is really what we need to accomplish…
So when we talk about the core engaging and the shoulder blades going back and down and the head coming back, the reality is it’s creating this slinky effect or a decompression of your spine… So that’s really it in a nutshell…
We want to create the decompression of the spine, we want to create length in the spine and if we’re like this (slouched posture)… that’s not very good but if we’re like this (slinky)… we’re gonna be doing much… not shaking that much… but like this, we’re gonna be in a much better place.
That’s my story of the slinky and the spine, I hope that makes sense. We want a long, elongated spine… we don’t want that short compressed spine…
So do your release work, release your chest, release your hip flexors with the ball and then do your strengthening work, core engagement, shoulder blade engagement, chin tuck. We’re creating length in the spine…
Hey thanks for joining us guys, I appreciate it. I can’t tell who it is but I see a few likes coming up so thanks guys… That’s it, I’ll see y’all soon… Peace, have a great day… Bye now.
Have you noticed your posture in not a good way?
Are you starting to notice that old lady hump on the back of your neck? You know what I mean if you know what I mean…
Is your slouched posture contributing to your spinal pain? Lack of energy? Salty mood? Well guess what? Poor posture can do all of that and so much more… Call 512.215.4227 to learn more about how we can teach you to have a spine like a slinky…