Why does not understanding your shoulders cause pain?

Imagine being strapped too tightly into a full climbing harness. The harness is attached around your hips, around your legs and around your shoulders. It’s very uncomfortable because it’s pulling your shoulders back and down, jamming your body into your hips.

That’s exactly what you do with your shoulder muscles.

You have a whole panoply of different shoulder muscles. They pull your shoulders in every direction imaginable. These muscles can twist your shoulders every which way.

Because most of your shoulder muscles lie in your back, they get mistaken for back muscles and used to pull your back and neck around. They end up being used in your attempt to hold yourself tall and straight.

Which muscles am I talking about?

Latissimus Dorsi

The most important of these muscles is the widest muscle in your back: “Musculus Latissimus Dorsi” in the anatomy books. One on the left and one on the right, each latissimus dorsi muscle acts like a climbing harness strap. Together, these two muscles link your shoulder blades down to the large flat bone at the back of your hips.

From the shoulder blade, each latissimus dorsi muscle continues up, passing through your arm-pit, to attach to your upper arm.

Other strong muscles move and hold your shoulder blades in various other ways. Your shoulder blades are linked together across your back, attached up to your head and neck, and anchored down to your lower back.

Yet more muscles attach the shoulder blades forward to your rib-cage. These last muscles act like the strap across your chest on the climbing harness.

A natural climbing harness

Taken together, all these muscles form a natural climbing harness.

Apes and monkeys use that climbing harness to swing through the trees by their hands. All that swinging keeps those shoulder muscles stretched and limber. No monkey would ever mistake its shoulder muscles for back muscles.

We humans are different in that we tend not to swing from trees very much. As a result we tend to forget what those muscle are for. We forget that they are shoulder muscles. We forget that their main purpose is to enable us to swing ourselves around by our arms.

Misusing our natural climbing harness

Mistaking our natural climbing harness for back muscles, we begin to use it to pull ourselves up straight.

“Neck back, shoulders straight!” It’s not just soldiers on parade who are told to do that. We all get the same demands from concerned parents, from teachers, even from friends and colleagues.

It may be a bit more subtle, but we get essentially the same input from fitness instructors, doctors and physiotherapists. Culturally brain-washed as we are, our professionals share and propagate the myth that our shoulder muscles are back muscles and that their purpose is to hold us erect.

Now we recognise our climbing harness for what it is, we can begin to slacken the straps. Relieved of the pain caused by a too-tight muscular climbing harness, we can begin to look in more appropriate places for the secret to standing tall and straight.

Further Resources

Here are some ways I can help you further.

Wherever you live

1. If you’re not already getting my free weekly article delivered to your inbox, then go here to get it.
2. Repoise is our membership site for people who are serious about improving themselves (and getting out of pain as they do that). Find out more here: SmilingBackMethod.com/Repoise When you join, you will:–
   • have daily access to me. Together we will work out what’s going wrong for you and how to fix it
   • learn from reading other Repoise members’ questions and following their progress as they work with me
   • get access to all my articles, not just the ones that are published on my web-site
   Check it out and judge for yourself: SmilingBackMethod.com/Repoise
3. I’m writing a book about my work. It will come out on the 1st July 2010. The book I was going to write this year (on the Tube Principle) was a bit too specialised so I changed my mind about writing that book. This new book will still include a chapter or two on the Tube Principle — and, of course, much more besides.

If you’re in Liverpool (or can get to Liverpool)

1. I’m also running introductory workshops in Liverpool teaching you how to apply my work to improve your life. Go here for details of the next workshop: SmilingBackMethod.com/workshop
2. There’s no substitute for individual lessons. Ring me on 0151 708 6172 to book your initial lesson. (Leave your number so I can get back to you).

If you’re further away and can’t get to Liverpool

1. There’s still no substitute for individual lessons. Here’s where you can find a teacher near you in the UK or elsewhere
2. Remember to still do the things I listed above for everyone. Even if you’re having lessons from someone else, you will find these a very great help. They’ll help you understand your lessons better and get a lot more out of them. All my own pupils read my weekly articles and several of them are active members of Repoise.