How to stop your Demented Mechanic giving you that bad back

You’re taking your car for a service. The mechanic drives it on to the hydraulic lift and raises your car up high so he can work underneath it.

Next, he rolls a crane up beside your car as it sits on the lift. Then he then attaches the crane’s claw to the roof of your car. Finally, he leans the crane back and lifts your car up off its hydraulic support.

How dare that mechanic treat your car like that? Truly he must be demented to even think of doing such a thing!

What does all this have to do with your back?

Practically every person I see does the exactly the same thing with their chest that that mechanic did with your car. (That’s practically every person I see anywhere, not just those who come to me for lessons). Strange but true.

So what’s really going on here?

Like the car resting on the lift, your rib-cage and chest naturally rest on top of your belly. It’s common to think of your belly as some kind of flabby space between your chest and your legs. If this were so, then you really would need to use your spine and back muscles as a kind of crane to hold your chest up.

Since that’s how you imagine your belly, that’s what you do.

But your belly is not a flabby space

Your belly is a hydraulic support.

What you call your “belly” is better described as your abdominal/pelvic region. This region of your body is entirely enclosed in strong, muscular walls. Essentially, it’s a kind of very strong, water-filled bag. (Of course, there are fats and oils there as well as water and of course many of your organs are there in that bag.) The point is all those organs are all contained in and filled with a mixture of fluids.

Fluids, unlike gases, cannot be squashed, so, as long as the muscular sides of your belly bag remain firm, the top of the bag provides a firm support for whatever is sitting on top of it. Just like a firm water bed — or a hydraulic car lift.

What makes your belly firm?

When you allow your chest’s weight to be supported by that belly bag, the extra internal pressure in the bag tries to push the front of your lower belly outwards and to widen your hips. This pushing stimulates your Transversus Abdominis muscle (and your pelvic floor muscles) to tighten, keeping everything in place. While this is happening, the top of the bag can’t be pushed down.

That’s how your belly works.

… until your Demented Mechanic steps in

I should have said: “That’s how your belly is meant to work”. The problem is you don’t imagine your belly being like that. Like your demented car mechanic who didn’t trust his hydraulic car lift, you imagine your belly as a flabby space, unable to support anything. So you press your spine and back muscles into action. You make your back act as a crane, hoisting your chest up off your belly.

This involves a lot of extra effort in your back and effectively disables the support you would otherwise get from the hydraulic nature of that belly bag.

Worse, your belly bag, far from supporting your chest, is now hanging from your chest: it’s actually weighing you down. So, in tightening your back and arching your lumbar spine backwards, your Demented Mechanic is lifting not just your chest but your belly as well.

This extra lifting means your back has to work even harder to do something it never should have needed to do at all. It also means that your belly gets flabbier and flabbier because it no longer has anything to do.

“But if I don’t hold myself up, I collapse”

“If I’m not meant to hold myself up with my back, why do I collapse when I don’t hold myself up straight?“

Good question. The answer has two parts.

The first reason for your collapse

Remember you’ve been hauling your chest off your belly. So you have to lower it back down again before your belly can support you.

However, this is only a temporary lowering.

Lowering your chest on to your belly bag stimulates exactly the necessary muscles in your belly. They then work harder to support the weight of your chest. So stimulated, these muscles squeeze the bag into a longer, thinner shape which then pushes your chest up to where it’s meant to be.

This stimulation simply doesn’t happen unless you first increase the pressure in your belly bag by lowering the weight of your chest onto it. You must first collapse onto your belly before your belly muscles can react by pushing you back up again.

The second reason for your collapse

The second reason why you collapse when you don’t hold yourself up straight is this. In order to hoist yourself up with your back, you arch your spine and lean backwards. That’s what you’re accustomed to, so it feels normal — and straight.

When you stop leaning backwards, you allow yourself to be truly straight and upright. Since this true straight is further forwards than the leaning backwards you’re accustomed to, being truly straight feels like stooping forwards.

That feeling of stooping forwards is incredibly convincing. Being so convinced that you’re leaning forwards, it’s no wonder you don’t stay there. It’s no wonder you quickly return to leaning backwards. Once again, you hoist yourself back and up, off your belly. Once again you deprive your chest of its support from below. Deprived of that support, you sag downwards under the strain.

Now you can see what your Demented Mechanic is

Your Demented Mechanic is that crazy mixed-up mish-mash of old habits, debauched kinaesthesia and truly mad ideas that I’ve been describing to you. Your Demented Mechanic is also part of our culture: you share that same crazy mish-mash with most other people on the planet.

So stop listening to your Demented Mechanic

Both reasons for collapse come from listening to your Demented Mechanic. Your Demented Mechanic is used to being in charge. Your Demented Mechanic isn’t going to stop telling you what to do. You have to stop listening to him — or her.

Here’s how to go about it

Notice the effort your back is making to hold you up and just stop it. Let yourself collapse. It’s the only way — and it works. It does take practice, though. Any old collapse is just any old collapse: it’s not the stopping pulling your chest off your belly that I’m talking about.

Stopping listening to your Demented Mechanic is going to take a lot of practice. So start now. Then write and tell me how you’re getting on. If you write, I can help you further.

This article is included under the following categories:‒

Personal Coaching by Philip Pawley

If you want to get the best kind of help, come to me for an introductory lesson in Liverpool.

If you’re too far away, then the next best thing is to get personal lessons and advice from me online at Repoise.com, my on-line school. (Both far-away and local pupils use Repoise).

In more detail:–

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

There’s nothing better than individual lessons. My practice is at 37 Hope Street, Liverpool L1. Ring me on 0151 708 6172 to book an initial consultation and first lesson. (Leave your number so I can get back to you).
If you’re short of funds, you can still have first class training from me — though it will require a little more work on your part.

The thing to do is have an individual, in-person lesson just once a month. That will entitle you to also get regular on-line lessons from me through Repoise. That way, you have the best of both worlds: in-person lessons and very regular, even daily, on-line Personal Coaching by Philip Pawley from me. That’s a real bargain because Repoise costs the equivalent of three lessons a year to everyone else.

Ring me on 0151 708 6172 if you want to arrange this.
I occasionally run group lessons. If you’re interested in these, go here for details.

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

There’s still nothing better than individual lessons. Here’s where you can find a teacher near you in the UK or elsewhere
I suggest you also get direct day-to-day guidance from me by joining Repoise.
If you’re having plain Alexander Technique lessons from someone else, you still need to discover the Smiling Back Method of the Alexander Technique. You’ll get a lot more out of your lessons when you do.

37 Hope Street, Liverpool, Merseyside L1 9EA, England
Telephone: +44 151 708 6172 Mobile: +44 7872 905 154

Philip Pawley

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