Regarding the differences in bodies

I am a wee bit busy, so I shall for that necessity keep this shorter than I had thought. Yesterday saw another Kali Sikaran practice, but even before, there was something up with my right knee. The right knee is usually more well-behaved than the left, but not this time. It might have something to do with a wonky move I did during a kata on Monday, where I certainly did not make the right movement with my right leg while turning from a sitting position, and it felt as if I had almost torn a muscle or something in the thigh. I kept going, of course, but that may have affected my knee. Thus, the Sikaran practice, where of course we were kicking, we also were to grab hold of the other's leg and hold it, sometimes drag and sometimes push, and that, as you may imagine, did not do anything good for my knee. In fact, the trainer managed to make me say "Aow, that hurts, that hurts." which is rather rare indeed. Of course, I am careful in general, having no softening stuff underneath the kneecap itself, but this was something more than that. Some of the twisting and turning when kicking also stressed the same parts of the knee, and I resolved to be careful with stretching, and do it several times also today. It does not appear to have helped much, so I suppose I tore something small, or caused a... well, something. This evening I was to be the trainer for iaido, since sensei could not come. To my surprise, neither did anyone else, bar one woman from the beginners' group. This was of course turned into something very beneficial as soon as we figured no one else would come, and the entire practice was spent with the added focus of having a woman's body in what is, gender equality and so on notwithstanding, a sport essentially designed by and for a male body. Biologically, this does make quite a difference at times. The positioning of certain parts of the skeleton are different, such as the hipbones. Our hips are far more mobile, I suppose you could say, giving slightly different conditions in many areas - for example, when running, biologically female bodies expend more energy than biologically male (henceforth, the terms "female" and "male", "man" and "woman" will be used without such prefixes, but rest assured I am aware of the difficulties and nuances and variations of gender and sex, chosen and biological). In iaido, the most noticeable part is the cutting. A proper cut with a katana is stopped partly by correct grip of the tsuka (sword-handle), and more besides, but definitely by your arms sort of naturally hitting a stopping point: your chest. Even with shoulders rolled back, if you hold and cut correctly, your upper arms will naturally come to a halt because there is a chest in the way. For a body where there is not merely a chest with ribs and muscles, but also two bags of fat, that can be everything from nothing annoying to a bloody nuisance and huge in size, there is a problem - your arms will suddenly stop before they ought to. (Quite apart from the fact of the shoulders being built slightly different, and women having a wee bit of a harder time building muscles). So there you are, cutting as beautifully as you can, but... bump. The most natural way is to in some way bend your elbows, but be careful the male sensei and senpai (lit. "teacher" and "person of higher [status]") know WHY you do this*, and do try to find a compromise between having the "correct" posture and way of cutting, and adapting it to your own body's condition and prerequisites. *And don't let them get away with the "hrrrmhhrrrrmh" of not wanting to speak of it. We are at practice, training in one way or another a martial art. Stop being flustered about body parts. It's just a variation on a general theme - sacks of fat, or no sacks of fat. If you have them, you do have to do things a wee bit differently. Get over it. But be careful you do not suddenly start doing strange things. Keep your shoulders back, have a look at what you're doing with your elbow - it might possibly have to be a wee bit more bent, and try to twist it so it doesn't show the inside upwards, but rather towards your body. Now, I am using iaido as the example here. But the discussion is still valid: every body is different, the differences between bodies of different sexes are generally the largest. When running or walking, a female body will swing the hips a bit more than a male, their way of using the feet is a bit different, when doing crunches or pushups or what the bother ever - it will be different. Variations on a theme (the theme being human body with bones, muscles, ligaments etcetera), but still variations. Your body is different from everybody else's. This means one body may have visible, swelling muscles with no effort, and you forever wishing your softness would disappear (mine won't, it just doesn't run in the female side of the family to go without a most charming little roundness on the stomach and well-shaped arms that look soft and feminine no matter how strong we are, but the legs, and the butt, oh, THEY show at once if we have been running or walking or somesuch). Or your body may refuse to be more dextrous than it already is, no matter how good at yoga you have become, whereas your neighbour can bend around like a gymnast. Or you need to work bloody hard at the dexterity part, whereas your stamina has been good since you were little. Always try to follow the advice of your trainer, but do read up on it too. Don't go wikipedia or youtube on it. Don't argue too much (especially not during your training session! damnit, there's little enough time as it is), but do ask questions and pose suggestions in a creative way, rather than a criticising. If you train something that has very set rules and ways, well, deal with it, and keep in mind who it was made for, and in what circumstances and how your body may differ from the conditions of that. If, however, your trainer says "...but we have different strengths and weaknesses, and our bodies are different" then rejoice, because then you know what no matter how long you train, you will always meet other people who do the same thing as you, but perhaps in a slightly different way, to better suit their own bodies, and sometimes you will gain good insight from this as to your own way of doing things. Always be ready to listen, and try, but be also always a little bit careful. ...did I say this was going to be short? I seem to have failed. Especially relevant for this blog, I would say is the matter of running. Surprisingly many people have now confessed to me they run barefoot style in various situations, and one even during their normal jogging , but I got the feeling that the people selling them shoes didn't quite accept that way of running... It can work. It certainly does for me. Suddenly, changing style and way of using my body, I found one that suited me. Have you experienced such a change in your preferred way(s) of physical exercise? How do you deal with the limit, constraints, strengths and opportunities your body has? Give an example, if you like!

On stretching your legs

I believe I said I would write a post on stretching, and thus I will do! This might become a wall of text... be warned. Now, I have heard so many contradictory things on stretching, that it is quite ridiculous. I will once again revert to my favourite saying of "to each their own", but to me, that is a "yes please". Some feel nothing, some (like me) can immediately tell the difference the day after between having stretched properly, and not having done so. I am not a scientist, I am not a researcher in this matter, but these will be my personal reflections and recommendations. Regarding the main point of this blog, which is to keep me running and exercising because I know people know if I do or not, this brings with it several things. Stretching is one of them. I tend to say I am about as dextrous and limber as a refridgerator, which I am not alone in saying about myself. Remember the three important things I spoke about earlier? Strength, stamina and dexterity. The last is the trickiest, and the one most often overlooked, and the most important. Being limber helps prevent oh so many injuries, and that, at least, is something I have never heard disagreement of. Even weight lifters and boxers need to be limber and dextrous, whatever one may think. Stretching is something that needn't be done after training. It can be done before, during, or without relation to at all. The different kinds of yoga have different ideas about this, too - some say it should be done in a hot environment to keep the body soft and limber, others say it ought to be done with no warmup, so as to get better effect. But stretching after training have, with the majority of people I know, a beneficial effect, in that not only does it limber you up, it also helps the muscles so that they do not go all contracted from earlier exertion. I will here mainly focus on stretching the legs - that is the most important part for me, and there are really so many ways of stretching it is quite astounding. I recently saw a book which I liked, but could not afford at that moment, regarding "new ways" of stretching. They took a bit of a look at some exercises and told of how to change them, so as not to, with the new knowledge we have of the human body, risk injury or strain it involuntarily. There are many books on the matter, but the best also contain some anatomical guidance, so that you can see things from a more holistic point of view, and with a better understanding of how every little thing affects another. "Prescriptive Stretching" by Kristian Berg is one that might be good, as I am always a fan of going past the "everyday things" into the realm of recovery, medical aid and so on. After all, why should I do "everyday things" instead of things that are designed to be extra gentle and extra good and extra helpful in rebuilding a body, or keeping it in good condition? "The anatomy of stretching" by Brad Walker might also be of use, although I have not read it myself. The more technical and less popular-science-y a book, the more I am inclined to look at it... Your mileage may vary, however. An important part to stretching is this: we want to stretch our muscles, usually, first and foremost, and the tendons carefully and second. We do not want to bend our bones out of the way, nor make odd little bits of the body pop out of their sockets or strain to keep up. The standard starter point is a good posture. Oh, have you heard this until your ears fell off! But it is still valid. Stand straight, your knees ever so slightly bent, and clench your stomach muscles, straightening up. Then you can let go of that, but the important part is: do not rest on your back. Do not get a duck-butt. It is not good for your spine. Push your jaw in a bit. In fact, try to stretch out your spine, holding two fingers above your breast area and sliding them upwards, trying to follow with your entire body. Roll your shoulders back. Hold your head proud but not nose in the air! Roll a bit on your feet, perhaps, back and forth, but keep your weight perhaps 55%/45% onto the front part of the foot. And so on, and so forth. No one can learn this but you yourselves. When stretching, do not allow yourself to get all duck-butt-ed. Your spine was not made to hold you up on its own, that's the job of the muscles around it to help out with. Basic thing: Take it slow. Breathe. I try to count to between twelve and twenty breaths for every exercise, sometimes aloud, as you need air in order to speak, and you need to breathe in order to better relax your muscles! Stretching the front of the thighs is perhaps one of the most common sights to see. You can stand up, for which I recommend having something to hold on to - you want to relax while stretching, not have to constantly tighten the muscles in order to keep your balance. Or you can lie down, your bent knee on a thin pillow, and hold it up to your rump. That is a very effective way for me, by the way. You can also stand on the ground with one knee at about ninety degrees, leg forward, and hold the other (and do keep something soft underneath that knee!) up to your butt. Ideally, you should be able to stand and do this against a wall, but start out allowing yourself to bend forwards, if necessary. Straighten that back, friends, and your hips as well! This is not the time to allow them to sag, although for some, pushing them forward may help. To stretch a slightly different part of the thigh (and actually a part of some muscles in the lower back, or so I heard), one can stand on the floor, again one leg forward and knee at about ninety degrees, and the other backwards, letting it lie down (and that includes the foot and toes) and sort of allowing the hip to fall forwards. If you need extra leverage on this, twist your torso gently over to the side of the upstanding leg, and even raise the hand that is on the same side as the "resting" leg, to create quite a nice shape with your body, and help stretch it even better. From there one can easily go on to the hamstrings. Just put the toes of your back foot up instead, hold your hands behind your back (straight! no duck-butt or slouching!), keep the front foot on its heel and the knee slightly bent (oh yes, bent, I said), and lean forwards slwoly, relaxing the muscles all the while. And then, one can pull the front leg back, sitting with one leg and foot underneath one's butt (much like a one-sided Japanese seiza posture), and bend the front leg, almost hugging it, keeping the foot by the thigh of the leg one is sitting on, and trying to get the heel to touch the ground. This may take a bit of mucking about, and it might not work for everybody, and believe me, it is a dashed tricky one to describe, but you look a bit as if you're crouching down, hugging or leaning on your knee, and the lower thigh muscle is what is supposed to be stretched. While we're at that, stand up and put your front foot up against a wall. As steeply bent as you can! Straight back again, relax, breathe, and lean forwards. I find that I need to do this either by a low wall which I can bend over, or by a corner to bend around... It's not very effective for me. Then, you can use to your advantage a variant of what I know as the iai-goshi position. That is, one leg forward, the other backwards, try to keep the back heel to the ground and lean forwards, bending the forward knee. Easy, but takes a bit of knowledge of your own body to do effectively and not simply put strain on various important bits. The hips are part of the key here - and the back. And the stomach. Having core and stomach muscles help a lot in performing it better. There's the ever-popular standing up, straight legs and trying to reach the ground. I am now proud to say I have only about a finger's length left until I can do that again (I could when I was a child, before I broke my leg at least), when I started trying again about ten years ago, I could reach only down to just below my knees. Refridgerator, didn't I tell you? This is a good one. Sit on the floor, reading, with something against your back. Feel the back of your knees stretch, yummy! Or, when standing up, cross your legs, and reach down. Then switch foot. Good variation on the classic theme. Or, sitting down again, bend one leg to have the foot as far in towards your crotch and other thigh as possible, aaand bend. To the toes of the outstretched leg. Some people are able to do this sitting with their legs in a V, switching foot and holding them with both hands, putting their forehead against their own knee. I am not. But I am working on it, doggedly. Some people hoist one leg up over the other, hugging the knee to the chest and turning to the side of the bent leg. Some bend the then straight leg in under them. Do the Youtube on this, to get a proper idea of how it should look... Text works only so far, and I am not going to go the Photoshop way. I have a personal favourite which seems to require bare feet (no problem for me as I always seem to prefer bare feet). Stand on all fours, pushing your butt as high as you can. But still, no duck-butting! Your back should be straight, and your body ought ideally to make an upturned V. Push your shoulders away from your ears (try it, and you'll understand) and experiment a little with the position of your hands and feet. Sometimes keeping them closer together is better, sometimes pushing them further and longer apart. This is supposed to stretch the back of your legs, and some people prefer taking one leg at a time. The important part is to try, to keep your back as straight as you can, and to keep your shoulders back. This may feel like an exercise for strength, and in a way it is, but mostly, it is to stretch your legs. Don't keep that position for too long, though. No need to overdo it. Some people use four or six breaths, I tend to go at least to ten or twelve. Do the superhero thing, too - stand with legs wide apart, and lean towards one side. Some stop when their knee is a bit bent, others go down to stand on the front foot with knee bent, yet others go all the way to sit on leg and flat foot. The common denominator is to stretch the inside of the other leg. Some point that leg's toes straight up, I tend to keep them forward. It should not hurt except in a "good" way. A little pain, all right. Much pain, not good. Relax, take a quick pause, do again, and find out what works and what doesn't. Strive, but don't be stupid. You can then lie down on your back, put your one foot over your other thigh right by the knee or wherever it feels comfortable, and hold your hands around said thigh near the knee (usually), pressing it towards you. Straightening that leg is also a good idea, it usually feels as if I get more out of the bent and being-stretched leg then. There are many, many more ways, and Google is excellent help on the matter, but oh, do look at what you find with a critical eye! Stretching is for muscles, not for joints. They ought to be strengthened and helped along by said muscles, not torn apart or put to stress. I focus here on leg stretching, as without it, my knees would still be giving me much too much trouble. The muscles around my knees are what helps me go through some days almost without any pain at all, and I have in the past cried in happiness and joy and thankfulness and relief, that my iaido, which is so strenuous for the legs, have built up so much strength of the right kind, that recovery-type and medical exercises never did. I can walk, and now - I can run. The sense of joy and freedom and completeness is indescribable. But when the pain comes a-knocking, stretching can give quick relief, and it can help after training, and it certainly helps in an overall manner. Easy exercises help too, but oftentimes, stretching is more accessible, for example when one is oot and aboot on town. And remember, no duck-butt. Use the muscles in your back and your stomach. Do you have a favourite stretching exercise for the legs? Would you explain any of the above in a different and better way?