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Sit tall: stop distorting your hips

That’s right, the way you distort your hips makes you slump. Let’s find out how.

We’ve already seen the same pattern in action in my last two posts:–

  1. What happens if you treat your body as a tube? looked at the small of your back and your belly. We found out how the contortions you habitually perform there give you a sway back.
  2. Getting rid of your hunchback looked at your chest. We found out why what you habitually do there gives you a stoop.

Now let me show you how to un-distort your hips and stop slumping.

What is happening to your hips?

There at the bottom of your torso, at your hips, you can feel that you’ve bone all the way around your back and sides — the only soft part of your hips is between your hip bones in front. So how do you distort your hips?

You distort your hips by tightening the muscles behind them. This tightening causes those big hip bones to splay out. In front, between your two hip bones, your muscles slacken and your hips widen. When that happens, your guts tend to spill out in front.

As the tube model predicts, this slackening and widening in front causes your body to crumple forward so that your hips roll back and the upper part of your body drops forwards into a slump. Quite apart from being unsightly, this distortion of your body-tube easily becomes a cause of much pain.

How does this distortion cause pain?

This distortion of your body-tube means that you end up having to strongly over-tighten muscles in the bottom of your back. If you strongly engage the muscles at the base of your spine to try to stabilise your back in this way, the great effort involved puts the muscles into spasm, giving you a bad bout of acute back pain. As so often happens with habitual reactions, this one only makes your back weaker, tighter and less stable. Go figure.

How do you stabilise and strengthen this part of your back?

Since the habitual reaction really doesn’t work, we need a better way. The tube model tells us what that better way is. You need to allow the muscles at the back of your hips to ease, allowing the back of your hips to widen. As that happens, your hip bones stop splaying out: they rotate so that, at the front, the space between your hip bones becomes a little narrower. Your muscles there at the front then join in and help to pull you together in front. That also stops your guts from spilling out in front. Your body-tube straightens and you now have a strong, firm platform for the upper part of your body to sit on.

When this is working just so, your hips become an extremely stable power-house. That’s the power-house you need not only to stand and sit straight and easily but also to run and jump with ease.

Once again, you can see how important it is to learn to apply the tube principal. I’ll be back with my next post on Friday, continuing this exploration of the tube principal.

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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.   Subscribe to “Back in Action”  (It’s free)
    When you subscribe you also get to download “The Hows & Whys of Semi-Supine”. This free e-booklet is indispensable to anyone serious about strengthening their bad back (or further strengthening an already-strong back).
  2. Repoise is our membership site for people who are serious about improving themselves (and getting out of pain as they do that). When you join, you will:–
    1. Have daily access to me. Together we will work out what’s going wrong for you and how to fix it
    2. Learn from reading other Repoise members’ questions and following their progress as they work with me
    Find out more about joining Repoise here.
  3. I’m writing a book about my work. It will come out on the 1st December 2010. If you're getting the free weekly articles, I'll send out more details about the up-coming book as soon as the information is available.

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

  1. I’m also running Friday lunchtime group lessons. Go here for details.
  2. There’s nothing better than individual lessons. Ring me on 0151 708 6172 to talk to me about booking individual lessons. (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 nothing better than individual lessons. Here’s where you can find a teacher near you in the UK or elsewhere
  2. I suggest you also do the things I listed above for everyone:–
    1. Read my weekly articles
    2. 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 learn the Smiling Back Method of the Alexander Technique. You’ll get a lot more out of your lessons when you do.
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February 23rd, 2009 in The Tube Principle directions

2 Responses to “Sit tall: stop distorting your hips”

  1. MOIRA KIDD says:
    26 February 2009 at 1:49 pm

    I HAVE OSTEOPOROSIS IN MY SPINE WITH THE RESULT OF HAVING SEVERAL VERTABRA FRACTURES. I HAVE BECOME VERY HUNCHED AND SHORTER. I WAS WONDERING IF YOU COULD RECOMMEND SOME EXERCISES THAT WOULD STRAIGHTEN MY BACK IF THAT IS POSSIBLE. I AM ON TREATMENT FOR OSTEOPOROSIS.

    Reply
    • Philip says:
      26 February 2009 at 5:07 pm

      Where are your fractures, Moira? While exercises would not be helpful, the procedures I suggest in these posts may well be. Which is most important for you depends largely on where and in which direction your spine has collapsed. The corkscrew one seems the most probably beneficial one at the moment — but get back to me on this and we’ll see what’s best.

      Reply

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