Category Archives: Uncategorized

At The Core Of Stability: Stacks vs Slings

Understanding how the mechanics of the human body works can be difficult. At the simplest level, we need to understand how pushing (compression) and pulling (tension) occurs in the body. It’s tempting to think that compression is just the opposite … Continue reading

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Posture and Stretching (Part 2): Muscles Locked-Short or Locked-Long?

Last time, we looked at how your posture is affected by how your nervous system remembers what is “normal” for you.  Your brain calibrates your muscle spindles (the muscle length detectors) so that your muscles know how long they should be … Continue reading

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Posture And Stretching (Part 1): Playing The Right Game

Changing your posture can be a tricky business.  All too often we try not to make ourselves crane our necks forwards while we work at our computers, or try not to let our shoulders rise when we are stressed. Does … Continue reading

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More Than One Type Of Balance

It’s often said that restoring health is about achieving balance in a patient, however, the problem is that balance is a term which means many different things.  In the west, balance means preventing any one quantity from dominating its opposite. … Continue reading

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Passive strength (part 3): How to get connective tissue to work for you

From school, most people are aware of the way in which bones transmit compressive forces, and muscles transmit tensile forces. Muscles connect body parts over small to medium distances, however, fascia (a type of connective tissue – see my previous … Continue reading

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Passive strength (part 2): What is connective tissue?

Last time, I talked about good technique, the kind where you can be simultaneously strong and relaxed (or better put, effortlessly strong), and how this comes about through engaging the passive strength of connective tissue.  Connective tissue is a term … Continue reading

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Passive strength (part 1): A question of technique

When I was just beginning martial arts, my teacher would tell me to relax, but I could never understand how to generate strength at the same time. It was only years later, that I realised that this ability (also known … Continue reading

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