Physical Alchemy: Alchemical Stretching Workshop, Saturday August 27th, 2022, Canberra.
Backward Bending [base ingredient]
Let us now caste our gaze over the base ingredient [posture] that is backward bending. A combination of spinal extension and often shoulder flexion; backward bending is a wholly natural and human activity and you can expect wide ripples of dysfunction in your system if you cannot do it to a certain degree of competence.
If you are old enough, you will remember some truly insane cotton-wooling around this form from numerous physical therapies. Notwithstanding the fact, like with any decent grade fires, you can get *burnt* if you are not prepared adequately.
The backward bend is found in a huge diversity of physical arts and systems: wrestling, contact-improv, dance, circus, yoga, Stretch Therapy, archery, capoeira, bioenergetics, gymnastics – and more!
Now, the form is the same but it is used very differently in different cuisines. You will also train very different qualities from these different cuisines. I found that many people from dance, circus, yoga or other backgrounds could not initiate even per-preparatory alchemical stretching use of this posture; in spite of ludicrous skills and qualities in other domains. Similarly my body is definitely not currently in the condition where it would enjoy regular suplexii.
If we look at the modifiers [herbs and spices] to the back bend we have firstly the gravitational modifier: boat pose, hanging from a door-frame to stretch and winning a limbo competition all require different orientations of the back bend in space – which means gravity bares down on the body in a completely different way.
Further into the proprioceptive modifiers we find that stationary but active [bridging] feels very different and confers different benefits that passive [backbending over a whale or support]. Rotational and moving bridges [circus and capoeira] again, develop different skill sets and qualities to the organism. Violent and vigorous bridging [wrestling] again, is different.
Then we can add all types of soft tissue ‘sinews’ modifiers into the equation. Some of my favorite work is ‘whale work’ i.e using the Baby Whale, Mother Whale or The Leviathan [sizes of Whales] with intensive soft tissue modifiers within an alchemical stretching cuisine.
This contains a huge array of sensation ‘herbs and spices’, as does the utilization of the bridge and backward bending within contact-improv.
Then there are the oddities: strongmen/women having people stand in towers on their bridges; ‘feet archery’; demon-possessed staircase decent, and limbo competitions.
Within this mileau it is probably good to have your body imbibe this base ingredient within a number of different cuisines. A number of the uses of this form are exceptional when we add that special saphron ‘spice’ that is breathing into the mixture.
A lot of adults do not have this pattern in even a rudimentary way. As with the chin up, and a few other choice exercises – getting a person a solid back bend, when they originally had none, normally has a extremely positive and far ranging impact upon the multi-faceted nature of being human [not just the physical traits].
It must be repatterned in a strategic and systematic way – but it is amongst the most powerful basic physical transformations you can enact for someone. Some lucky people, like myself, have just always had full bridge. I dunno, one day whilst eating a Vegemite sandwich as a young boy I just decided to do a bridge and nothing prohibited me from doing so. It happens. I liked exploring my bodies capacities, and as many kids find out – bridging is just innately fun! The clouds are the ground, and the ground is the sky!
So if you do not have a bridge currently, consider adding it as an opus to work towards. If you have one or two versions, there are others. In part two of the PA note on backbending [later], I will go into the qualities in a bit more detail.
[D]
Hip Flexor work [base ingredient]
[*] hip flexor work [base ingredient]
Well, now I have two longer essays up on the Physical Alchemy website [see below], I can begin to utilize the information presented in these works for more practical purposes. One of which is to do a little tour of the ‘base ingredients’ [postures] used within the alchemical stretching syllabus [cuisine].
Why not begin with postures that stretch the flexor muscles of the hip.
Around the time of the photoshoot for the image on the cover of the 2nd edition of Stretching & Flexibility – which, as my daughter recently commented, has ‘a ‘cursed’, beardless version of dad’ on the front cover – the focus of the Advanced P&F class had been: hip flexors, more hip flexors and yet more hip flexors.
It was a very fun and intense period of physical development for me.
Even at the non-alchemical, repatterning order of stretching, hip flexor stretches offer huge benefits that extend far beyond their locality due to a number of features of their keystone anatomy.
Changes in foot bone and soft tissue structure; changes in gait; a large spectrum of positive changes to muscle and motor activation patterning [not just the reciprocally inhibited glutes]; changes in sensations and feel of the body, towards more grace, ease and juice.
There are a huge number of exercises within the broad category of ‘hip flexor stretches’.
At one stage, and being quite strict, I tallied 27 different postures [each of which can be modified in a lot of different ways]. Fact is, I use very few of these most of the time – yet the few I use never get boring because of the cuisine they are practiced [cooked] in.
Using this ‘base ingredient’ within the cuisine of alchemical stretching has curious ‘night’ and ‘day’ flavour. Most of the time, at home, I use a very basic set-up of a box-chair-couch supported arm posture.
The range of depth of the stretch is actually not that extreme [and, in fact, most people do not need or want extreme range]. The position goes deep enough to begin to evoke the alchemical stretching qualities – and then we do other things that are beyond the scope of this little PA note.
This basic set-up is one of two main hip flexor setups I do at home if I am stretching solo. The other being Front Splits, if I am working more on pure flexibility [which I still like to do, upon occasion].
The flip side of this is: if I am teaching alchemical stretching in a class format and the students present can hold the qualities necessary to activate alchemical stretching. Then I will actual move towards teaching almost exclusively the more complex ‘Body Tessellation’ syllabus multiple-partner work. As the amount of impressions and work that can be done in these postures [again, only IF the qualities are present in the students] is far beyond what can be done solo. And in its strange way, doing these complex postures actually augments the basic versions, done alone.
The way the Body Tessellation postures were designed was to maximise the alchemical stretching potency of the postures. When I saw other people trying these postures out, they were using them for flexibility and repatterning purposes – which is fine, as they do work for these ends, too – but the alchemical stretching qualities were observed to be absent.
Again, as per ‘the culinary metaphor’ essay – there are many factors governing results that have nothing to do with the postures or exercises being used.
As you can see in the schemata for the syllabus [photo], there are gates. These ‘gates’ are not just about the flexibility, body awareness and coordination of the person. The are also about the ability to activate and sustain the qualities necessary – at the digest the impressions for such a session.
As for hip flexor stretching, wherever you are on your physical training expedition, these are amongst the best ‘bang for buck’ stretches out there. Often they are the only stretch I do on a given day.
One should try and learn them in a sequential way, learning the ‘rules’, methodologies and form points. Later, one can bend and even break the rules [but only when it is safe and indicated to do so].
All the different orders of utilizing of this ‘ingredient’ [posture] have so many benefits. I remember one day, out somewhere with a reasonably manic and excited [K], where he began to riff on an unsuspecting woman [who appeared to know very little about stretching]:
‘Hip flexor stretching should be taught in schools. In fact, hip flexor stretching should be everywhere! Go to the doctor, they proscribe what-have-you – then they stretch your hip flexors. Go to the barber, get a hair cut – then he stretches your hip flexors! Hell, go to the florist and buy some roses for a Beau…and get your hip flexors stretched.’
[this is paraphrased heavily, of course, as the actual words are lost to the sands of time. The exchange was highly amusing to witness – and I must say I still share this sentiment: hip flexor stretching for All!]
[…]
We will be covering a number other postures [ingredients] and modifiers [herbs & spices] over the coming weeks. For background on the use of ‘the culinary metaphor’ see this essay:
the culinary metaphor
and for an introduction to Alchemical Stretching, see THIS essay:
https://physicalalchemy.com.au/alchemical-stretching…/