I asked a client to perform a simple movement. She was getting stuck in her hips, spine, head etc in order to perform the movement. Eventually, after we talked about it and I had her feel the movement in my body, she simply said: "So I just don't need to brace and prepare."
We have become so controlling of our movement that pretty much every movement is conducted in the light of brace and prepare. This is incredibly unbalancing and unharmonious for the body. If we really needed to do this, all animals on the planet would likely be doing the same thing. But animals do not think the way we do. They let the body get on with the physical tasks it was born to do. Surely we are looking to find balance and harmony in the body.
Bracing and preparing are mental concepts we have placed on the body. There is no truth in them. Indeed, if we are to lift a weight, particularly dead lifting a weight, we do need to stabilise the body because it has no chance of effectively carrying out that movement. Many people who have learned to brace and prepare through their exercise practices continue unconsciously to brace and prepare for everything. And much of the time, this bracing is in the front body which we easily control. Yet it is the back body that is strong, extensive, communicative. The back body informs the front body, not the other way around.
Movement is a sensory performance. The body will make any movement with which it is familiar easily and smoothly, but only if we stop intervening. Added to this it, the body is sensory and it acts best when we allow it to sense.
Our connection to the world around us is through our senses. It is through these that we find true presence. The sense of touch is one that is so overlooked. The subtle magic and beauty of it cannot be overstated. It is profound, as are all the senses.
So stop bracing and preparing and come back down to earth. Allow the body to feel the delightfulness of movement.
