Process versus Thing

Posted on June 11, 2010 by Josh

The distinction between process and thing was emphasized to me recently, and ever since, I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it. And, as often happens in my experience, other sources of knowledge repeat the lesson frequently.

What is a “process?” First, “process” is a word. It is a word we use to describe the, usually predictable or repeated, movement of something through stages (its development). Process usually connotes change, ongoing development, and dynamism.

What is a “thing?” Again, “thing,” firstly, is a word, a concept. A “thing” is an identified, isolated object. It is static. While it can change over time, a “thing” is typically seen as relatively constant. And, even if the thing itself is not seen as constant, the concept is constant in our mind.

Why do I point out that those are both words/concepts? Because words/concepts are different from “reality.” Words/concepts are tools we have developed over time, and that use to describe or get a handle on reality.

It’s important to remember that our words are tools. If and/or when we forget that, we stop considering whether or not our words make any sense – in relation to what we’re trying to describe, either to the other person, or to ourselves.

That said, what really is a “thing?”

THANGS
I ask the question, because I’m interested in what is really “static” or “unchanging” in reality. There’s nothing I’ve been able to find. Everything changes. As Heraclitus said – “everything flows”

The only real “thing” it seems, is the concept of “thing” itself. The ability to isolate elements from processes in order to be able to manipulate them.

For instance, in order to use a tree branch as a tool, we first have to separate the branch from the tree in our minds. We have to “thing” it.

Luckily, trees, or nature generally, helps with this “thinging” process. When a branch breaks off, we get to see that. Suddenly, we differentiate between “pieces” of the tree…there’s the “roots,” the “trunk,” the “branches,” and the “leaves.” Science has differentiated smaller and smaller elements.

This process is sometimes called “reification” (the making-concrete of something) or “nominalization” (making a verb (process/action) into a noun (thing)).

This is part of what Western science does, by the way. The specialty of science is to “thing” processes into smaller and smaller, and more and more discrete pieces. Recently, science has begun to embrace “systems thinking,” which takes the pieces identified by science, and attempts to recognize the interrelationships between those pieces.

However, this approach is a little flawed, since you’re already approaching the process from the perspective of the “pieces” you’ve identified. You’re already going from a thing-to-process approach, instead of from a process-to-process approach.

Be that as it may, let’s delve into some “things” we encounter in daily life that are actually processes, and some of the ramifications of treating them in that way.

Being and Becoming
The “process philosophy” folks started to try to describe this back in the early 1900′s, but unfortunately, came at it from a Western perspective…they couldn’t play with it too much, and eventually, most of them end up getting locked up in weird word-play, instead of creating anything meaningful or useful.

Anyway, one of the main distinctions they made was between “being” and “becoming.” Usually, “being” refers to an imagined static state, a “thing.” “Becoming,” on the other hand, refers to the process of continually coming-into-being. Heidegger I think does a good, poetic job of describing this idea in a mindbending way in his book “The Question Concerning Technology.”

Happy and Happiness
I believe I’ve mentioned this in previous posts, but happy, or the act of feeling good, is a state of “being.” That is, it’s a single instance in a longer process. We’re never “happy” forever.

However, we lay claims to the “pursuit of happiness” as an ideal. But what is “happiness?” Happiness is the extended state of being happy.

Is that a realistic expectation? As part of a process of feeling/living, doesn’t the feeling of being happy come and go? Is it realistic to want to be happy all the time? If that were to happen, how would we know the difference?

The pursuit of happiness, it seems, is unrealistic…

Success and Failure
When we achieve a goal (which takes a process of learning/doing), we call it success. When we don’t achieve that goal, we call it failure.

However, success usually requires multiple “failures.” This dichotomy is unreal. The process of attempting is the process of alternately succeeding and failing.

What matters most in that process is where we focus our attention. If focused on the task, success and failure are important to us. They provide us with lessons about how what we’re doing is leading us closer to our desired goal or further from it.

If we are not focused on the task, success and failure are relatively meaningless. We aren’t looking for lessons. We aren’t trying to get closer to the goal. We’re just going through the motions.

But we can also focus either on success or failure. If we succeed, we may feel good about ourselves, or linger on that success. If we linger too long, we stop trying, we lose momentum, we’re out of process. If we fail, we may feel bad about ourselves, lose momentum, and fall out of process.

If we see the act as process, though, success and failure each have their turns, and each have lessons to offer us. Those perceptions become tools again, that we can use to help to guide our actions.

What is this thing called? Love?
Another place we can see “thing-speak” or nominalization is in the concept of “love.” I’ve written about love before, recently, talking about the process of observing another person’s development without interference…with passion, but without a cherished outcome.

Love, too, I believe, has been nominalized in our culture/language. We talk about being “in love.” Or “loving” something. But usually, it represents a static state – a certain chemical cocktail – attraction – that we name “love.”

When that happens, we aren’t able to know “where our love went” when that cocktail wears off. In the hangover, we wonder, “what happened?!” We were “in love,” and then “out of love.”

Again, I’d suggest that love is something much deeper and broader than the chemical flood called “attraction.” It is something that also encompasses a certain detachment, admiration from afar, pleasure in watching the unfolding, and also – discipline, self-control, vigilance.

In Relationship, or In a Relationship
The distinction was made to me recently between being in relationship, or being in a relationship.

If we are in relationship, we are in process. We recognize the dynamic as unfolding and developing, as demanding attention, awareness, discipline, care.

If, on the other hand, we are in a relationship, we are in a static thing. We’ve already killed the dynamic before it’s even had a chance to begin.

Exercise
Fine, Josh, but, again, what does this have to do with exercise?

Well, the first example that comes to mind is the concept of “being in shape.” “Being in shape” is actually the ongoing process of “doing in-shape.” If someone is “in shape” and stops there, they rapidly will fall “out of shape.”

Similarly, we refer often to static, controlled exercises. As I’ve said before, while this type of control may be necessary in times of rehabilitation, or intense concentration, it must reflect the process of rehabilitation, or it’s worse than useless.

For instance, when I had my first ACL surgery, the PT’s put me on the leg extension/curl machine afterward. While that is fine, it’s far from enough.

ACL tears frequently mean that the person’s motor-program is faulty…is leading them into dangerous uses of their limbs. Simply doing exercise to strengthen the muscle on either side of the joint may stabilize it, but does nothing to prevent future injuries.

The Gardener
Living in process is like gardening (flowers or food). You go through process with the plants. You try to offer only as much as they need to thrive. It requires a lot of work, a lot of diligence – both to provide for the plants, and to keep yourself from going too far.

And the rest is out of your hands.

Social Conformity, and the Chuck Wolf Seminar I Went to on Saturday

Posted on May 10, 2010 by Josh

I want to start here by talking about the social conformity experiments of Asch and Milgram back in the 1960′s.

Asch had people seated in a room, with a leader at the front. Six of the seven people sitting down were in on the experiment (“confederates”). Only one of them, number 7, was the “experimental variable.” There were cards with lines drawn on them, and the people were asked to identify the relative lengths of the lines.

When the subject was allowed to make his/her own decisions about the length of the lines, they were 99% accurate. When the other people (the confederates) were allowed to answer about the lengths of the lines first (incorrectly…as in, “A is shorter than B,” when it is not), the subject would conform to their answer 35% of the time.

In Milgram’s experiment, someone in a position of authority (a confederate) dressed in a lab coat, instructed the subject to ask questions to an unseen person in the room next door via a microphone/speaker system. Also, the subject was to administer electric shocks to that person if they gave incorrect answers.

The subjects would deliver “450 volt shocks” (there were no actual shocks administered, the screams and pleading of the person in the room next door were acted) 65% of the time.

Milgram said that part of the results were due to the conformity effect Asch noticed. But also, that part of it was due to “the agentic state theory, wherein, per Milgram, the essence of obedience consists in the fact that a person comes to view himself as the instrument for carrying out another person’s wishes, and he therefore no longer sees himself as responsible for his actions. Once this critical shift of viewpoint has occurred in the person, all of the essential features of obedience follow.”

One of his later experiments combined conformity and obedience, and noticed significantly greater compliance in the subject.

Social Conformity Is Evident in This...hold on a sec...where'd I put my blow-dryer...

Putting Your Best Foot Forward with Chuck Wolf
On Saturday, I attended a conference put on by the WAC Academy and the University of San Francisco, featuring Chuck Wolf, on the topic of “how the muscles and actions of the foot affect the hip, gluteal complex, and spine. By changing body angles, utilizing reaches, understanding how the foot functions, and applying the concepts from the Flexibility Highways, the fitness professional will come away with methods to enhance traditional exercises into a truly three dimensional chain reaction movement.”

Chuck was a really nice guy, and has a long history in post-rehab athletic conditioning. He walked around and said hello to everyone before the conference started, introducing himself and getting to know folks.

Yeah...you tell em Sammy!

But…those shoes…
You know how they say that women often look at a man’s shoes to learn more about him? I do that too…for everyone. When I looked at Chuck’s, I was shocked. He had large, Adidas, what looked like motion-control sneakers on. What Mick Dodge would call “flower pots,” and Tom Brown would call “foot-coffins.”

I began to wonder what Chuck was going to tell us about the foot and ankle.

Been There, Done That
I’ve been in this industry long enough, and been to enough of these seminars, to know not to expect too much. Most of the time, the information you get is rehashed, recycled stuff from the PT world. Chuck, as it happens, works in a PT clinic in Orlando. He hangs with those guys. That’s his social crowd…uh…social conformity…hint…hint…

Starting out, he talked about the structure of the foot. The bony structure. We didn’t get into musculature, except for the gross musculature of the shin – gastroc/soleus, anterior tibialis.

Chuck actually said that “the control of the ankle comes from the shin.” While I agree with him to a point, I strongly disagree with him in every other way.

There are something like 25 muscles in the foot, and three layers of musculature within the foot itself. The bottom of the foot is laced with muscles. So, if you want to talk about things “from the ground up,” you need to start there. On the bottom of the foot.

4 layers of foot muscle...courtesy Frank Netter

Knee-Jerk Reaction
I’ll admit that I quickly tuned out. The other trainers there were doing some sort of social-conformity thing. They were very interested in speaking in PT lingo – “pronate, supinate, evert, invert, abduct, adduct.”

These last two, by the way, are apparently defined in certain circles, opposite to the normal understanding – that is, by judging whether a limb or body part is ab/adducting by the motion of the distal portion (furthest from the trunk of the body) of the limb to the proximal portion. I learned that abduction is when you move the limb or body part away from the midline, and adduction the opposite. And I’m not clear on the reasoning for the new definition. If you can enlighten me, please do!

Anyway, they wanted to “dig deep,” but only into what he was presenting. Not into the topic itself. Which I guess is fair. I guess.

Chuck said that flat footed people have a greater incidence of ACL tear. That may be, but why is that the case? He didn’t say. Actually, a few studies (here’s one) have shown that people with flat feet have lower risk of ankle injury than those with high arches.

There it is! Right there! I can see it!

Yes, I know the ACL is in the knee, not the ankle. So you’re saying the strain isn’t transferred to the ankle, but instead, goes up the chain to the knee. I guess I can understand that, to a point. But usually, soft tissues change structure to match kinetic patterns. So the argument that a person with flat feet automatically has pre-stressed ACL’s is suspect to me. If they had flat feet their whole life, wouldn’t the ACL conform?

Is it flat feet that cause ACL tears, or is it poor motor patterns?

Haile Gebrselassie hasn’t had any problem being one of the world’s greatest long-distance runners for years in spite of gross over-pronation:

The point of this section, though, is what gets missed when you skip over the bottom of the foot, and move straight to the calf and ankle.

Or, also, what gets missed when you skip over the most basic reflex patterns that stem from the stimulation of the bottom of the (bare) foot? See this paper for ideas about that.

This little cutie knows what I'm talking about...

Where’s My Cookie?
Look, I can see the multitude of perspectives there are on the human body. I can smell them and taste them too. I’ve touched those perspectives with my own hands. Trust me.

I have two problems with what happened to me on Saturday:
1. The body is not that complicated.

2. The way of addressing it in these complicated (and contradictory) terms, only causes confusion and dismay. And,

3. People seem to have turned off their brains…they’re just following anyone who stands up and says “follow me.”

I’ll explain the way I look at the body in another post…so STAY TUNED!!!

Sorry for the rant…hahaha…

Real Progessive Training

Posted on July 5, 2009 by Josh

I’m working on a project right now…I might call it “Real Progressive Training” or something catchier, like – HOT TRAINING FOR FUNCTIONAL SUPERFITNESS BODY HOT! Yes, I said “hot” twice! If that doesn’t get your attention, nothing will! I might add the word “kardashian” to the title too…for no specific reason…

But that aside, let’s talk about “functional training” for a second. It’s constantly on my mind. As a trainer, I want my clients’ function to improve. I want them to have greater range of motion in their joints, with greater control of that range of motion, and greater strength (of all types) in that control.

One of my biggest pet peeves in this industry, though, is mindless application of methods. “Functional Training” is still a hot topic, and everyone attributes “functional” benefits to their product – Crossfit, stability balls, etc. Let’s take the example of stability balls.

Stability Balls

If you haven’t heard of stability balls, I’m not sure where you’ve been. They’re everywhere. They’re in homes, they’re sold as “functional” desk chairs, they’re in gyms, they’re in the street!!! Stability balls, aka Swiss balls, were first used as circus implements in Italy, back in the earlier part of the 1900′s. A Swiss physiotherpist found that the instability caused by the balls helped her patients to recover normal function more quickly.

I would imagine it was an inductive case of monkey-see, monkey-do. If the people with the greatest balance in the world (circus performers) balance on these things, using them with my clients (albeit in a toned-down manner) will eventually bestow unto them a small fraction of the attributes those circus performers have.

Anyhow, soon physical therapists all over the world were using these things with their clients, to introduce instability, and thereby challenge their clients’ proprioceptive (awareness of position in space/time) and kinesthetic abilities.

One young enterprising trainer (Paul Chek) grasped onto the potential for the use of these tools in training normal clients. Another inductive case of monkey-see, monkey-do. It probably went like this - “If it helps sick people to get better faster, it must help people who are well to get even better.”

However, instead of going back to the souce (the circus), and taking cues from there, this trainer took all his cues from the physical therapists. He basically started giving sick-people exercises to non-sick people. This is now a huge (and hugely misguided) industry – giving physical therapy/rehabilitative exercises to general personal training clients.

That’s not to say that there shouldn’t be any crossover, or that knowing these techniques is bad. However, these techniques are usually misused, and certainly overused by personal trainers.

Case In Point

Strong and Asking to be Injured...

Let me relay a personal story first. A good friend was doing bench presses on a stability ball, with 70lb dumbbells. The ball burst. He landed on his back on the floor. When his elbows hit the floor with those 70lb dumbbells on top of them, his radial and ulnar bones shattered. He was in immobilization rings for six weeks, and in physical therapy (not personal training) for six months afterward.

There are two points I want to make here:

1. Once you pass a certain weight threshold, why would you want to be unstable?! Further, and related, at that threshold, how unstable are you, really? In the image above, with the 100-and-whatever-pound dumbbell pushing down into the floor, how unstable is that guy (that’s Paul Chek, for those who don’t know). And,

2. At what point do you throw the risk/reward calculation out the window? Take the above example again. What is he gaining, that can’t be gained in another (safer) way? Is it really necessary to do that movement, that way? What happens if that ball bursts? It may not seem like very far, but 2 feet is a long way to go when you have 100+ pounds on your chest. Ribs will break, at a minimum. What if the ball slips out behind him? Broken coccyx? Why the hell is that bench right there?! He’s not using it for anything! Is it there just to compound the danger?!

Consider this, friends, before you buy in to “functional” training. Use your common sense. And when my next project is done, buy my book.

Current thoughts on human fitness.

Posted on February 20, 2009 by Josh

Okay, here’s just a bunch of random stuff I’ve been wrestling with recently. Sorry for the haphazard collection, but I want to get this stuff down, and if anyone out there can help further my understanding, even better!

Somatic Therapies

I’ve been reading up on Laban, Bartenieff, Feldenkreis, Alexander, etc., techniques recently. I’ve also been speaking a lot with Charlie Reid about the Egoscue method. All of the strictly “movement” therapies (i.e., everything but Egoscue, which has other elements) are aimed at increasing the individual’s awareness of their own body in space and in motion. “Amazingly” fundamental problems in structure/function can correct themselves simply through awareness of dysfunction.

This isn’t so “amazing,” as I’ll point out in more detail in a second.

“Physical” Therapies

Egoscue is more of what I’d consider a “physical” therapy technique, since it diagnoses problems (typically based on posture or movement dysfunction) and then attempts to correct those problems through movement prescriptions. These prescriptions are aimed, like somatic therapies, at increasing the person’s awareness of their body (and dysfunction in their body), but also in doing this in a very specific way, addressing specific muscles and patterns of muscles throughout the body.

In fact, we could create a continuum of approaches to human function/dysfunction based on how specific the approach is in its corrective tactics. Along the lines of Egoscue, here, but a little more specific, would be Vojta’s reflex-locomotion techniques for improving function in cerebral palsy and similar disorders. Still more specific would be things like Proprioceptive Neuromuscular Facilitation (PNF). The most specific would be physical therapy techniques aimed at correcting or rehabilitating imbalances or injuries to specific muscle groups or joints.

However, that’s not to say that any of these are better or worse than the other. Instead, one approach might be better or worse for a particular person at a particular place and time. I think it’s crucial to recognize the similarities in these approaches, and their differences, and know when it’s important to use one versus the other.

Central Pattern Generators, the Body, and the Environment

Central Pattern Generators (CPG’s) are neural networks that create the rhythmical/cyclical motor patterns that determine/allow for things like gait. These circuits operate independently from the larger nervous system, or any type of brain-driven control. They are the basis of Vojta’s “reflex-locomotor patterns” mentioned above, and are the way that we are able to walk on two legs, and turn that walk into a jog or a sprint.

However, the generators don’t exist in isolation. Feedback from the body is needed. You can’t walk if your feet don’t know that you’re standing. You can’t run if you don’t know where your legs are in relation to your arms. This is “internal” awareness, or proprioception – your body’s awareness of itself in space. There is another, equally important factor that is often overlooked – that is, the body’s relation to its environment, let’s call it “external” awareness.

Research by Goma has shown that the body, and the generation/instantiation/sustenance of CPG’s relies just as much on the perceived environment as it does on internal factors. You can’t walk if you don’t know how fast the ground is moving beneath you. You can’t run if you don’t know where your feet are going to fall next.

Further, environmental awareness not only shapes the ability to do these things, but the environment itself shapes the things we’re capable of doing. This is true from a physiological perspective – if you grow up in an area short on uninterrupted, long distances, but long on heavy stones that have to be moved, you’ll likely become a miserable long-distance runner, but a very good heavy lifter. It is also true from an anthropomorphic perspective – the relative heights of the Amazonian native and the Masai warrior are no mistake – it’s helpful to be short in the jungle, and very tall in the desert.

The point here is that your body is designed by nature to move in certain ways. These CPG’s already inhabit your body as a function of your very anatomy/physiology itself! So it isn’t “miraculous” when a somatic therapy cures some ill (related or not). It’s simply that your body has been shown the path to normal function again, and is now able to deal with all of the other junk it needs to fight off.

Posture Makes Perfect

That’s the title of an excellent book by Dr. Victor Barker. In it, he outlines some of the things that happen when you have good or bad posture. What I’m most concerned with, is the effect that consistently poor movement has on posture. More than any other factor, limited motion contributes to poor posture. In fact, I would go further and guess that 90% of the “stretching” that is done out there would be completely unnecessary if full-range movement was carried out on a regular basis.

Postural correction is necessary. Proper posture is fundamental for proper movement – neither can exist without the other. However, I think that many of the ways that current methods attempt to correct poor posture and movement are faulty at best, and just a waste of time at worst.

Basic, fundamental movement

Fitness is all well and good, but of what use is it if you have no fundamental movement skill? I’ll give you an example of what I’m talking about here. I worked at Gold’s Gym years ago, and there was a guy who worked out there who was a strongman and powerlifting competitor. The guy was incredible. He was currently only benching 450. He wanted his bench press to go up to 500 by the next meet. For those of you who don’t know, 500 pounds is an incredible bench press.

This man was a behemoth. He was easily 6’5″ and probably weighed around 300+ pounds. He looked like classical pictures of Paul Bunyan – big, barrel chested, thickly muscled, with a heavy beard and deep-set eyes.

He was also a heck of a nice guy. But that didn’t stop him from tearing all of the ligaments in his knee when his foot accidentally got stuck under the concrete stopping-block in the parking lot one night. This is not a joke.

For all of his strength, and his size, the man only practiced one thing all of the time – lifting heavy weights, in the sagittal plane (that is, straight ahead or directly up and down). He didn’t spend any time developing basic movement abilities.

Why have we lost the practice of these abilities in our gyms? Gyms these days (though the tide is slowly turning) more closely resemble factories than they do places to explore and develop optimal human movement. Look at a picture of any gym prior to 1970, and you’ll see something very interesting – LOTS OF OPEN SPACE.

Yes, there is a TON of open space. All of the weights either stack nicely against the wall, or in a closet somewhere. There are gymnastic rings hanging from the ceiling, and stall-bars along one wall.

What is that space for?!

Well, it reflects one of the central tenets of Asian philosophies, which is this – until you create space, Nature cannot express itself through you. You’ve heard it said in many ways, probably the most popular is the koan of the overflowing cup – how can the Master give you knowledge, when your cup is already overfull. Empty your mind to be able to accept the great learning.

The space in those gyms was used for tumbling and acrobatics. Things that are strangely relegated to their own, separate gyms these days. Remember how to do a somersault? Okay, go for it. You don’t need a gymnastics gym to do that.

Why has this disappeared, though? Funny enough, a large component of the feats of the early “strongman” – the predecessor of today’s bodybuilder – were exactly these “gymnastic” abilities (not to mention – WRESTLING). These guys had to do back-bridges with five people sitting on their chest. They did 1-arm handstands from the backs of chairs while holding dumbbells in the other hand.

This ethic, this part of physical culture, continued to “muscle beach” in Venice, CA, but then mysteriously vanished with the advent of Gold’s Gym and the bodybuilding craze.

I guess it was too complicated, and required too much practice. It wasn’t as easy as going into the gym and mindlessly blasting your muscles with rep after rep of the same movement pattern.

Or maybe it was too much fun. It didn’t satisfy the deeply-ingrained Puritan work-ethic that we thrive (and die) on in this country. Too much lolly-gagging. To many laughs when you had to somersault out of that 1-arm handstand.

Don’t get me wrong, I love bodybuilding. Arnold, after all, was one of my big idols as a kid. But so was Bruce Lee. I’m just sort of shocked at how little REAL MOVEMENT is a part of any modern workout routine. Instead, it’s mostly STATIONARY – go to this station, do 10 reps, go to this station, do 12, this station…

From now on, all of my clients are starting with somersaults.

And what about Nature?

The gymnasium/gym comparison relates back to the topic of environment, and it is worth noting another idea I’ve been dealing with recently regarding that topic, which is the effect of “natural” environments on human physiology. A paper by Tsunetsugu, et al., reveals the effects that simply “taking in” a natural woodland setting have on humans. I quote: “1) blood pressure and pulse rate were significantly lower, and 2) the power of the HF [high-frequency, the relaxed-state component] component of the HRV [heart-rate variability] tended to be higher and the LF/(LF+HF) [low-frequency] tended to be lower. Also, 3) salivary cortisol [the main "stress hormone" in your body] concentration was significantly lower in the forest area.”

If that’s true, what are the effects of EXERCISING in a more natural environment? Would those effects be heightened?! Would recovery be increased?! Would fatigue be diminished?!

But what about Nature? All of this talk of “greening” nowadays is really just a bunch of advertising. Nothing substantial is changing in the hearts and minds of people around the world. Their perception of nature and the natural world remains as it always has been – something distant, somehow separate from themselves.

I’ve already written a ton about the benefits of being barefoot, but let me outline them again here – reduced blood pressure, greater environmental awareness, improved proprioception and balance, improved movement ability and posture. But what about a more natural diet? Lower cholesterol, lower salt, lower CRP (i.e., lower inflammation levels, reduced risk of heart disease), reduced risk of diabetes, reduced instance of arthritis, etc., etc., etc.

Well, that’s a lot of words, and, that’s all for now. I’ll be chewing on all of this till we meet again. If you have any words or ideas, please share!

Still Unconvinced

Posted on February 6, 2009 by Josh

Physical therapy, and the various other branches of the medical field all have something in common – they all attempt to “fix” maladies occurring in the patient.

As I mention in a previous post, many personal trainers are starting to blur the line between being strength/fitness coaches and being physical therapists.

While it’s important to be able to recognize and to address obvious structural
or muscular problems in your clients, I’m still not convinced that this should be the end-goal of a personal trainer, or of the client of a personal trainer.

Movement is the domain of the personal trainer. And movement itself will often “cure” the ills of the person seeking the help of a trainer. Let me give you a few examples of what I mean.

There are three “classic” postural deviations, first identified and categorized by Vladimir Janda (to my knowledge). They are Upper Crossed, Lower Crossed, and Layer Syndromes.

Trainers or therapists will often say that Upper Crossed Syndrome is “caused” by shortened/tight (or “facilitated”) musculature of the upper chest and lengthened/weak (or “inhibited”) musculature of the upper and mid-upper back. They will attempt to “fix” this issue by stretching the muscles of the front of the body, and strengthening the muscles on the back.

Lower Crossed Syndrome is similarly attributed to facilitated thoracolumbar extensors (the iliacus, psoas, rectus femoris, quadratus lumborum, latissimus dorsi, etc.) and inhibited thoracolumbar flexors (abdominals and gluteals, among others).

Layer Syndrome is a more pervasive series of imbalances, throughout the body as a whole. Often recognized by “Over development and activity of the deep neck extensors, scapula elevators, spinal erectors, and hamstrings are common. This is combined with muscle weakness in gluteals, deep neck flexors, lower scapula fixators, and abdominal musculature.”

My issue with these descriptions is that they are only that – descriptions. What therapists or trainers who use these terms are doing is describing the syndrome, not explaining the cause. The cause of all of these syndrome is unbalanced movement (either due to lack of movement, excessive movement in a particular direction, or both) across the shoulder girdle, pelvis, or (as is usually the case, since the body is a single unit) both.

And what is the “cure?” As Phil Page and Clare Frank recognize in their paper on the Janda Approach – “the coordinated firing patterns of muscle are more important than the absolute strength of muscles.” Similarly, the coordinated firing patterns are more important than any classification of facilitation or inhibition.

So what’s the point, Josh? The point is this – the coordinated firing patterns of muscles occur in natural movement. And while it is important to recognize people’s deficiencies, and to try to fix them, stretching and strengthening particular muscle groups (say, stretching my pecs and doing more face-pulls to correct my upper-crossed syndrome) does not constitute natural (whole-body) movement.

If the entire body is not involved, the dominant pattern will eventually find its way back to supremacy. This is no different from any other “habit” – the smoker who tries to quit without altering their entire lifestyle or behavioral patterns will ultimately start smoking again. The dieter who tries to diet, but doesn’t empty the cupboard of the Little Debbie snacks, thinking that those are their “reward” after a good week…etc. In fact, I’d go so far as to attribute this typical biological behavior to our current economic state in the US. Why is it true? Habit is the definition of economy – habits save time and energy for an organism. The trick is to form habits that are helpful and useful, and not harmful or wasting.

I’m still unconvinced that all of these “therapies” are really useful or necessary. Granted, there are people with true pathologies (conditions rendering normal functioning impossible), but for the most part, most people simply seem to be suffering from a general lack of movement.

To me, most of the aim of any therapy is getting the person simply to move again. If, instead of focusing on the isolation of syndromes and their treatment, we were to focus on the progression of the individual through a continually widening range of healthy, whole-body, movements (by this I mean fundamental motor patterns, mostly associated with gait – crawling, walking, skipping, running, sprinting, and the exaggerations of those movements – lunging, crawling pushups, jumping, etc.), we might treat the person to improved structure and function simultaneously, without “treating” them at all – and without boring them to tears with countless sessions involving ridiculous instructions to isolate particular muscle groups or stretch their opposites.

PT? or PT? Physical Therapists and Personal Trainers

Posted on November 27, 2008 by Josh

Hiya!

Just wanted to blog briefly about something I’ve noticed in the “elite” personal training world. Within the past ten years or so, thanks to a few advocates (who will remain unnamed), Physical Therapy methods have flooded the Personal Training arena.

To name a few tools – Swiss balls, Airex pads, Bands and Tubing, Blood Pressure Cuffs, etc.

To list a couple of “techniques” specific to Physical Therapy that have invaded the Personal Training realm – Transverse Abdominus (TrA) Activation, Rotator Cuff exercises, “stabilization” exercises, etc.

Why does it make me cringe when I see some trainers take, week after week, someone obviously extremely overweight, and put them through a contingent of Physical Therapy-based exercises? Why? I’ll tell you why.

First, because these guys are Personal Trainers, not Physical Therapists. It’s like going to your family physician for surgery on your knee. You go to an orthopaedic surgeon, not a GP. I hope…

Second, because those techniques they’re using aren’t entirely evidence-based. I hate to tell you, but you can’t activate your TrA in isolation. There’s little evidence that using a Swiss/stability ball for exercise is any better than doing the exercise on a bench, the floor, or a stable surface. Sucking in your stomach before you lift something heavy can be disastrous for your spine. Core training is not the end-all be-all of conditioning.

While people with a history of lower-back pain, or dysfunction/disease/disuse of muscular conditioning in the abdomen may need some prone work to “wake up” their TrA, continued isolation work is just wasting time. For one thing, the body just don’t work like that. Better to focus on the hoop created by the TrA, Internal and External Obliques, and the Thoracolumbar Fascia. Here’s a great article with some ideas about abdominal training, most of which has been borrowed from the pioneering work of Stuart McGill.

Training on unstable surfaces for general conditioning (i.e., not for a specific therapeutic purpose) doesn’t amount to a hill of beans in most cases. Several recent studies have shown the same levels of activation of main and supporting musculature in exercises performed on stable surfaces versus the same exercise performed on labile surfaces (swiss balls, airex pads, etc.). The biggest thing it does is decrease the amount of force you can create with your prime movers (the muscles doing the bulk of the work), and increase the work of the trunk, or stabilizing muscles. While that might be fine after you’ve given those prime movers some serious work to do, relying on it as your main stimulus is counterproductive, and boring.

The point of these tools is to increase proprioceptive demand in certain circumstances, with certain needs. If you want to improve your or your clients’ balance, use the Indo Board. Or just close have them close their eyes while doing their regular routine. (BE CAREFUL! I’m not taking responsibility for your actions here!)

Okay guys, just had to vent. Sorry…more later! But if your trainer is having you do a split-squat with one foot on a stability ball and one foot on a balance board with a Bodyblade in your hands, and you aren’t joining Cirque du Soleil or Ringling Bro’s anytime in the near future, start asking them WHY?!!