This week's topic is going to be about the abdominals, both about the activation, the engagement of them, and also how much tension to have in the abdominals. Is there such thing as too much tension to be holding in your abdominals? And should we be trying to control the amount of tension by consciously holding our muscles contracted or engaged, or should it be more of a natural process? So we're going to dive deep into that. And this was prompted again, another week's topic prompted by a student question. And so lots of great questions coming in from students every week through the course. So the question is assuming that this program, if you if you don't already know, this program is designed to activate the deep core muscles and the abdominals. So assuming that has taken place and we have the ability to activate them, we have control over them. The next step is how much activation, how much engagement should we strive for during our movement. And so it's a great question. It's something that I wondered a lot during my journey of trying to get out of my personal struggles with back pain, and so I think it is relevant to many other students as well. So this is from Merrell. It says, I know we are supposed to keep a bit of tension in the core as we do these. I'm thinking that this was I don't know, you could apply this to any lesson of the program. But my problem is overly tight core muscles, including the hip flexors, which cause a lot of pain and to my knowledge, are probably pulling on the spine, causing back pain. That is correct, Meryl. The hip flexors attach directly to the spine and if they are tight. If they're overly tight, they pull on the spine and they create problems, she says. I wanted to get your thoughts on how to keep the right amount of tension in the core, but also on how to relax these muscles sufficiently when they don't have to be active. So I think it's a phenomenal question. It shows an understanding that there is an optimal level of tension, and it's not always pedal to the metal. You're flexing your abs, and you certainly don't want to have no tension in them, because that's how the power leaks out the front of your body and just seriously causes a collapsing of the lumbar spine. So we need to have some level of tension. It's not going to be high intensity all the time. So what is the right amount of tension. So that's this is really what we're going to get into. She does have a kind of a more specific question about her problem. I think it's a very common problem. Tight hip flexors. So we're going to come back to this. But I'm going to start off with a more broad, general answer that kind of applies to everyone. And just to point out real quickly the hip flexors. This is the psoas muscle and it is attaching directly to the spine. What it does is it comes down and forward or anterior towards the front of our body from the spine, and it comes out on the front side of the hip. So it would come out, it would exit the abdomen and attach to the femur. And what its action is, is to pull up the leg. It's a hip flexor, meaning it flexes the hip joint. And so if you were to lift your knee up, as in a marching movement that is largely this muscle. And so if it's pulling on the femur, you know, to lift it up on this end of the muscle, it's also pulling on the lumbar spine. And that's normal and healthy. But what we want to make sure of is that we have good stability of the lumbar spine. So it's not yanking on it, creating instability and friction. The other thing is we don't want this muscle. There's one on each side to live in a chronically tense position, chronically tight position, because that brings the spine out of alignment and also causes friction and problems. So yes, this is a core muscle. I don't consider it one of the abdominal muscles. We're going to be focusing on tension creating tension in these four muscles. So this is the most superficial one the the infamous six pack abs. And then we have the layers underneath which are more important for creating stability. The six pack ABS is more designed to create movement. So if you were going to do a sit up or a crunch or a curl forward getting out of bed, these muscles are working to move your trunk forward. And so not so much designed for stability. If you can imagine there's not a lot of surface area here. It's long and skinny, like a hamstring or other muscles that are designed for movement. If you go to the deeper muscles of the core, these are just the abdominal ones. There's deep muscles in the back as well, the posterior deep core. But we'll focus on those in another stream. So these deep abdominal core muscles, they're more broad more surface area. Their job is to compress. And by creating that compression like a abdominal corset. They create stability and that is what protects the spine. So these are the muscles that I love to target and that we are activating in the program. So how do we know how much tension to put in these muscles. So we are assuming that you've already learned how to activate these muscles. Remember that's a major challenge in itself and for most people is how do I access these muscles. I don't even know what they feel like. So we do learn that in the very first week of the program, we connect to something called our back anchor, and we learn a natural way of connecting and activating these muscles. And that comes after the breathing lesson where we wake these muscles up, let people know that they have them. And so if you do a forceful exhale, You are using all of your abdominal muscles, not just the six pack abs, but all the muscles. Compress your abdomen to help force air out of your lungs. So that's a great way to just discover the activation of these muscles. And then in the next lessons, we learn to actually have more control over activating them. So assuming we've gotten through that portion, now we're trying to decide, well, how much activation should I have. And so this leads me into what I believe is one of the most important lessons in the entire program. And that is the ten percent rule. This is a lesson that comes in module two, day two, and I believe it should be actually delivered earlier in the program. And so, uh, someday that may be moved forward in the program. But there there does need to be a point where you are ready to learn this lesson. Uh, if it's the first thing you learn, it's not going to make a whole lot of sense. Um, but once you get to a certain point and you're ready to learn that it's actually not beneficial to go full bore and turn and exercise with high intensity and learn why that is the case, and understand that we are targeting these muscles that operate at a lower intensity. Then you're ready to have this lesson. At this point in our training, you're going to get more benefit from exercising at a lower intensity, because these muscles that we're trying to wake up and target operate at a lower intensity. And if you activate, if you exercise at a higher intensity. You are likely going to bypass this subtle postural system and go straight to the power mover muscles, not just the six pack abs, but all of the movement muscles that are more on the surface layer of our body, the muscles that we know, the names of the quads, the hamstrings, the biceps, the triceps. These are all movement muscles and they're glorified. They're popular. People know them. And the deeper muscles, people don't typically know the names of them. So that's the problem is high intensity training works. The movement power muscles that we can see and we can flaunt in the mirror and all that. And low intensity training can potentially, if you're doing it right, target these deeper stability muscles that are designed not to move the body, but to create stability for all day long support of the spine, so that your power muscles have a foundation from which to pull and from which to create levers, to move the limbs and to operate without compromising the structural, the bones and joints, the structural makeup of the body. And so the ten percent rule suggests that we do not exercise at full intensity or even half intensity, level of muscle contraction or engagement, and that we actually try to, um, we try to estimate at about that. We're using about ten percent of or less of our effort. In some cases, when students are having trouble to turn off the hyperactive muscles, such as the lower back muscles or the hip flexors. I will suggest one or two percent effort. So the question is, well, the suggestion is about ten percent effort and this is in the initial stages. So we are trying to become familiar with these muscles. We're trying to just develop a sense of control. And familiarity is really the best word to know what they feel like and to know what they're that we're using them. And then once we have that sense of familiarity, and this is not something that can be taught through words or reading a book or even having an expert right next to you to say this is familiarity. It only can be learned through feeling and experience and tuning into your body. And so we use the back anchor connection, the front anchors connections. To accomplish that we spend time on the floor connecting and pushing away from the floor as we did as infants and babies, to turn on these muscles and feel what they feel like. And then we get up off the floor and we take that familiarity that we developed and we apply it to other movements, functional movements that we can use in our daily life. And when we start applying these movements, we're not going to keep that ten percent rule forever. The ten percent rule is a training strategy. So the basically, if you look at the shape of the muscles, the thin, broad muscles are more stability Oriented, and they are typically deeper layers, and they are more triggered by low intensity activities such as standing. Yes, standing is an activity and sitting and walking. But if I were to say this is my body, and I were to say, I'm going to train my core, I'm going to use a barbell with heavy weight on it, and I'm going to do a deadlift or a squat, and I lift that heavy weight. It's possible that I'm primarily just bypassing these muscles. They may or may not be turned on. Depends on my relationship and the neuromuscular connections that I've developed, and just using my quads and my hamstrings and my back muscles and the abdominals. There's no telling that we are engaging the deep stability muscles. And so we have to treat the body in layers just like it really is, and start at the deepest layer. And think of that as the deepest layer is low intensity. And as we increase the intensity, we go layers out. And so you can think of intensity rising as an expanding like power bubble basically where it starts reaching the more superficial power muscles as you turn it up. And so I'm going to kind of get back on track to the question here, which was how to keep the right amount of tension in the core, but also how to relax these muscles sufficiently when they don't have to be active. Like many things in life, this is going to be a scale. And so we're past that ten percent rule of training. And we're doing higher level activities. We're doing functional movements. Sometimes we have to turn up the intensity, and the right amount of tension is going to be the amount of tension that it takes you to stay connected to your anchors. That's the right amount. And if you're doing more tension than what you need to stay connected, then it's probably too much. And I can compare this to one comparison I have because I have personal experience with it is rock climbing. And so if you've ever I'm assuming most people haven't done rock climbing, but it's a sport where endurance is really important, especially in your hand and finger muscles, or your forearm muscles, which control the hand and fingers. So as you're climbing up a rock wall, you're gripping the rock. And if you over grip the rock harder than you need to hang on to the wall, you're wasting energy and you're going to run out of steam sooner than you would if you only grip the rock as much as you need to safely hold on to the wall. And so that is the right amount of tension to have in your forearm muscles, or your hand and finger muscles. And so if we compare that to the core and core balance training, the right amount of tension is that amount of tension which you need to stay connected to your anchors. And so that begs the question, how do I know if I'm connected? What is staying connected to your anchors? And if that's a question that you're asking, then we need to go back to the basics. Module one. Module two. Get back down on the floor. Connect to your back anchor and feel what that feels like. Okay I'm connected. That required a certain amount of tension from my abdominals to make that connection. And then I'm going to do a higher intensity movement. I'm going to push away from that and elevate my pelvis. That's higher intensity. I got to turn it up higher than ten percent to accomplish that. It might even require one hundred percent of tension. And that's related to doing a higher intensity activity. But then we go back down and we lower the pelvis and we just remain connected. Okay. That maybe is somewhere around ten percent effort now. So that's staying connected. If you let go fully and your back anchor disconnects from the floor, then that's not enough tension. So the right amount is about that amount that requires you to stay connected. And if you need to do a higher intensity activity, then you turn up the intensity. And so you develop that familiarity and you eventually are able to get up off the floor and feel okay. This is what it feels like to connect to my back anchor in standing or in sitting. And if I were to get off completely, I lose connection. My rib cage flares a little bit, my back arches a little bit. Uh, might even have a little bit of pain. Okay. Reconnect. Okay. Rib cage to pubic bone is connected. And that takes, I don't know, somewhere around ten percent effort. If I were to stand up and get up out of my seat, it's going to require more tension to stay connected. So I ramp up. And so it's not a really easy thing to do. The answer is you could look at it as straightforward. It's the amount of tension that you need to stay connected. But actually implementing that is more of an art form than a science. It's about feeling. It's about staying tuned in to your body and your core for a while. And eventually, over time, over a period of months or longer, uh, that can become ingrained into your movement and become your default way of moving your body. So hopefully that answers some people's questions. Let's switch gears a little bit here. I'm going to come back to this question and answer it a little more specifically for Merrill. But before that we're going to go to something we've been doing every week for the last few weeks. We have a featured student for this week. We actually have two featured students for this week. We're getting too many coming in to be able to only do one per week. So we're going to have a second one today as well. But this is Michelle and she is today's main featured student because she completed the program. The other student I'll be sharing did not has not completed the program yet. So Michelle wins our Featured Student award for this week, and she answered the questions that we ask every student who completed the program. First of all, I just want to say awesome job, Michelle. Congratulations and just want to commend you for completing the program. It takes a lot of commitment and so it deserves being honored for that. So she says thank you for your course. Here are the answers to your questions. The first question we ask every student who completes the program is overall, have you experienced a decrease in back pain? How significant? Yes, I have had a decrease in pain since starting the program. Overall, the difference has been small, but that is significant enough for me given I have as and any improvements are awesome. So for anyone that doesn't know as is, I believe it could be classified as a disease. And it's a progressive disease. So it's typically gets worse over time. It affects the spine. And so it is significant. It says a lot about Michelle that she was able to reverse the progression of as and and be able to have improvements. It says more about her than the program because because most people are on a trajectory where this does get worse over time, the spine becomes stiff and less mobile and it impacts life. So I think it's a huge deal that she was able not only to stop the progression, but also have improvements and reverse the progression of As. So great job on that. The second question is were you able to stick to the program and did the daily emails help you stay on track? Yes, the lessons were the perfect length and I was able to follow each day. I incorporated into my morning stretching meditation routine. Great job. Next question. Do you feel you've improved your body awareness and core connection? Absolutely. I have a very strong core and pretty good balance, but your lessons helped improve both my body awareness and core balance. I am easily able to incorporate the core the anchor lessons while walking daily. Do you believe the benefits you've experienced will have a lasting effect? Most definitely. What concepts from the program did you find most valuable? For me, I feel the basic anchor lessons and the hip rotation lessons were the most helpful. However, with that said, I do feel that all of the lessons put it all together for me and have enabled me to continue to strengthen my core, hips and legs. Thank you again. I felt your course was exactly what I needed. I will continue to use the exercises and stretches daily. Best regards Michelle. Thank you Michelle. As all students do who complete the program and improve their lives, you deserve all the credit. The program is only half the solution, and the other half is that you actually do it and you did it. So great job. Congratulations. And I hope that you continue to apply the concepts of the program to your daily life and integrate them into your movements to have and to make sure it's a lifelong benefit. Shane has a question, I believe so it says the hour car ride and sitting in my computer chair are the two things that cause me the most discomfort on a daily basis. Do you recommend any specific types of office chairs or wedge cushions? I do because I also work at a computer a lot, but my recommendations are quite unusual. would I sit on? This could be interesting. I sit on a box. It's just a box. And it's actually considered a plyometric box. So people jump up and down on it in gyms and stuff. It's pretty basic. You can turn it on different sides and it'll be different heights. So I like that because I believe variety is a it's the spice of life. It's a huge thing to be able to have in for your body. So it's like a thick mat that I put on top for a slight bit of cushion. And so basically what this is no support for the spine. If my spine gets tired, which it does, I just stand up, move around, change position. I've got other variations that I use, which maybe I'll do an entire stream on someday, but it would take too much time for me to to go over it today. So, Shane, my recommendation to you is build your stamina and your spinal support muscles to be able to sit comfortably without spinal support. I believe that's an important ability to have. And then it makes it that much better when you do get to have a spinal support or a backrest for your chair to let the muscles just relax. But you don't want them to be relaxed all day long because that's when they lose connection. They lose the communication channels with the neuromuscular connection essentially to your brain. So my recommendations are variety. Not too much support. If you're using a ton of support right now, you can't go to nothing. You got to gradually work your way down to more natural sitting. Imagine you're just sitting on a tree stump or something. I think that's what people used to do back in the day. And then when you do have a backrest, use it intermittently and add that variety. Change positions and do what the body loves, which is move. And I believe that the body really appreciates that variety as far as a wedge or a backrest. Let me go back to your question here. I don't have any I don't use any wedge cushions. I don't use any kind of like lumbar supports. But one one thing that I genuinely believe is that there is no lumbar support or wedge cushion that is going to be comfortable for more than a couple hours. Every single thing that you can buy as a support for your spine will probably, if it's right for you, will probably feel good and work for a little while, and then eventually it gets uncomfortable because the body wants to change and move. And so maybe that's two hours on average. And then you go, ah, this you know, you've been sitting on this lumbar support for two hours and then you and then and then it gets uncomfortable. It doesn't mean it doesn't work, just means you need some more variety. So take it out I don't know stand up change position. And that's why I use this box because it has three different height levels. I can put things on top of it. I can I can kind of like put one leg up on it and stand and then switch legs. And so that's my strategy. And the car is a different story. That's going to have to be adjusting the seat. And and if you have a lumbar cushion to put it in take it out, stuff like that for long car rides anyway. Thank you for sharing. Austin says she sits on a stability ball, so that's like a Swiss ball exercise ball. A lot of people do that, and if you do that, I recommend having it a little bit less than fully inflated because if it's fully inflated, it takes a lot of balance, which is good for a short period of time. But your muscles will eventually get tired and then you start to resort to, you know, your default protective muscles and what you feel the fatigue. And it's a little bit too much work for longer term sitting. So if you deflate that ball, you still get the benefits of the movement, but it's a little more stable. So let's get back to questions. So it's appropriate that we do the one that the topic was based on for today. I know we're supposed to keep a bit of tension in the core as we do these, but my problem is overly tight core muscles. So I wanted to address this because typically most people have overly tight hip flexors. So she does say that including the hip flexors. And it's a little bit more rare that people have overly tight abdominals, although it does happen. And if that's the case for you, Meryl, then let me know. I'd like to differentiate between core meaning abdominals or hip flexors, because if you have overly tight hip flexors, which you're saying that you do, that's normal. And we're going to follow the typical protocol of the program. If you have overly tight abdominals, it's a little bit more rare. And so that would change my answer. So I'm going to I'm going to wait until I hear from you until to give to talk about that. Because it can be quite a lengthy answer. So I'm going to assume that your overly tight muscles are the predictable pattern, which is the hip flexors, the lower back, etc. the the rectus. Rectus femoris is part of the hip flexor group iliopsoas. Those could be considered core muscles and many people do consider them core muscles. So you say this causes a lot of pain and to your knowledge are probably pulling on the spine causing back pain. And that is true. We teach about that in the first week of the program. I wanted to get your thoughts on how to keep the right amount of tension in the core, but also on how to relax these muscles sufficiently when they don't have to be active. So if we're talking about the hip flexors, iliopsoas, rectus femoris, and some others, it's hard to say. I'm going to relax you and just relax the muscles so That I don't have a strategy for. I don't I haven't discovered how to actively relax an overactive muscle. So what we train to do is we train to lengthen the muscle, and we provide support around that muscle so that it feels safe to let go of that overactivity. Muscle overactivity is typically a protective mechanism. It's protection. It's holding a lot of tension in it to protect some part of the body. And so if we can support that part of the body with the surrounding muscles around, that muscle can turn, do a little less work, turn down the tone. And just I think of it as just letting go. And that happens through the activating of the other muscles. Not so much the Deactivating of the overly active muscle. I that's difficult thing for I haven't figured out how to do that. In most cases we can use our breath to help relax muscles. Sending your breath. Sending your inhale into the areas that you want to relax can be effective. And so you, especially in the bridge, you can think about sending your breath into the hip flexors. That can be really effective and in other positions as well. So that would be one strategy the breathing. The other strategy is using the exercises to build the muscles around it. And also like in the bridge, you're lengthening the tight hip flexors in an active way. So they they remain lengthened and they learn how to function in that lengthened position. And let me go back to your question. Keeping the right. So the other part of your question is keeping the right amount of tension in the core. And so it will depend on what activity you're doing. Meryl. So as I talked about in the beginning topic of this stream, you know, standing is going to be very low level of tension, but it's the amount of tension that you need to stay connected to your anchors. So what does that mean? Well, we developed that familiarity with staying connected to your back anchor and your front anchors in module one and two in the front in the anchor positions, the anchor awareness positions. So we're kind of taking from that experience and using that familiarity to to know what that feels like and standing. And also we have some key indicators like if your rib cage flares, you can see that that it's flaring or feel that it's flaring. That's probably means you're not connected your rib cage to pubic bone connection. The abdominals are not connected. And so. So that may mean you need to get down on the floor and reconnect and do a little routine. And then once you get back up off the floor, the amount of tension that you need, just enough to stay connected. And I did give kind of an analogy to rock climbing earlier in the stream that can help to describe the right amount of tension to stay connected to your anchors, but not more than what you need to stay connected. So that's my advice. And it is a scale. And that scale changes depending on what you're doing. So if you're doing a higher level activity, higher intensity activity, you're going to need probably need to ramp up your tension and your abdominals to maintain connection during that activity. But ultimately it's going to it's going to often go back to module one. Module two we don't try to control the abdominals. We don't try and artificially flex them. We connect to our anchors, which are not muscles. The anchors are not muscles. They are support points. They are typically bony prominences of the body. And so when we connect to them, the abdominal engagement happens naturally. And the the body has it wired in, of which muscles to use, the synergy of the muscles to use, and how much to use to perform that movement. And so we trust the body. We trust what's ingrained in us from birth to be able to control the how, the who and the how much. And so all we have is this intention to stay connected and to be able to do that throughout the things that we're doing and not to do more than what is required to stay connected. So that's my answer. If you want a more specific answer to an activity, then you can give me an example of an activity. And I can kind of break down doing that specific movement. But in general, it's going to be a scale, and we need to match the intensity to the activity that keeps us connected during that activity. Okay. Hopefully that helps. We're going to go ahead to the next question. And that is from Manami. This is another general core question. So on theme with today's topic, it is it says thank you for all those answers. So this is in response to other answers I gave. Very helpful. I understand it's hard to explain exactly on standing. When I breathe in and expand with fat, I get the feeling that my low back is flat and engaged. That may be close to what you may be saying. I wanted to bring this up and talk about it on the stream, because I do prefer the focus of the get Fat concept to be more on the front of the body. So we're focusing on the abdominals and not so much the back muscles. If the back muscles engage and they do something in the process, then that's okay. If they're engaging too much, then we want to turn down the intensity. But when we're talking about getting fat, we are more focused on the deep core abdominals. We're focused on three layers of muscles that are underneath your six pack abs. And we want these to be expanded outward if there's indentions here or there's. It's soft. And you get that doughboy effect when you push in with your hands. And it's doughboy. That means these muscles are not engaged here. And so we want them. When they are engaged, they actually expand outward. And that's the get fat concept. So that's what we're focused on with get fat. The lower back muscles are not our focus. If they're doing something that's fine because the body works synergistically. But if they're doing too much, you might want to consider turning down the intensity. Manami. So that's kind of just the point I wanted to make with that. And so sending that focus more towards the deep abdominals, then it says, and when you say lengthen the core muscles, I take it that they are contracted and become weak. So I do refer to lengthening the hip flexors. So I do want to be specific that we're not trying to lengthen all of the core muscles. The abdominals actually could benefit from a little bit more tension in them. In most cases, the deep abdominals and even the six pack abs. So when we're talking about lengthening, it's specific to the hip flexors. And those are being lengthened through exercises like the bridge and the front anchors progression and the awareness exercises of the front anchors. We're lengthening the hip flexors, but not the all the core muscles. Just wanted to be clear about that. And yes, contracted muscles do become weak. That's true. And so lengthening them can help restore their strength in the new ranges of motion that they are able to perform by lengthening, we strengthen them in the new range and that allows us more function. That's very healthy. So that you did say, let me know if I'm off on these. So I just wanted to address that and make sure we're clear. Strength versus endurance helps a great deal too. Now I know I just I need to stay up for five minutes. So that's the goal. We do the bridge for five minutes. If you can't make it five minutes all the way through, which is very hard. I don't expect everybody to be able to do that. You go as long as you can. Maybe that's 30s take a break. Do the proper form lowering, come back up, do another 30s and spend five minutes doing the sets and reps. But the goal is to extend your endurance because that's what posture is. And yeah, if you can get up to five minutes in the full bridge, then you're doing really well. Especially, you know, we're prioritizing staying connected and good form throughout that. So thank you for that question. I see a question coming from Paul and it says, hi, Doctor Peebles, when I'm doing the bridge and then concentrate on getting fat, I have a harder time doing the deep breathing while simultaneously keeping those ab muscles tight. Yeah, I believe in the beginning is the hardest part of the bridge. And all of this is maintaining the breathing, the breathing intention that we learn on day zero of sending the breath down low and if possible, back towards posterior, towards into the lower back, into the pelvis. And maintain that intention throughout these exercises and movements that we're learning as a layer on top of the breathing, that's hard to do to keep the breathing as the priority. And it should be So Paul, instead of thinking about doing the bridge and the getting fat and then adding in the breathing. I'm not saying that you're doing this, but I'm just making a comparison. It is preferable to think about doing the breathing and then adding in the bridge, maintaining the breath as a priority, and then adding in the get fat or vice versa. You could do you know the get fat happens naturally when we connect our back anchor. You should see or feel expansion in your abdomen when you connect your back anchor to the floor just in the supine position. So that's that. Get fat happens naturally, and we want to maintain that as we come up into the bridge in our back, anchor actually comes off the floor. Uh, but we are keeping that engagement of the deep core muscles that makes us get fat. So the breathing is the priority throughout that. I just want to recognize to you that it is very difficult. It feels like in the beginning there's a lot to think about. It's kind of feels complicated. So I would make some recommendations if I could. I think I can, you know, when I'm, I still do the bridge. I do think about my breathing while in the bridge as a kind of a priority. It's more important than the other things of the bridge. I don't really focus on how high in the bridge I am. I don't really focus on what my arms are doing or, you know, if I'm doing a progression of the bridge, I don't really focus on the actual activity of the progression. I'm thinking about breathing, and then once I have that and I'm got that consistent rhythm of breathing, because that's what breathing can become is very rhythmic and you get it down and it's like, you know, chewing gum and walking or chewing gum and playing the piano. You can get the chewing of the gum into a rhythm that you don't think about. Breathing can be the same way. And then you can start thinking about the piano playing. Then that's when you can move on to, okay, I'm going to focus on the progression now. All right. I'm pushing out with my legs or I'm, you know, I'm coming up higher into the bridge. I'm feeling the stretch in my hip flexors. So that is my recommendation. But just know that it's hard and it eventually gets easier. It gets more simple as your body and you realize that it's all connected. The getting fat is connected with the breathing. The getting fat is the back anchor, and the bridge is the challenge that we add to those things. Paul, you say, I've been doing a lot of the Butt buster bridge since. It's helping with my Si joint pain, so when I add that I'm more concentrated on the leg movements with the resistance bands than the breathing. Yeah, I think that's probably really common. I would say most people would agree that that's the way we tend to do things, and so it's hard to do, you know, it's helping your Si joint pain, which is going to help you in life. And so sacrificing here and there to accomplish the goal, that's your priority. That's understandable. So if I were you, what I would do is start with the regular bridge, because it certainly doesn't hurt the Si joint, and it actually helps it as well. And focus on the breathing and then add the band as another layer on top of that and try and continue that rhythmic breathing that you developed with the regular bridge while adding that extra layer of the band and actually, just one interesting thing that I believe is the pushing out motion of the band is not the only thing that helps the see, actually, you could just have the band around your legs and if it's really tight, just that pushing out resistance that you need to maintain your legs in that position. If the band is trying to pull them together and you're resisting it, that in itself, you don't even need to move. Your legs can be really helpful for stabilizing the see. And I've even used a belt and other static, you know, not elastic, but static materials on my patients and myself to provide that resistance. Just push into the belt. I strap the belt around their thighs, push into the belt as hard as you can, and it really locks in that that. See? So more resistance is better and you don't really need to move your legs. Just pushing out into it is very effective. This one is from Howard. So Howard and I have been going back and forth about the front anchors lessons. So module two, front Anchors awareness part two of that lesson. And this is lesson the third lesson about the front anchors. It's called the front anchors progression. And Howard says as I anchor my pubic bone, I notice it's hard for me to feel like I can push in with my top anchor, the bottom of the rib cage so the pubic bone is the bottom anchor. The bottom of the rib cage in the front is the top anchor. He's saying as I connect with my bottom anchor, it's hard for me to to push away from my upper anchor. And so I did respond to this. This is great observation. I'm glad he shared. I'm glad you shared, Howard, Because it's something I can explain why that is the case. And so let's get to your question. You say it's like the lower anchor becomes the whole fulcrum. So the pubic bone becomes the whole fulcrum. And probably your rib cage kind of comes off the floor. Any suggestions on how I can maintain that upper connection pushing away. So part of the predictable pattern that we fall into is tight lower back muscles. And when the lower back muscles become tight and the abdominals become stretched out, that creates a curvature in the body. So the curvature in the body is causes a concave curve in the back and a convex curve in the front. And so yeah, the pubic bone is pretty far away from the floor. But if we look at this healthy posture it's more of a straight line down, and you can imagine it'd be easier with this posture to connect the bottom of the ribcage and the pubic bone to the floor at the same time if you're laying face down. And so just explaining to you, Howard, that this is a it's indicative of the pattern that the vast majority of us fall into. That is the underlying cause of chronic lower back problems. And and so it's okay. You fit the pattern. And this is the pattern we're trying to reverse. And so just trying to say that it's understandable. It's explainable. It's okay. And through the work that you're doing we're going to get more towards this posture. And it will be easier to connect the front anchors at the same time. So do I have any suggestions about that? Yes, absolutely. So my suggestions Ah, this is what I'm addressing here. Any suggestions on how I can maintain the upper connection pushing away? So my first suggestion to you, Howard, is just to start in the front anchors awareness position and don't even try anything. Just relax into the position for like a significant period of time, a couple minutes, and just breathe and let your body relax, because that in itself can be very powerful for allowing the lower back muscles to relax and just letting your body kind of or mold to the floor. And that can help your posture alone. Once you've felt like you've reached a level of relaxation, then you can start with the two anchors separately, because working on them separately will help to correct the muscle imbalances that may allow you to, in the future, do them Simultaneously with more ease, with less effort. And so, you know, doing the front. The lower front anchor separately from the upper front anchor will help lengthen your hip flexors and reverse that pattern of tight hip flexors. Doing the upper front anchor separately and working on that by itself, will help to strengthen your upper postural muscles that allow you to not have that rounded shoulder posture. And that's part of the back of your core that we need to turn on and engage. And then if you can then work on just not pushing away yet, but just connecting the front anchors at the same time. So the pubic bone and the rib cage and just work on keeping them both connected to the floor simultaneously and breathing into that, that's going to help shorten that distance and help give you more of a straight line. And so it's all it's progression. Just like the name suggests, this entire program is progression. Everyone starts out from a different starting point in their fitness and their life and their age. And so you have to work where you're at and progress at your pace. And it may mean that you need to take an extra week in module two to be able to get to the front anchors progression properly, where we're staying connected to both anchors, and then elevating the legs by pushing away and alternating and marching essentially with them. So that's my suggestion on that first part. We're going on to the next part. It says, oh, I answered this one already in my written response. The abs are not you're not trying to intentionally control the abdominals we're focused on connecting to the anchors and allow the abdominals to do what they need to do to make those connections. If anything, the abdominals are pulling the pubic bone into the floor. That is one intention I do want you to have. And if that means that they are expanding or pushing into the floor, sure, let that be. But we don't need to try and control too much of what the abdominals are doing. Our focus is on the anchors, which are bony prominences and the connection to the solid floor. And so the anchors are not muscles, and we don't try to control them. We control the bony prominences, and the muscles are our means to do that. They have neuromuscular connections that are ingrained in the body, and they know they're smarter than our conscious minds. They have. They work synergistically together, and it gets very complex. And for us to try and control that and all those little muscles and how that happens, it gets too complicated. So we want to simplify and just focus on connecting the anchors. Should there be space between my stomach and the floor? No. If you watch the videos you'll see that my stomach is kind of just it's it's congruent with the floor consistently from pubic bone to rib cage that stays the same. What changes is what's above the rib cage and what's below the pubic bone. But that area from, uh, again, back to the skeleton from here to here, uh, stays anchored pretty much, uh, throughout all these, these front anchor exercises. Uh, lastly, it's really hard for me to move my upper legs. I can get them to elevate by anchoring down the pubic bone, but then elevating them more is really hard. That's okay Howard. Again, this is just a progression and you got to work where you're at. And it may be extra hard for some people and not so hard for others. And that's just because we're all different and coming from different levels of, you know, our past. So work where you're at and you're going to progress towards this becoming easier. And that happens gradually over time. I can do it a tiny bit, but I feel like it really engaging my. But that's okay. Yeah. And I can bend my knees but not lift my thighs and that's okay too. This is how I was for months when I was first experimenting this stuff. It was really just my lower legs that were elevating, and my knees and thighs were not coming off the floor. But eventually, through repetition and practice, I was able to push away from the pubic bone and my thighs would elevate. And that's as my hip flexors become more lengthened and there's more range of motion for that to happen. So it's a gradual evolving of the body, of the shape of the body, of the posture, and everything actually just becomes easier through repetition. And the key is to stick with it and work where you're at. So hopefully that helps. Howard. We're going to get to the next question. I see. Paul says, thanks. I'm definitely getting benefits out of the bridge exercises. You gave me access to the coaching hub recently. I'll send a video. Awesome. Uh, yeah, I'd love to see that, Paul. So look forward to that. Next question from Eduardo. This is in the back anchor challenge two. So this is a quite a challenging exercise module for probably one of the last lessons in module four, probably day three or four. It says every time I try to do this exercise I feel more pain. What should I do Eduardo. And this is going to be my advice for everyone and for any exercise if you are feeling pain doing an exercise, specifically the back anchor challenge and specifically to you, Eduardo, my advice is to turn down the intensity and to potentially go back to a previous exercise where you're not experiencing pain. And the reason is because everything about this program is a progression of what preceded it. And so if you get to a point and it's too challenging or painful, then that's okay. That just means you probably need to spend more time on whatever preceded that. And in this case, it would be the back anchor. Challenge one and get better at that. More confident. Develop your core stability and strength. And then once you feel ready, you return to the back anchor challenge two and work on that until you get better and the entire program is laid out like that. And so there's nothing inherent about this exercise that's going to be harmful or damaging to the body. But if it's being done without that back anchor connection, which is the top priority, is maintaining that connection and um, and, or too intensely and the connection eventually gets lost. Then that is game over for the exercise. It's not providing any benefits. So this exercise is safe when connection is maintained. And this is a very scalable exercise in itself. So you can really turn down the intensity within this exercise and just not extend your legs, arms and legs so far and just maybe go out just a tiny bit where you can maintain a strong connection and feel no pain and work there. That's where you're at. And then try and gradually push that limit. Push your abilities over time, over days and weeks. And that's how the progress is made in this program. It's not over one session or even a couple sessions. The progress is made over repetition over days and weeks and that's the commitment. So I appreciate you asking that, Eduardo. I'm sure it's relevant to other people. So thank you for asking and I hope that helps. Drew, in the chat you say, I know we're supposed to do these exercises every day. However, I notice my muscles get pretty tired towards the end of the week and I have a hard time standing straight up with an active core. So is it okay to rest all day on day seven before starting the next module? Absolutely, drew. One of the core concepts of the program is to listen to your body. There will eventually be an entire lesson on the art of listening to your body. But in the meantime, I've done a live stream all about it. And so yes, definitely do what you got to do. Take a day off if you need two days off, because delayed onset muscle soreness can be two days or even three, although I don't. If you're getting sore for two or three days after a routine, I recommend you turn down the intensity. Because we are training muscles, we're trying to target muscles that really shouldn't be getting Doms, and that's delayed onset muscle soreness for anyone. After you go to the gym and you pump your iron with your biceps and then your biceps are sore for a few days sometimes, and they call it delayed onset because sometimes the soreness doesn't even come on until one or two days later. That that is for power muscles, that is for movement muscles. And what we're targeting in this program is primarily stability muscles that don't move the body but Stabilize the trunk. And so those are designed for not so much power and strength but for endurance. And so if you're getting real strong Doms, I think you might want to turn down the intensity. And I also think that no matter what you listen to your body. And it also could be frequency. I know I think you mentioned you're doing it more than once per day, which is great. I fully support that for students that want to go above and beyond the protocol of the program, because these exercises shouldn't be you shouldn't be able to overdo them if you're doing them right, if you're doing them at that level of intensity where we're training our posture, you can't really overdo it. And so that's great, but it may be just a matter for you of the combination of the frequency, doing it more than once per day and also maybe going a little harder than what you need to. And that's our natural tendency as part of the topic of today's stream is ten percent rule. Turning down the intensity and just how valuable that is. So yeah, the try less thing. Yeah, maybe I should call it that, but that's really what it is like. Our natural human tendency is to try hard when we really want something, and all of us really want to get out of pain. And so we try so hard to get out of pain. And it's really counterintuitive to try less hard. But if you want to try hard in the mental focus part, because this is ninety percent mental focus and ten percent physical training, really it is. So when you're doing the movements, try really hard and focusing on what you're doing and tuning into your body and getting into that meditative zone. Meditation with movement, that's where you try hard and then the actual movement is the deliberate movements where you are staying connected through the movements, and not necessarily feeling like you need to pump iron to gain more benefits. Yep. So drew says hamstrings super weak is super common. That is a thing with the bridge. You know, a lot of people in the beginning, they start off with they're doing we're doing the bridge, doing it really well. But the hamstrings are primarily doing the driving of the bridge, the force. And gradually as we continue to do the bridge, the perfect bridge, the way it's taught in the program, the glutes will become stronger and start taking more of the role of that driving force and the hamstrings. They are also getting stronger, but they're needing to do less, and that's why they tend to cramp significantly less. And they often cramp in the beginning. First day or two, and then that completely drops off after the glutes start to come in and support. So yeah very typical. I see Chris showing up live. Chris, good to see you. It says somewhat off topic question. I recently began running again and have pain in my right lower leg just to the inside of my shin. Okay, inside of my shin, right leg always feels slightly externally rotated. Any advice? Let me come back to that. I just want to see if we are still on topic with drew says yeah, concentrated meditation and cramp. Cramped hamstrings in the beginning. Yeah. So all of that is, you know, making sense. Drew. So it seems like you understand what I'm saying. So let's see. Chris recently began running. So if I was going to if I was going to do an evaluation on you in a physical therapy clinic, I'm your PT, I work in a clinic. You come in and you're like, hey, I'm Chris, here's my script. I'm your patient. I would say, have you changed anything recently to cause this new pain that you're experiencing? And your answer would be yes. I recently started running and I would go, okay, that's that is where we need to start. And so it's most likely has to do with this change in your lifestyle, change in your activity levels, and often with running. In particular, I did work in a sports clinic that primarily served runners because runners are very stubborn and they will run through pain. Oftentimes it's going to doing too much. It's repetitive trauma and going beyond the body's current ability. Or if it's a really avid runner, it's often break down from doing too much and not giving it enough rest in between running. And so that's probably what's going on. Pain in the right lower leg to the inside of your shin. If it's not nerve pain, then it's likely, you know, impact pain. And I dare I say, you know, the common shin injury that happens to runners because it's not a fun one, but there is a common shin injury that happens to runners from going too hard and doing too much and it's impact related. So hopefully it's not that because if it is, then you got to rest. You're going to have to rest quite a bit and let that heal. And then it's all going to be about gradually exposing your body to the increased levels of stress. And you could apply that statement that I just said to everything. If you're trying to make progress in with the body. I'll be. I'll just limit it to the physical body. But I assume this applies to more than just that. If you're trying to make progress with the physical body, it's graded. Exposure to stress gradually expose it to more stress over time, over weeks and months, while giving your body enough rest in between exposures to build back up stronger. And that's that's it. So hopefully that's really just what it is. If it is nerve pain, which is not a typical place inside of your shin, is not typical of nerve pain. Chris then I would give a different answer. Right leg always feels slightly externally rotated. That's good awareness, Chris. So I'm not sure if I want to go deep into that just because of time sake, because we're already at an hour and a half. I don't have like a solution to when somebody has that feeling of always having one leg that's rotated differently than the other. But in general, you're going to want to look at your hip rotation range of motion on both sides, see if that is limited. So potentially your right hip is limited in internal rotation. Internal rotation of the right hip. You want to make sure you have enough of that. And an exercise that you know that I could recommend would be the deep hip rotation motor control for just getting more control of rotation. And then also I really like the the typewriter squat for training hip rotation. You can really target that exercise to go into your hips. And I think that's going to be my advice for now and and see if you can train that away. And if not then we might have to dive a little deeper. Paul says I find it helpful to break it up during the day. I do a few exercises in the morning, and then in the afternoon when I've been sitting at my desk working for a couple hours. Do more. I love that, Paul. That's actually a fantastic strategy. That's probably what I would recommend to everyone if it were feasible, but it's just like too much to ask. But I think that's really great to break up the day. I really believe in doing little bits of the big goal, little bits and pieces of the mission or the whatever, whatever the job is breaking it up and doing it more spread out. It seems really effective. So for the body that works too, and it breaks up the sitting as well. So thanks for sharing that, Paul. Yeah, I support that. So you're up drew. We made it through everything and yours was really long as you know. So I'm going to be reading a lot right now. not only because it's a good question, but also drew shared just his experience in the program so far in the first two weeks. And it's been extremely just powerful to me to read it and I think it would be inspiring to other people. So here we go. It says, hey Ryan, I would just like to say thank you so much for this course. Literally my entire body is healing. I am using these exercises to fix my anterior pelvic tilt and it's working really well. But there are things that are amazing. Me even more. I am just now realizing after doing these exercises that the whole time I just had a really weak core aka weak stabilizer muscles. The lesson on how working the bigger muscles does not work really changed the game for me. I'll read that again. The lesson on how working the bigger muscles does not really work, really change the game. For me, that's pretty much the topic of part of the topic of today's stream. This is the kind of imbalance I was coming from. My pelvis was rotating anteriorly that was making my thighs tight and back tight, and my glutes and abs weak. I knew that stuff already, and so I was doing traditional core exercises and even some weighted squats and ab exercises, but nothing was working that well. But here's the kicker my core was so weak that my right shoulder has also been out of place for years now. My lower trapezius and maybe other muscles, maybe other muscles could not hold it back in place. So it would always dip forwards, making my chest and shoulder and arm tight. Sitting in chairs and lying down was uncomfortable and I could never relax, right? Always having to constantly adjust my shoulder blade back. I thought, okay, so those muscles are weak. I'll strengthen them by doing weighted back rows. Back flys with like five pound weights and pull ups etc. from my back, but those didn't work because I was working the bigger muscles, not my core stabilizers. Doing these exercises, especially the front anchor belly time one, has literally reset my shoulder faster than me doing the previous things mentioned for months. That's really powerful. I really appreciate you sharing that, drew, because I think it's not that people don't believe me or don't believe it. I think it's hard for people to believe this whole ten percent rule thing, and that it's actually more beneficial to do less sometimes not to do less quantity of effort of, you know, commitment to your body, but to do less intensity of effort while you're working on your body. Okay. So this is a real life example. And I think that's easier for people to believe and grasp. it spells it out. So thank you for sharing that. Drew, you say, I seriously cannot believe how simple this is. All I had to do was strengthen my inner core stabilizers. My entire body is being healed, held right and put back together. Literally all my issues are going away. Thank you from the bottom of my heart. These issues have affected literally every area in my life. I couldn't play guitar very long without cramping, I couldn't dance, I had to stop exercising and working out. Me too drew. I had to stop exercising and working out for a couple years of my life because of my back. I was afraid to move too much without my hips popping and snapping, or my shoulders snapping the nerve back and forth. To be honest, I was losing everything that I loved to do. My dreams and goals were starting to fade away. So thank you. There's more everybody. Uh, I'm loving it. I just, you know, typically I don't read a whole lot on stream, but this is just so powerful. So here we go. Also, it is totally true about the Dan Tien sea of power that gets stronger as my core is being strengthened. My confidence in myself just keeps getting better. I haven't felt this confident and sure of myself concerning accomplishing, accomplishing goals and believing I can do anything and facing my fears in a long time. It's doing wonders to my mind. I had tried other things, and so I kind of hesitated spending two hundred dollars on this. But this program I was always looking for. But this is the program I was always looking for. Thank you so much, drew. So here we go. We have a question coming up from drew, kind of in like the P.S. section of his message, but just want to like kind of separate this out. And thank you, drew for sharing. I hope that some other student out there or prospective student watches this and sees this story. This is I believe you're two weeks into the program, drew and that it motivates you to make the commitment and change the rest of your life. Change the trajectory of your life from potentially going down a spiral to being able to climb out of it and get back to doing the things you love. That does help your mind, and doing activities you enjoy is is going to be just a positive feedback loop for everything. It affects your entire life. Not that the program does all this, the program just helps you be able to use your body in a healthier way, which then leads to all these other benefits. So here we go into the P.S. section. Oh, also, from my core being weakened I think, and also from when I was lifting heavy weight with a weak core, my ankles kind of suffered. I can't roll the right one in a circle without making cracking popping noises a bit. I tried it just now and it feels like it's getting stronger, but still makes the noises I first noticed when sometimes I would walk down a flight of stairs, I would have to quickly jump up and take pressure off of it, almost like it was too much, or it would sprain from the weight of going down stairs. Does strengthening the core help with this, or do you recommend certain ankle strengthening exercises? I don't want to make the same mistake of finding some that work the bigger muscles around it, or just basically don't address the root cause. My wrists also became weak and poppy, but I'm pretty sure that was just lifting too heavy weight with no core power. I really messed myself, straining everything too hard. Okay, so the ankle. So I'm going to address the ankle question. And I have a professor from my physical therapy school, my doctorate program that would disagree with me on this. So I just want to put that out there that there are people that don't agree with me about what I believe, and that's okay. But I genuinely believe that. Yes. Connecting with the center of your body and strengthening your spinal support muscles and your trunk, and improving your posture in that way will help your ankle. And I can go down the chain reaction that happens when your pelvis goes from an anterior pelvic tilt to neutral, and your hips go from internally or externally rotated back to a more neutral position, which affects your knees and certainly your ankles. The rotation of your legs sit on top of your feet, and that joint between the two is called the ankle. And so when the ankles become typically they become overly. Let's see. I guess if I hope people know the term pronation and supination. So that gets off and that affects the joints and the ankle. I've experienced something similar to what you describe drew. So I am coming from a place of experience where at different times, both of my ankles would pop and sometimes feel like stuck, and I needed to, like, unstuck it or it felt like I was going to, like, hurt it. And so I'd have to like, do exactly what you describe and be like, ah, I need to like, put roll it or move it or something, and a little pop or adjustment would happen and then it would feel released and then later it would happen again. So that actually doesn't happen to me anymore. And I don't know why I never really focused on my ankles, but you did remind me that I that did used to happen to me. And anyway, where it was on me, since I know the anatomy was on the outside of my ankle. It was the head of the fibula, head or base. I believe it's the head. And it would just kind of like get out of place. I had chronic ankle sprains, so I always associated it with that. But the two things that I think helped me are centering my body, improving my posture, and also single leg exercises are incredibly powerful for stabilizing the ankle. And so we do that in the program. Towards the end of the program, we start we move to unilateral exercise. I believe that's I'm just going to guess module nine. We start that. And so we start doing a whole bunch of single leg stuff. And it's not for the purpose of this, but one of the byproducts of this is that your ankles will become strong and mobile, which is a really great combination. Typically, you know, strong can often come together with immobile or stiff or and mobile often goes together with weak or loose or lax. So when you're doing single leg exercises, you're getting that mobility in your ankle plus building incredible strength. And so I would just say stick with the program. And once you get to that point in the program, you know, really spend a lot of time on that ankle and build, build the strength standing on that. You could start now standing on one leg connecting to your anchors. You haven't gotten to module five yet where we put all the anchors together. But you know, we do single leg anchor triad and yeah, that'll be that's the starting point of standing on one leg. I think that'll probably help a lot. I'm not going to recommend you go to any manual therapist and have someone adjust your ankle. It seems like it's an instability issue, and there are probably some tendons that are pulling on things a little too much in some places and not holding it together in other places. And I just don't think that a manipulation is going to be. I don't even know if it would be beneficial at all. It may not be the opposite of beneficial. So stabilization in that case, single leg stuff. Just try balancing on one leg and and then we'll get to that point where we add functional movement to it. It should get better I believe it will. And we don't have to like get the microscope out and start dissecting your ankle and doing real specific stuff, because I think the whole body works synergistically and it will find balance if you guide it that way. So drew says, right? It's like everything is twisted. And so the pressure on my legs and ankles is too much. I really feel like putting my hips in balance will fix them. But yes, popping ankles feels like a release. Yes, I've noticed the step back single leg squats stabilise me more. Yeah for sure. It does seem like what you're experiencing, drew, is kind of possibly the same thing that I experienced in. Another thing I can tell you is that if there's no pain with the popping, don't don't worry about it. That's what they teach in PT school. And I do agree that, you know, if there's popping together with pain, then we'll do something about it. But if the pain is starting to go away, even though the popping is still there, it's not something it's actually going in the right direction. Whatever you're doing, keep doing more. And it's not really a popping without pain is not something to be too concerned about. That's what they teach anyway, and hopefully the popping goes away too, with you doing the right. Continue doing what you're doing. So yeah, I think that's everything. Thank you all for committing to your body. As you get up from the computer, go do something good for your body. Pay back your tissue debt. As I like to say, for putting it through this repetitive trauma of sitting at a computer for hours. That's what I'm going to do. I'll probably go for a walk. And if you're a student in the program, then get down on the floor and connect to your core because your body does so much for you. So don't forget to pay it back, just like you do for your teeth by brushing them. Pay back your tissues for letting you do fun things all the time. And until next time, connect to your core and I'll see you next week.
