TCCBasicsHomePage WuMovementAbstraction

In an earlier post I referred to the small of the back (yao) as a catch 22

area, another common handle to the self-same area is 'bad back' like in 'I

have a bad back'.

Well ... I used to have a 'bad back' and now I have a good one, all the

credit for this and other refurbishing of my body go to TCC as taught by

Rock.

The cause is hidden in structure of the of the spine, and the load bearing

function that it has.

If you'll look through Gray's Anatomy - or your descriptive anatomy book of

choice, you'll see the structure of the vertebrae, the load bearing part of

it is the body which is connected to vertebra above and below through the

disks. The load that the spine carries is the thorax, and the balancing

force are the gravity muscles passing though the 2 grooves at the sides of

the vertebral spines.

As long as the structure is such that the weight is passing through the disk

bodies, the structure is stable. An analog will be:

+++ddd+++++++++++++++++++++wwwww

ssssssbbblllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll

mmm ddd

mmm..../\

mmm.../..\

In this configuration, as the weight (ww) increases, the muscle (mm) will

contract more, and the resultant force will be still passing through the

disks (dd). This structure is inherently stable.

When the lower back curvature gets more pronounced, the balance point will

move off the disks, towards the pedicles impairing their function, and then

when the arch increases more it'll pass beyond the vertebral structures,

into the muscle mass creating a bow.

When this happens, any muscular contraction, instead of balancing the

structure will unbalance it further (catch 22), at this juncture the

structure is inherently unstable. More so, the splinting reflex will kick in

increasing the dysfunction. This is a positive feedback circuit, and the

only way to stop the runaway process is full bed rest, muscle relaxants etc.

Some MD's and others will recommend at this juncture to increase the

strength of the abdominal, reasoning that pulling the far side of the lever

(ll) will decrease the curvature, true as it goes, however, this will

increase the pressure in the body cavity, impair abdominal breathing and in

essence create a 'double weight' area.

When attempting to use TCC incorrectly at this juncture (using the muscle at

the top {front} of the thigh) the knees, qua and yao are blocked (the qua

directly since the quads will pull the pelvic rim forward, the knees from

lots of pressure on the patella, and the yao indirectly from rotation of the

pelvis that translated to additional lower back curvature) , and little

headway can be had.

The TCC 'trick' is to flatten the yao by bypassing the quads, counter

rotating the pelvis to flatten the yao, and releasing the abdominals so that

belly breathing can be had.

Peter G. has posted a very detailed description of the recovery process to

the TCC list a few months back.

The key to this is reasonably simple even if not commonly spoken about, one

has to transfer the load bearing from the quads to the fascia lata by

tightening the tensor fascia lata.

This practice is commonly referred to as 'u shaped crotch' (see CPL's book)

and is accompanied by an outwards rotation of the thighs, and inwards

rotation of the lower legs.

This method has to taught hands on, and practiced under supervision.

Once the key is given, one needs to invest in daily horse stance practice.

Starting with a few (5-10) * seconds * at a time, (if you can do much more

to start with you're ding it wrong). The feedback is simple, the sides of

the thigh feel a very hard burn.

One practices 3-5 times a day, a total of a minute of so at a time. As

endurance builds up, one increases the depth of the sit, until one can have

'knee over toes'.

When this stage is reached, one narrows the stance, and starts high again.

When one can maintain a *correct* sit for 5-10 minutes, one can starts doing

the form, correctly.

David L.