Hi everyone,
Phew, are you enjoying this little burst of heat, or does it feel too much? Either way look after yourselves with plenty of water - remember at least 30mL per kg per day (more if you drink caffeine or alcohol ;)
Today I want to share a fantastic short video with you. Warning: it is not for the faint hearted as it shows a dissected human cadaver. If you can get past that it is just brilliant. They've been able to remove everything including the skeleton and organs so we can clearly see a continuous line of muscle and fascia from the tip of the toes to the tongue.
To help you follow the video the body parts / muscles are:
foot (flexor digitorum longus) - shin (posterior tibial) - back of knee (popliteus) - knee capsule - inner thigh (adductor magnus, pectineus) - hip flexors (Iliacus, psoas) - lower back (quadratus lumborum) - diaphragm - sac around the heart and connective tissue around lungs (pericardium) - sternum (mediastinum) - throat - mouth - tongue
Why am I showing you this? Because I often use the phrase, "it's all connected" in a Kinesiology or Pilates session and this video is a great visual demonstration of just that. It brings the phrase to life in a very real and tangible way. Seeing how different parts of the body are connected is what I love about both Kinesiology and PIlates. For example, you may come into a Kinesiology session with a sore ankle but the muscle testing guides us to work up around the ribcage and shoulders, we don't even touch the ankle yet it feels better at the end of the appointment. How is that possible? Because it's all connected.
There are many implications we can take from the video. One that jumped out at me was seeing the connection of the psoas (hip flexor) and lower back muscles directly to the diaphragm. I always forget just how big the diaphragm is. Now you can see how having tight hip flexors or lower back can affect your breathing and how improper breathing can affect the back and hips.
Also I know that I've had to retrain my tongue to sit correctly in the roof of my mouth and I still have to work on getting it moving properly as I breathe. Now we can see how the tongue affects the diaphragm and how they work together!
And of course there's the implication that an issue in your foot could affect anywhere up the chain - right to your mouth and tongue!
Happy connecting!
Carla :)
P.S. How big is the tongue?!
