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The Gokhale Method® is designed to be, well, methodical. But although the process of learning healthy posture is mostly systematic and progressive, it is also usually punctuated by “aha moments”. These glimpses of intellectual, visual, and kinesthetic understanding of the body can arrive like the warm glow of returning to home ground, or they can be seismic shifts that change your life forever…

Having an aha moment makes most people’s posture journey exciting, and sometimes profound. This blog post shares some student experiences and reflections on their discoveries.

David Samuels got out of constant sciatic pain while taking Gokhale Foundations with teacher Amy Smith. For David, learning to bend well was a revelation. 

Aha! The moment when the mind relaxes…

With aha moments we are often talking about cognition that differs from the slow burn of incremental learning. It’s a flash of insight—somewhat like a lightbulb coming on. In “The Power of Now,” Eckhart Tolle’s bestselling book on meditation, he describes how his mind finally shifted out of a period of intensely stressed and anxious overthinking. His mind finally gave way one day to a state of peace, clarity, and insight.

Stress and anxiety are not intended to be a part of our learning process, but I think a similar mechanism sometimes plays out. Students are often very conscientious and expect to master a lot of  material in a short time—this expectation can overwhelm the mind. The mind loves to learn with firm foundations and linear, logical steps, but it can get overloaded. When it lets go, it can sometimes make connections spontaneously. Aha.

Nancy Sullivan was amazed to learn she could resolve her lifelong headaches herself with Gokhale Method teacher Aurelia Vaicekauskas.
 

Eminent violinist Kala Ramnath could scarcely believe her back pain had really gone after years of suffering.

Embracing change for the better

Heike Eschbach is a retired midwife and lives in Germany. She had suffered with back pain and sciatica for many years, and, while taking the Foundations course with Julie Johnson, was able to reduce her pain medication by two-thirds. 

Learning about the benefits of a J-spine, a well-positioned pelvis, and external rotation in her hips, have been just some of the posture principles that are bringing healthy changes to Heike’s body. For her, learning how to relax and read in comfort was a breakthrough—the realization that healthy posture holds the key to resolving her pain. Heike wrote to us:

The new movement patterns I’ve learned integrate wonderfully into my everyday life. I am now also noticing improvement in my cervical spine and shoulders. I'm very happy about that.

Aha moments can be profoundly relaxed and comfortable—it just takes know-how to get there. Heike is embodying numerous posture principles that arrange her spine and body well as she relaxes on the sofa to read.

Posture breakthroughs are a state of mind, as well as body

It is not surprising that the majority of our students are delighted to find solutions to physical issues, whether that be to address pain, improve appearance, or more generally for self-optimization and future-proofing. But they often find, at some point, that changing their posture also impacts the way they feel about themselves and the world around them.  

Below is a heartfelt account from a British student, Lavinia, from Milton Keynes, who wrote:

My whole life has been blighted by BIG bosoms! To the extent that I have become excessively round shouldered and as soon as I am in a new environment with people all around me, the shoulders come forward and my tortoise shell envelops me in order to hide those which I detest!

Well, I read the book, listened to Esther online, and attended a Foundations class. What bosoms? I’m so busy perfecting a lovely straight back I have forgotten all about them. Who cares anyway? My neighbour has noticed my back is so much straighter, things are changing for the better. I intend to keep up the good work. I feel like a new woman! 

Finding our natural uprightness and height in a relaxed and comfortable way not only gives us the space our spine and other structures crave, it often liberates our personality and self-confidence too. 

Professional cellist Katie Rietman discovered greater freedom through learning the Gokhale Method with Julie Johnson, both in her neck, and her confidence. 

Aha moments can turn students into teachers

Most Gokhale Method teachers can clearly recall their first aha moments too! Clare Chapman, a teacher in the UK, tells how she initially encountered the Gokhale Method through my book: 

One of my yoga students, who knew I was interested in solutions to back pain, lent me 8 Steps to a Pain-Free Back. As she handed me the book, to be honest, being a somewhat sceptical Brit, I thought this was probably just another “easy steps” self-help book that would promise the earth and fall far short. But within a few pages I was compelled to read more. 

The next few days and chapters brought repeated aha moments. My understanding of the body, back pain, and posture, shifted into a new paradigm. Within weeks I knew I wanted to learn more and teach these principles. My aha moments may have slowed down a bit, but are still happening 14 years on…

Self-help steps, principles that challenge the conventional wisdom on back pain, and hundreds of compelling illustrations, bring aha moments for many readers.

Best next action steps 

If you would like to discover your aha posture moments, get started by booking a consultation, online or in person, with one of our teachers. 

You can sign up below to join any one of our upcoming FREE Online Workshops…

Each generation brings fresh perspectives to the way they live their lives. 

Each generation finds its own way of looking at things…Image from Pixabay

One trend to emerge from the Millennials (born 1981–96) and early Gen Zs (born 1997–2012) is self-optimization. 

Personal optimizers are aiming to optimize their productivity, happiness, intelligence, and health. If personal growth is about doing the right things, then personal optimization is about doing things right.

Healthy posture and a pain-free body enable you to optimize your work, rest, and play! Image from Pickpik

So what do self-optimizers work on?

Optimizing can be about doing what you are doing better, faster, with fewer resources, to higher quality, and with better results. The optimizers’ mindset needs self-awareness: awareness of your preferences, and what choices you are making every day—look at all the options and pick the best one. 

Some examples of self-optimization include exercising regularly, taking care of your diet, managing time and stress, and getting enough sleep, all with the aim of making your body and mind more resilient against fatigue, negative mood, and illness.

Broadly speaking, optimization is the act of changing an existing process in order to increase the occurrence of favorable outcomes and decrease the occurrence of undesirable outcomes. And this is exactly what the Gokhale Method® does—it enables people to exchange unhealthy, damaging, painful posture, for healthy, healing, pain-free posture. This allows you to meet your potential for musculoskeletal health.

Gokhale Method students can use the latest biofeedback tech with the Gokhale PostureTracker™ to assist in optimizing their posture.

Healthy posture helps you walk your talk

Healthy posture gives you a body that is upright but relaxed, and super-comfortable to live in, with an athletic bearing that says you are ready for life. People instinctively perceive this in others, and it makes a positive impression. 

Wealth coach, life coach, and entrepreneur Ramit Sethi saw himself in a photo taken from the side, and didn’t like what he saw. Presenting himself well is a priority for Ramit, so he went looking for help—he had no idea if such a thing as a posture coach existed. Back last December, he spoke generously on his YouTube channel about his sessions with Gokhale Method teacher Cynthia Rose, which he described as “life-changing.” 

Ramit explains how he optimized his Gokhale Method sessions to a busy schedule in NYC. For Ramit, healthy, good-looking posture is one of life’s riches.

Rahul shares his posture optimization on Google

Rahul Reddy runs his own business doing analytics for internet startups. Before his Gokhale Method course he wrote, “As a result of many hours at my desk I’ve lost strength, flexibility, and most certainly good posture. My goals are: 

1) Better posture and physical activity habits on work days. I have picked up bad movement and posture habits as I spent more time building my business. 

2) Rebuild my strength in other activities—I maintain a small vineyard, and work with clay… and I did enjoy doing more with my hands during the pandemic. 

3) Continuous improvement and future-proofing. 

Rahul took our in-person Foundations course, and later our online Elements course. Among the many techniques he has learned in becoming pain-free, he knows to externally rotate his legs, roll open his shoulders, open his chest, lengthen his neck, and engage his inner corset. Rahul now enjoys a more stable, athletic, and symmetrical stance.

Rahul was delighted to get out of pain and enjoy his activities more than ever by learning the Gokhale Method. Thank you for your Google review, Rahul!

Don’t be a posture pessimizer

Ok, that’s not a real word, but if you are a posture pessimist then you might find yourself saying things like, “I think I inherited my bunions,” or “Everyone in my family has a rounded upper back,” or “Nobody in my family has a butt,” or “I’m learning to live with my back pain.”

These statements are usually premised on misinformation, or are wanting in alternative points of view and experiences. For example, a posture optimizer will know:

• Bunions happen due to poor stance and undue pressure on the first metatarsophalangeal joint.
• A rounded upper back is often a result of tucking the pelvis.
• A flat butt simply points to the fact that you haven’t yet learned to use your buttock muscles in walking.
• Just because back pain is common does not make it normal! We should expect to not have it.

You don’t have to be a Millennial to be an optimizer! Every generation stands to gain from being inspired by healthy, pain-free posture. We are passionate about helping all people discover their best, pain-free selves.

Best next action steps

If you would like to optimize your posture, get started by booking a consultation, online or in person, with one of our teachers.

You can sign up below to join any one of our upcoming FREE Online Workshops…

ALL OF ME

In December 2020 I received an email from Gokhale Method® offering a five-day trial period of exercise classes and dance parties with posture lessons. Every day for five days! I was thrilled to receive this email and joined on January 1. From day one I knew I had found something very special.  

Before the COVID-19 pandemic, I swam to stave off the pain I felt in my back and hips. But when the virus struck, I wasn’t able to swim. Eventually my back pain returned to being constant. This showed me that being dependent on an external circumstance, swimming in this case, to feel good, could not give me everything that I needed to heal. 

January 1, 2021, day one of my five-day free trial of the Gokhale Method daily program. It was about the inner corset and how it protects your back.

Those first five days were like a prayer being answered. I thought, “this is the place where I can learn how to care for myself day by day." Three weeks later I decided to take the online Elements course. With each lesson, I learned new ways to relieve pain in my body and gained confidence that I could help myself if pain returned. Fortunately, I could take the lessons at my own pace which allowed me to take my time and savor what I was learning. Some positive results came very quickly for me, and yet there is a lot more depth left for me to appreciate. For both these reasons, it was with deep gratitude that I came to write this article.  

As a very young girl I was confident in my body. Being athletic, I felt I could do anything. I was just me. . .whole. That all changed growing up in a troubled family. Mine was a childhood of great conflict and uncertainty. But I was resilient, so I forged ahead.

Here I am, aged 18.

In my late twenties I fell through a porch, leaving one leg on the deck and the other dangling below. Alone, I pulled myself up. It was a terrifying experience and had a strong physical impact. Sitting became possible for only short periods at a time. I was profoundly uncomfortable with no ease or let up. Doctors couldn’t find anything “wrong” with me —no broken bones or serious injuries that X-rays could detect. A chiropractor told me my pelvis was twisted from the fall. This was a helpful diagnosis but he treated me for nine months with no change. So began my search for something that would permanently help me. Yoga, swimming, massage, physical therapy, chiropractic; you name it, I tried it—everything mainstream and more. All were helpful in some ways, but none resulted in lasting improvements.

Me in 1997, aged 40. I would tend to lock my knees and park my abdomen forward, creating sway and compression in my lower back. 

My search continued for 32 years. My back would give out, I would have to lie down for days, and then slowly over weeks I would loosen up and go on. My chosen profession in the Fine Arts is of a physical nature, allowing me to move around frequently throughout the day. This was my saving grace, because moving kept some of the muscular tightness at bay. 

Leaning in to paint book covers contributed to my hunching. I needed to learn how not to round my back and hunch my shoulders.

Sensing there was an emotional connection to my physical pain, I continued searching and exploring different avenues for a deeper understanding of why I was still “not right.” Talk therapy was enormously helpful. The fall had scared me. So had other experiences in my early life. Even with all this therapy work, the pain persisted. Over time I gained in self-confidence and felt reconciled to what I had to deal with—occasional debilitating bouts of back pain—and I moved on with my life. Things could be worse, I thought to myself. Years later the answers to my predicament became clearer as I took on the role of a caregiver. I imagine as I write this that many readers will understand from personal experience what it is like to care for someone who is ill and relies on you heavily.

Caregiving became a central focus in my daily life as I cared for my mother and later my sister. Caring for them made for conflicted feelings. As my mother’s condition worsened I took on more responsibilities for her care. One day she asked me, “why are you helping me?" It floored me, though I knew why she asked. Why would you care for someone who did not care for you? All I could say to her at the time was “because I love you, and you deserve it." She did not believe it—I was conflicted. But deep in my heart I knew she did deserve my help. This is what family does, right? I had to care for her, love her, show her that she was worthy. I do believe that we are all worthy of love and care. For myself, I wanted to learn what it is to have a positive experience of family.  

The Dust Bowl book. (Buttons, tin type photos, hand-painted paper, birch bark.) A central focus of my work is to give attention to the unseen in plain sight. From the tiny bits on the forest floor to the unrecognized work that women do daily. Now after many years I understand hiding was my main way to feel safe, unrecognized, and unseen.

But it wore me down. It was almost more than I could bear, and my body caved in on itself. I stiffened with fear and worry. My shoulders slumped forward and my back rounded. It was a relief when my mother quietly passed away in her apartment.

The Dust Bowl, closed. Its insides are hidden.

Several years later I drove to Georgia with my husband and our pup, Ace, to bring my older sister home to Massachusetts so I could care for her. We had seen each other only a few times in 40 years. We were sisters but you wouldn’t know it. She needed help and care desperately. I knew I had to step in.

I made this piece when my sister was diagnosed with cancer. Dark and light come together. My photographs are not enhanced—these are printed on tissue paper, then applied to the frame like gold leaf. The black handmade paper is arranged edge-on.

That was nine years ago. Through those years we got to know each other and grew as close as she would allow. Several times she asked me nearly the same question my mother had, “Why are you helping me?" And again I said, “because I love you, you deserve it.” But I was angry with her for the hurt and pain she caused in our childhood. Even though I had grown a deep emotional understanding of myself by that time, I still didn’t recognize what was happening in my body. Again my body stiffened and caved in.

My mother and my siblings. I am the worried looking one on her lap.

Caregiving wore me down and filled me up, leaving room for little else. The burden from stress, worry, responsibility, and physical strain, is exhausting. Along with that, the sense of connection and privilege of being trusted and important to the people who needed my help filled me with wonder, love, and self-confidence. I held up and helped out. This is as it should have been in many ways, except one—I could not find effective or adequate ways to care for myself at the same time. 

I have learned for myself how interconnected everything is. I used to think that we were made up of separate parts—a mind, soul, spirit, body. I sought out solutions to my pain as though I was made up of these different parts. It was as if, like jigsaw puzzle pieces put together in the right place, I could become whole. This did not work for me.  

A limited edition of 39 copies, published by 21st Editions. As a bookbinder I co-designed and created many editions. This is one of my favorites. I painted linen papers for these covers. Each set is different. All stages of production are by hand.

Book cover opened. It took me a long time to find the integration within myself that I could create in my artwork.

Now I understand things differently. I believe there is an interrelated dance to the patterns we develop. These patterns play out over and over again. Our own individual ways of moving our bodies are part of the constellation of being who we are and how our life experiences inform our reality.  

While I was still taking the Elements course and attending the daily program, the puzzle pieces started coming together. Sometimes, while dancing in class, I’d be swept away in movement, crying and integrating the grief my body was holding. All while moving with better posture!

Tucking my pelvis and rounding my back as I am doing here was a self-protective postural habit—almost like a turtle’s shell. 

Now I prefer to hip-hinge and my spine, back muscles, and neck are much happier!

It’s been 13 months since my first Zoom classes. I still show up for the daily classes and dance my heart out. Moving as freely as I can, feeling myself move through space, sensing the physicality inside of me. How does it feel to anchor my ribs? What’s it like to roll my shoulders back and feel their weight as they hang by my sides or float around? I feel alive and connected to me. I feel wonderful sensations of flow as I move around the room. 

I loved painting these lines, which are covered in tissue paper. This is the flow I had been searching for and have now found for my body/self.

This work with the Gokhale Method teachers and the online community continues to be full of opportunities and I am still learning. My latest adventure with this wonderful work is using the PostureTracker™! This is an amazing tool that gives real-time feedback on my body’s movements and is rapidly deepening my understanding of my posture habits.  

PostureTracker used to show how I habitually contracted the back of my neck and lifted my chin up (left). Now it is helping me to learn and maintain a much healthier, tall neck position (right). 

Aligning my body in healthy posture so that I can move with ease is my goal. I am simply engaged in the process of making the unfamiliar familiar. Over time I will be “at home” standing tall with ribs anchored, shoulders back, arms hanging comfortably by my sides, and strong feet beautifully supporting all of me.

Here I am seeing that my back remains unswayed using the Upright and Relaxed PostureTracker™setting.

If you would like to find out more about how the Gokhale Method can help support you, sign up to join one of our upcoming FREE Online Workshops…

According to Dr. Tammy Chen’s NY Times column, dental patients are suffering from an “epidemic of cracked teeth” due in part to posture. How can we avoid a similar fate? Image courtesy Engin Akyurt on Unsplash.

I recently came across a New York Times column by Tammy Chen, DDS, a prosthodontist with a practice in Manhattan, describing the “epidemic of cracked teeth” she’s seen in her patients during the COVID pandemic. Dr. Chen names two suspected culprits: the slumped posture many people adopt while working from home with improvised furniture, and excessive anxiety and stress. Both of these culprits lead to jaw clenching and tooth grinding.

This man’s C-spine — an intensely rounded upper back and tucked pelvis — are all too common in people working from home and on laptops. As Dr. Chen pointed out, such postural habits can have deleterious effects on the jaw.

The dangers of a C-spine
While working remotely, people are slumping and hunching at their computers more than ever before. For many unaware of how to sit healthfully, lack of access to office workspaces (and in some cases, ergonomic furniture) has been difficult to adjust to. Anyone plagued by a C-spine — with an intensely tucked pelvis below rounded, hunched shoulders — is doing themself some real damage if they don’t learn new ways of using their body. I’m always calling out the unhealthy stresses this puts on discs, nerves, bones, and ligaments in the back and neck, but the consequences of poor posture don't stop there.

Gaming posture also often tends toward a C-spine, to the detriment of gamers’ long-term spinal health, as well as jaw health.

As Dr. Chen points out, nerves passing through the neck and shoulder lead directly to the temporomandibular joint (TMJ). TMJ dysfunction is a widespread problem in our culture and can lead to pain, clicking, and popping in the jaw. So it stands to reason (and I’ve seen in my decades teaching) that hunched, slumped posture in the upper body, including the neck and shoulders through which nerves pass, has detrimental effects on the jaw.

The temporomandibular joint (TMJ) connects the jaw to the skull. Original image courtesy Wikipedia user Jmarchn under CC BY-SA 3.0.

Healthier posture = healthier teeth
Thankfully, learning new and healthful ways of using the upper body while sitting and sleeping is within all of our reach. When sitting, the alternative to collapsing into a C-spine is to first fix the foundation of the spine, which is the pelvis. When the pelvis is tucked under, it provides a wonky base for the spine to rest on. Like a building with poor foundations, the spine is then distorted as a consequence, rounding out the back to then cantilever forward with the upper body. This obliges the muscles in the neck and shoulders to do overtime supporting the substantial weight of the head, creating tension and compression all the way through to the jaw.

The remedy is to learn to position the pelvis well by stretchsitting or stacksitting — so named because they either allow the spine to stretch out straight (stretchsitting), or for the bones of the spine to stack upright and relaxed (stacksitting). Both enable sustainable shoulder placement, and a well positioned neck and head. Bingo! Their harmonious arrangement of bones and soft tissues gives our nerves the space and pathways they need to function happily.

Our jaws and teeth are among the body parts where anxiety and stress most noticeably take their toll. Image courtesy Nhia Moua on Unsplash.

Anxiety and stress affect the jaw
Jaw clenching and tooth grinding at night while sleeping are typically the result of anxiety and stress, both of which are increasingly common in 2020. This added pressure and friction on the dental surfaces are another factor Dr. Chen suspects in the high number of cracked teeth she’s seen in her practice since June. How can posture help here?

Learning stretchlying brings our students a level of comfort and rest many have never experienced before. Image courtesy Minnie Zhou on Unsplash.

The luxuriously comfortable and relaxed postures we teach for sleep help relieve tension all throughout the body and improve sleep quality. Better, deeper sleep gives us a more stable footing on which to meet the day, even in stressful settings, and can help our mental health considerably. Why not take steps to improve our sleep quality if it can help our health, both mental and dental?

We recommend stretchlying on the back because it supports and gently tractions the body in ways that allow muscles that have been overworking to finally relax, releasing their grip on the back, the neck and, yes, the jaw. It may seem surprising to link healthy posture and dental health, but it actually makes perfect sense that jaw tension and teeth grinding can have positional causes.

If you’d like to revamp your understanding of comfort and perhaps invest in something other than your dentist’s next vacation, try an Online Initial Consultation with one of our online teachers. We also have a new Free Online Workshop all about how you can use posture to relieve stress! We look forward to supporting you (and your pearly whites) in these challenging times.

Back, neck, and joint pain may be flaring up for many of us, especially those who have come to depend on palliative interventions such as massage, chiropractic, and physical therapy.

Does it seem to anyone else like the ribbon of life just tangled dramatically? It makes sense to feel this way — we’re living in a rapidly changing world with new information coming our way all the time. One way we may be physically experiencing that change is in our daily pain levels, which can increase due to myriad reasons: working from home on unfamiliar furniture, stress manifesting as tension in the body, eroded sleep quality from anxiety flare-ups, childcare we are suddenly having to do unassisted. Now, more than ever, we are forced to visit the root of the problem because our usual methods for temporary relief — such as massage therapy and chiropractic — are unavailable or inaccessible. These are marvelous interventions, but now we have an opportunity to address things ourselves. What do we do when we can’t physically visit our massage therapist or chiropractor or physical therapist and our aches and pains are spiraling out of control?

Massage is a worthy therapeutic intervention, but largely inaccessible during shelter-in-place restrictions. Posture re-education, on the other hand, is something you can learn online and put into practice immediately.

This is actually the perfect time to learn, revisit, and refresh skills to relieve your own back, neck, and joint pain without relying on recurring treatments from outside professionals. In the new world of COVID-19, the ancient wisdom and Primal Posture of the Gokhale Method are even more relevant than usual. We’ve had these tools on our side for decades, and our ancestors and forebears have had them for countless generations. Let’s now put them into practice with the goal of self-sufficiency.

To help with this, we’d like to remind you of our no-cost offerings which you can regularly access from your home. Here’s an example to introduce (or re-introduce) you to the fundamental Gokhale Method technique of stretchsitting, a way to gently lengthen your spine through traction and take pressure off compressed discs, nerves, and tissues. You can use equipment already found around your house, such as a rolled-up towel, or a Stretchsit® Cushion if you have one available. If you are even more fortunate, you own a Gokhale Pain-Free™ chair. Even if you’ve learned stretchsitting previously, refreshers are great at a time like this.

In the coming weeks, we’re further expanding our online offerings to include practical new material you can access from the comfort of your own home. Join us for new free teleseminars, posture workshops, online consultations, and online lessons to improve your quality of life without putting others or yourself at risk. Due to high interest, our next free teleseminars (taking place today, April 2, 2020) will revisit the topic of exercise breaks for calm and productivity. Each of our teleseminars is offered multiple times on the same day for ease of scheduling. Coworkers, friends, and family are welcome!

Social distancing can be a perfect time to learn some practical new posture skills alongside those in your household.

We also hope to support many of you with one-on-one online posture sessions, where our qualified teachers can provide personalized coaching on leading a pain-free lifestyle. Email our Customer Support team today so they can connect you with Gokhale Method teachers experienced with online teaching. Your body and mind will thank you, long after restrictions have been lifted. Consider it a gift to your future self and to future generations. Wishing you good health!

We’re all in this together. Hang in there!

Cecilia* didn’t expect to develop disabilities in her early 40s. She had led an active life, working as an academic in a competitive field and enjoying intense activities such as rock climbing, camping, hiking, kayaking, Iyengar yoga, Crossfit, and running. She even flew glider planes for fun. In her own words, she has an “extreme personality” — she pushes herself hard in life and seeks out challenging situations, whether working or playing.

Cecilia describes herself as an “extreme personality” and once enjoyed such intense outdoor pastimes as rock climbing, among others. This all changed once she began a law degree and bar exam preparations. Photo courtesy Brook Anderson on Unsplash.

Cecilia used intense physical activity for relief from persistent stress and anxiety in her demanding life, but her body bore the brunt of that intensity. She began to notice that she was frequently injured and in pain, and her healing process was unusually slow. Sitting in a chair and walking became increasingly difficult. The problems worsened when she began law school. As her degree progressed and the bar exam approached, the range and intensity of her symptoms increased dramatically. She had always been active and followed common guidelines for health. What had gone wrong?

Cecilia has seen an array of specialists she calls her “team.” She now includes Esther Gokhale on this list. Image courtesy Anne Karakash on Pixabay.

Over time, Cecilia amassed a supportive team of conventional and holistic medical practitioners who ruled out several conditions and found others. Her symptoms read like a laundry list. Unusually severe joint injuries and pain caused by relatively minor trauma. Poor balance. Extreme, chronic pain and fatigue, worsened by sitting and progressing to the point where all she could do was lie on the floor. Sizeable ovarian cysts which, thankfully, turned out not to be cancerous, but still required surgical diagnosis and monitoring. Infertility. Poor sleep quality. No arthritis, but indications of inflamed nerves and nerve roots. Persistent and severe irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), flare-ups of which often required Cecilia to spend 10 or 12 hours a day in the bathroom and left her ravenous and exhausted in her own body, unable to digest the food she ate. At her self-described “lowest points,” Cecilia sometimes woke up to discover she’d had an accident in the night as she slept. She recalls resenting a homeless person asking for money outside the pharmacy — they, at least, were able to obtain nourishment from food, unlike her. She felt ashamed of her accidents, her feelings, and her predicament.

Law school exacts a physical and psychological toll upon even the healthiest among us. Over the course of a few years, Cecilia went from extreme thrill-seeker to someone forced to use a mobility scooter to walk her dog. Both sitting and walking caused pain. Unless something changed, she didn’t know how she’d physically be able to sit for her bar exam, the culmination of her grueling law degree program and the gateway to her new career.

Active, intensity-seeking Cecilia never expected to come to rely on a mobility scooter to walk her dog. Image courtesy Sabine van Erp on Pixabay.

All of Cecilia’s individually challenging health concerns emerged and were diagnosed over the past few years, but it was having to depend on the mobility scooter, along with extremely slow-healing contusions to her bones found on X-rays, that spurred her toward a deeper investigation of the root cause of her problems. One of her doctors’ recommendation for pelvic floor physical therapy and a potential diagnosis of spinal arthritis (spondyloarthropathy) eventually led Cecilia to investigate posture training.

A postural approach to chronic pain

In childhood, she remembers her mother reminding her to “Stop slouching!” and to “Stand up straight!” However, what it means to have “good posture”, in terms of the technicalities and which muscles to utilize, has only started to become clear recently through her work first with another posture training method and now, with the Gokhale Method.

Like many Gokhale Method students, Cecilia first encountered Esther’s approach to posture through her book, 8 Steps to a Pain-Free Back. Some time before her symptoms reached their maximum intensity, she attended a Free Introductory Workshop, which was helpful, but as she was traveling frequently cross-country, her posture ended up on the back burner. She also didn’t initially think her posture could be related to her symptoms.

Esther in action, teaching at the Birch Street Studio in Palo Alto.

In contrast to Cecilia’s other posture training class, which focused mainly on relaxation, the Gokhale Method brings an array of techniques and real-life skills to the table. It also offers multiple props to assist those techniques, as well as innovative wearable tech. Each lesson is structured and specific: each micro-movement is broken down and clearly communicated, and Cecilia is given guidelines for followup practice and exercises. The curriculum continues beyond the studio and is incorporated into daily life.

Cecilia finds Esther’s teaching style especially noteworthy. As a teacher, Esther is compassionate and gentle, not judgmental or pushy — a particularly helpful demeanor for someone like Cecilia who has pushed herself very hard her whole adult life. Esther’s nonjudgmental attitude toward her students allows Cecilia to embrace where she is, here and now. “Esther really sees this as a process,” says Cecilia. “Each class is a process.” And it would be silly, she says, to think of that process in a judgmental way. This focus on learning, acceptance, and growth contrasts dramatically with the more typical American attitude, so exemplified by Cecilia’s pursuit of a law degree, an industry which idealizes perfection and punishes “underperformance” with shame and guilt.

Cecilia’s notable progress is evident in these photos and SpineTracker readings.

Cecilia finds it easy to progress in the nurturing environment of Esther’s lessons, and is able to refrain from berating herself about her ability level. She’s even experiencing gratitude to be stressing about her upcoming professional licensure examination, a grueling, three-day ordeal. "Considering everything that’s happened,” she feels “really fortunate." Were it not for her improved symptoms, Cecilia wouldn’t even have been able to consider sitting for the examination in the first place. She says, “Esther’s teaching me flexibility.” As is evident from her changing attitude toward her own body and ability, that flexibility is clearly not limited to the physical.

Although she hasn’t returned to her extreme outdoors activities, Cecilia credits the Gokhale Method with helping restore her ability to walk without pain. Photo courtesy Simon Lehmann on Pixabay.

Hope for the future

As Ceclia’s posture improved, her symptoms also improved.  Her joint pain started to improve after beginning posture training in October 2018. Since taking private lessons with Esther in early 2019, Cecilia hasn’t experienced significant joint pain. Her joint and ankle issues have mostly subsided, and her upper back pain is reduced. When pain does occur, she now knows how to use her breathing to manage the pain better. She can now walk her dog for 2 miles at a time without any pain. Her IBS has gotten more manageable, though she still has occasional flare-ups. Cecilia is optimistic that her posture training will continue to benefit her various symptoms.

Cecilia’s case is unusually complex and challenging. When she has time, she still practices medical qi gong and gets acupuncture, though she’s had to scale these back as she prepares for the ordeal of her bar exam. In addition, she continues to get sports massage and chiropractic treatment and follow a therapeutic diet for her IBS. In her own eyes, Cecilia still has a great deal of work to do and a long way to travel on this path. But things are looking up. She hasn’t needed to used her electric scooter for several months. And she’s on track to take her bar exam. She wouldn’t have been able to say that a year ago.

Cecilia’s dog benefits from her owner’s improvements, too! Image courtesy RitaE on Pixabay.

*Name changed for privacy reasons.

For some, Summer is a time of rest, relaxation and vacation. Unfortunately, for teens and young adults, these months are often wrought with the anxiety of life ahead: starting college, searching for a job...It is important to address the major role our bodies play in how we weather times of stress and uncertainty.

We’ve always known that there is a connection between the physical and the emotional. We know how hard it is not to get grumpy when we aren’t feeling our best. Being laid up with a cold or fighting a headache can spoil anyone’s mood.

Now there is a mounting body of scientific research suggesting this connection is much stronger than simply reacting to discomfort or pain. It appears that, to some extent, our emotional states are actually determined by the position of our bodies. In her book, Emotional Contagion, researcher Elaine Hatfield compiles evidence that our physical states are interpreted by our brains to create the emotions we feel. In her view, it is our bodies, rather than our minds, that react to situations, and this physical response tells the brain what we feel.

A beautiful girl in a Goan market whose regal affect matches her glowing smile (India)

Amy Cuddy introduced this concept to millions in her extremely popular TED talk on “power posing.” Her research shows that people like you better when you are more confident - and you can make yourself more confident by standing tall and throwing your hands high in the air. This almost instantly increases your feelings of power (testosterone) and lowers your stress levels (cortisol). In other words, just moving your body in a certain way for a few minutes causes measurable differences in your hormone levels.

This teacher in Otovalo, Ecuador does not compromise his form in order to please the children, and they are not the least bit put off by this! 

Another group of researchers found that bipolar patients felt significantly less depressed when they stood erect with their heads up, smiled and breathed deeply. In fact, this position eliminated the need for medication as long as they maintained it.

A recent Gokhale Method Foundations course graduate wrote eloquently about some surprising emotional effects of her posture training in her blog, the Moody Pinata.

Rates of depression are often lower in developing countries than in the west. One has to ponder whether we have more to learn. 

When dealing with the stresses of young adult life, posture probably isn’t the primary source of anxiety and depression. However, upright posture may be a successful coping mechanism for stress, as researchers at the University of Auckland recently demonstrated by subjecting participants to stressful tasks. Those that had been coached to sit up straight were “enthusiastic, excited, and strong,” while those who had been instructed to slump were “more fearful, hostile, nervous, quiet...and sluggish” while completing the same tasks.

Actors use posture to portray a variety of mind states. More than many, they understand the value of the body in establishing character - both mental and physical. 

This field of research deserves the attention it has received in the press lately. While human emotions are complicated and should be approached holistically, posture may be the easiest variable to control, and the fastest step toward a more balanced life—literally! After all, any of life’s hurdles are more easily cleared when our bodies are functioning at their fullest capacity.

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