family

The phrase “it takes a village to raise a child” is thought to originate from an ancient African proverb. 

As I have grown into being a parent, uncle, and beyond, I have realized that this quote extends to any age. I have directly experienced this with my own posture journey—my own family “village” has helped me and others dear to me find a near pain-free life through the Gokhale Method®.

Annoying body pains were affecting my fun in life

In my late thirties, a stream of inflammatory pains permeated my body, including back pain, shoulder pain, knee pain, and—worst of all—plantar fasciitis in my foot. While these weren't absolutely crippling pains, they were painful enough to keep me from enjoying life as I gave up my favorite hobbies—tennis, golf, and playing the piano.

I visited numerous renowned doctors in California. They genuinely tried to help, but nothing resolved my pain. So I began searching for other solutions.

Finding Esther’s book, 8 Steps to a Pain-Free Back

In 2012 I bought Esther’s book, 8 Steps to a Pain-Free Back, as it was highly recommended on Amazon. 

 
The book that helped me, 8 Steps to a Pain-Free Back.

In particular, what caught my attention was how traditional and tribal communities across the globe do not have the level of musculoskeletal pain that we are seeing in modern society. The book explained how their cultures have preserved our natural blueprint for healthy posture over the centuries, while industrialized societies have lost it. 

This made a lot of sense to me, because as an American with Indian heritage, I used to visit India a lot and noticed that many traditional communities there do not have body pains as modern cultures do. There were people in their sixties and seventies doing manual labor regularly without pain.   

As an Indian-American, I visited India often as a child, so I could relate immediately to the images like this one in Esther’s book that showed people with traditional posture performing physically challenging tasks with relative ease.

I then took the Gokhale Method Foundations Course. It took me a couple of months to meaningfully understand the core concepts. And then I felt significant pain relief for the first time in a long time and knew I was onto something. I began playing sports and music again! I was so happy. 

The Gokhale Method Foundations Course helped me stand, walk, sleep, and sit comfortably. Before the course (left)) I would sit with my pelvis tucked, back rounded, shoulders forward, and my neck compressed at the back. During the course I began to change this, learning to antevert my pelvis and stack my spine.

Helping each other out posture-wise

I shared my Gokhale Method story pretty regularly with family and friends. My family—perhaps knowing that I am a rather talkative person—would give me the “ol’ eye roll” when I talked too much about Gokhale posture!

That said, many of my family members nevertheless found the Gokhale principles intriguing. For example, my wife spent much of her childhood in India—and also learned the Bharata Natyam Indian dancing which Esther draws from—all of which gave her good posture and a relatively pain-free life. Equally importantly, it gave her a keen eye for good and bad posture. So she was able to provide excellent feedback to me as I kept trying to improve my posture with the Gokhale Method principles I was learning.

However, my sister Annissa grew up in America, and began experiencing hip and other arm pains as an adult, which was hard for her as she is a keen athlete. She realized that her posture might be the root cause. She learned the Gokhale Method with Esther’s younger daughter, Monisha, and started feeling meaningful relief. She is now a regular participant in Online Alumni Classes, which help her to keep healthy posture on her radar and continue refining it.

My sister Annissa (shown here with her PostureTracker) likes to use her Alumni membership most days—it makes checking in on and refining healthy posture comparatively effortless—and fun!

The next-gen

Interestingly, as my daughter Saya became a teenager, my wife noticed that her posture began to deteriorate. We were concerned that our daughter’s posture would worsen further when she went to college, leading sooner or later to inevitable pain and discomfort. Trying to offer advice and corrections to our daughter just caused a lot of frustration for both of them. 

When our daughter turned 16, we suggested that she learn the Gokhale Method before going to college. For her it was perfect to take the online Elements course. The fact that it was 18 compact 13-minute Zoom sessions worked perfectly for her busy high school life. Her posture markedly improved with Gokhale Method Teacher Kathleen O’Donohue.

We were so encouraged that we also asked our 15 year old niece Riya to take the course. She did the Elements course as well, and her posture improved too! 

Bringing different generations together with the Gokhale PostureTracker

In the last year, my daughter, sister, and I were really intrigued by the PostureTracker™ wearable, which gives real-time feedback on your posture by displaying the feedback from two highly accurate sensors on an app. My daughter and I did the first online Alumni PostureTracker class during the summer before my daughter headed to college. 

My daughter Saya is a young Gokhale Alumna, and has taken her PostureTracker with her to college. She has real-time feedback on her posture wherever she wants it.  

We then bought the PostureTracker (which comes with one-to-one tech assistance) for my sister Annissa’s birthday. She loves it and uses it most days, including in her Alumni Classes. When we all get together, we often have fun correcting each other’s posture and also talking about our PostureTracker experiences.

The village beyond my family

Beyond my family, my “village” extends to the Gokhale Alumni community too. I have truly enjoyed and benefited from the collective curiosity and wisdom of the 1-2-3 Move classes. The teaching and follow-up questions and answers have been so helpful and insightful. I will never forget Gokhale Alumna Mary Walsh’s saying, “Good things come to those who ‘bean-shape’ [their feet],” which really captivated me and continues to help me in my own posture journey.

Here we are on the 1-2-3 Move class sometime in the COVID winter of 2020–21. The online community we forged back then has continued to thrive and be a great resource for everyone on their healthy posture journey. There is a 7-day free trial open to the public. 

Best next action steps for newcomers

If you would like insight on your posture, consider scheduling an Initial Consultation, online, or in person.

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

Cycling has been a passionate sport and hobby of mine for decades. I am no longer a professional bike racer; I am now a mother and Gokhale Method® teacher. As a result, I have become more observant of what can “go wrong,” posturally speaking, when riding a bicycle. And I work to improve my posture as I pedal. For example, it takes vigilance to keep my shoulders back and my head aligned with my torso. I now know how cycling can enhance my form, and vice versa. I also enjoy modeling key posture principles to guide my daughters and partner so that they too can be comfortable and healthy on a bicycle.

Cycling is a part of family life

In this blog post I would like to share with you some of the cycling activities and posture tips that have benefitted us as a family. Prior to parenthood, my partner and I raced and trained together for many years, traveling to quite a few states and even abroad to indulge our passion. When our daughters were born, we decided that, at least in our busy city, Somerville, MA (the most densely populated city on the Eastern Seaboard, USA!), we would get about with them on bicycles instead of driving. 

Here I am supporting a customized cruiser with our daughter, Willa, aged two, in a car seat on the back. My partner, Skip, sits on a customized tandem with Coco, aged five. Car seats worked well as carriers and even allowed Willa to nap during our outings. Can you make out the second car seat on the front of my cruiser?   

Of necessity, we hauled our young daughters around on homemade bicycle “carrier-cruisers,” with car seats attached. Both bikes offered comfortable arrangements for young children—and great exercise for us parents! These days, there are so many choices of bicycles made for transporting children, it might feel overwhelming and hard to know where to start. Bike shops are now a terrific resource, happy to offer guidance and expertise, help with fittings and even track down special equipment if needed. With so many options out there, including information on the internet, you won’t have to customize your own bicycle unless you want to. 

Cycling makes a better world for our children

We know it’s better for our environment to cycle than to drive everywhere. Some people choose to live car-free, and that certainly saves money, as well as the planet! We are thankful for the bike lanes that are becoming a more prevalent part of the infrastructure in cities and suburbs alike. As bike lanes make cycling more accessible, you’ll find more people of all ages pedaling instead of driving, which in turn makes it safer for everyone. 

Charity rides or fundraisers are a great way to enjoy family time together while also supporting good causes. These benefit rides are usually closed to traffic, or directed by officials, which makes the ride casual and relaxed. Varied routes are offered, making the event open to a wider range of ability and fitness levels. 

Here we are doing a kids Pan-Mass Challenge, raising money for cancer research and treatment. Coco, aged five, is leading the pack on this 10K ride.

Notice the two photographers’ interest in Skip’s bicycle arrangement, with the little bike attached by bungees to the front so that Willa, aged two and a half, could ride a bit of the course too.

The Graves family has just completed the D2R2 (The Deerfield Dirt Road Randonée) fundraiser ride. They chose the moderate, yet challenging, 48.6-mile route, and will celebrate with a refreshing plunge in the river, and a BBQ for a refuel. Their son is just nine years old—the family that rides together, has fun together! 

Here is Lloyd Graves aged seven, getting ready to bike to school with his dad. Studies¹ have shown that children who walk or ride their bicycle to school are more engaged and ready to learn than those who have been driven to school. Their circulatory system is boosted, and also their executive functioning is activated and neural pathways have been firing, both being used to make decisions before even entering the classroom. 

Now that my daughters are 15 and 12, they’re ready to explore the world on their own to a degree. By cycling they now have the skills and self-confidence to ferry themselves around our city to meet up with friends or attend their extracurricular activities. 

We all need bikes that fit our bodies! 

You can consider bicycles as an extension of the human body, and both adults and children need bikes that fit them, for efficiency, safety, and enjoyment. Most often an ill-fitting bicycle is too small, which forces hunching and rounding of the shoulders and compression of the whole spine—neither of which are helpful for your posture or body mechanics. As kids grow so quickly it is especially important to watch out for this. With the right size, and sometimes even type of bicycle, it is possible to enjoy all the benefits of cycling from being very young until well into old age. 

›
Rachel Holt on tricycle, Dummer, New Hampshire, about 1927. This is a charming portrait. From a cycling perspective, Rachel could do with a bigger bike, so that her thighs can drop down and she no longer has to tuck her pelvis and round her back. She will also be able to pedal a lot more efficiently! Jim Griffin

A bicycle that is too big may have a child too stretched out to reach the handlebars comfortably, and/or bouncing on the saddle in an effort to reach the pedals, which stresses the hips. It can also be a challenge to maneuver, adding unnecessary strain and making it unsafe. 

This tricycle is still a little too big for its rider to reach the pedals and the ground—though she’ll soon grow into it! kenheyman.com

The benefits of balance bikes

We can begin bike riding at an early age, and even new walkers or soon-to-be walkers, can consider using a “balance bike.” They have some advantages over a tricycle. Balance bikes are built without pedals, so the novice rider can focus on balance and steering. (Pedals can also be taken off some bikes, then put back on when the child is ready.) With balance bikes, all the propulsion is with the feet actively pushing the ground away and behind, so there is a natural tendency for the body to adopt a position of biomechanical advantage by sitting with a tipped forward pelvis. This is an example of posture aiding our movement; when the feet go behind our hips, they can better push the ground away from us. This action comes readily since little children aren't fighting a tight psoas, or struggling with stiff joints. This is an action we would like our feet to do in walking, which is to actively engage with pushing on the ground beneath us. It is amazing how fast tiny children can propel themselves using just their feet to paddle along! 

Our daughter Willa, aged 11 months, scooting along on her Strider® balance bike. Notice how she keeps her shoulders back and leans slightly forward. Balance bikes encourage children to propel themselves with natural foot strength.

Another benefit to learning to ride without pedals is that, by definition, a child can easily reach the ground, so a parent is not pushing or guiding from behind or towing the handlebars in an effort to help the child maintain balance. This often sees the parent adopt a very compromised position, hunching over and distorting the back. Best to help the child learn to ride solo; take them to a grassy area or quiet, dead-end street or parking lot where they can let fly!   

This beautiful illustration shows the mother maintaining a straight back as she bends forward to guide her child learning to ride. Most parents do not bend so well, causing cumulative damage to their spinal discs. Esté MacLeod

Modeling healthy posture for your children

One of the best ways a parent can encourage their children to maintain healthy posture on a bike is to model it themselves. For example, once you get used to sitting with the behind behind and the pelvis tipped forward rather than tucked under, it is not only comfortable, but, pretty soon, preferred. We teach a similar style of sitting in the Gokhale Method called stacksitting, for when you don’t have a backrest for support. You can learn how to stacksit here. 

Willa, aged four, sitting forward enough on her “banana” seat to comfortably reach the handlebars and maintain her shoulders back. See how she stacksits beautifully, with her back straight and behind behind.

On a bicycle you may also be sitting leaning forward, which, to do well, requires more inner corset activity and also the ability to hip-hinge, which are both explained in detail in Esther Gokhale’s book, 8 Steps to a Pain-Free Back. 

Here Skip and I are both sitting angled forward. Skip is the leader in navigation, I’m leading in posture! My head, shoulders, and behind are further back, where we would like them to be. We’re enjoying quality time working in tandem! 

Even holding the handlebars in a relaxed way actually begins with relaxed shoulders that stay open and back. Just because you are reaching forward for something, does not mean the shoulders need to round forward. A tip I offer my children is to do a shoulder roll when we come to a stoplight. This allows the shoulders to “reset” if they have come forward a bit, or even a lot! We teach shoulder rolls in the Gokhale Method as a gentle way to open up the chest and allow the shoulders to rest back where they belong. Teaching this early on is good practice for other daily activities; if one can maintain shoulders back in place while using the arms out front on a bicycle, then keeping them back in place in other contexts, like at a computer, will be easier and become habitual. You can learn how to shoulder roll here. 

Willa, aged 12, helmet on and excited for a morning bicycle ride on the Cape Cod Rail Trail. One of the benefits of riding a bicycle at any age is the joyousness that comes from moving your body and exploring the world around you. 

In fact, nearly all the postural principles that we teach in our in-person Foundations course, Pop-up course, or online Elements course, can help your cycling to become more efficient, healthier, and more comfortable. If you would like expert help with your cycling posture, or to find out more about how our courses could help you with any activity, get started with an online or in-person Initial Consultation with any Gokhale Method® teacher. Or sign up for one of our free online workshops below. 

Reference:

¹ “Why Your Kids Should Walk or Bike to School This Year.” Saferoutes Utah. Accessed on July 5, 2022. https://saferoutes.utah.gov/why-your-kids-should-walk-or-bike-to-school-this-year/

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…

This is the fourth blog post in our series on old family portraits and photographs. Previously we have looked at how antique images can inspire us to improve our posture in the Upper Body, Lower Body, and Small Bends. Here we are going to focus on how old family photos from abroad make a special contribution to our posture knowledge. 

Photographs as historical evidence

Antique photographs are often notable for the healthy posture they capture. Even images taken well into the twentieth century are likely to show healthier posture than we see around us today.

In the US you have to go back several generations to reliably find images of healthy posture, and usually even to a time when photography was not widely available due to its elaborate processes and cost. Had the first immigrants to North America settled later, we would have much more photographic evidence of their intact posture. As it is, we have rare but valuable examples from the 1840s onward. 

These European settlers all show a preference for sitting with a straight back.

Sharing our heritage from abroad

People with heritage from abroad will often have photographs of their family, especially parents and grandparents, showing excellent posture. Immigrant parents frequently bring excellent posture with them from their homeland, while their children grow up adopting the tucked and slouched posture they see around them in the US.

In our “bring and tell” sessions on our Alumni 1-2-3 Move program participants have generously shared their own family photographs. It is noticeable how many of their ancestors and older generations from abroad have particularly wonderful posture. Their posture would not have been exceptional back then, but today we can find it an inspiration for our own personal posture journeys and improvement. 

Lucy Atkin shares a photograph of her maternal grandfather on the 1-2-3 Move program. He was of German/Prussian descent. It shows a lifted sternum, a tall neck, his head turns on the axis of his spine, his eyes look ahead.

 
1-2-3 Move participant Susan Rothenberg shares a photograph of her paternal grandparents from Lithuania. Their feet are turned out and their shoulders are back and wide.

The decline of posture in the US

Posture deteriorated sharply with the “flapper generation” in the 1920s, and then nosedived again after World War II. The decline in our posture over the generations is a fascinating story, which I have written a little about in my book, 8 Steps to a Pain-Free Back. 

I consider there are two main reasons why posture deteriorated more rapidly in the US, while the “old countries” kept it intact for longer. Firstly, when young adults are transplanted from their place of origin, they lose some of the kinesthetic traditions that would otherwise be reinforced by their parents and grandparents—for example, how to perform tasks in the fields, or raise children, with all the lifting and carrying that involves. Even rest positions for sitting and sleeping well can be forgotten. 
 

As children we learn what we see around us—and that goes for healthy posture too. 

Secondly, due to its pioneer days and mainly youthful immigrants, the US evolved a culture and commerce driven by innovation. While this dynamism has brought many benefits, prizing innovation also has its downside. New fashions, furniture, and lifestyles have been developed and adopted indiscriminately, often with a damaging impact on posture.

Posture deteriorated sharply in America from the 1950s—a decade earlier than in most of Europe. Crain's Chicago Business

Looking back to our heritage

“Modernizing” trends from the US were slow to take hold in Europe, due in part to postwar austerity, and this meant that more traditional posture often persisted well into the 1960s. It is not uncommon for today’s seniors to have photographs of themselves as children in the 40s and 50s with parents and grandparents showing largely intact posture, especially if their roots are abroad. You can observe chins rested down, wide, open chests, and externally rotated legs and feet. 

 
Gokhale Method alumna Pauline Tilbury, aged nearly five, at the beach in Filey, England, June 1959. Her grandparents in particular show the open posture typical of their generation—and children.

Some readers will recall the beautiful photographs in the post Posture in Old Lithuania by Gokhale Metho​​d™ teacher Aurelia Vaicekauskas. Aurelia came to the US with her parents from Lithuania in 1979. Her post shows the inspiring posture of the people there as they lived and worked in their traditional communities.

Aurelia’s post Teaching My 95-Year-Old Lithuanian Mom the Gokhale Method includes this wonderful family photograph, posed on her mother’s wedding day in Kaunas, Lithuania in 1957, with everyone exuding elegance and poise. Truly, when it comes to posture, looking back to our heritage is one of our best ways forward.

Gokhale Method teacher Aurelia Vaicekauskas’ parents (far left) in Lithuania with family on their wedding day.

We work diligently to bring healthy, natural posture within the most modern of contexts here in the US. We are grateful that this posture remains embodied in various populations around the world, and embedded in historical art and sculpture the world over. We also celebrate its existence in the photographic records of our relatives from abroad.

You are invited to share any of your family photographs of ancestors from abroad in the Comments below this post. (Log in and click on the upload picture icon, far right .)

Free Online Workshops

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

 
Lithuania, 1967. My mom is in the center, with my sister and me on either side of her.

My mom had beautiful posture when she was young, as you can see in the photo above. Here she is, flanked by my sister and me. Note her open chest, lengthened neck, and head pivoting on the axis of the spine. I believe healthy posture has helped her age well. When she recently developed leg pain, she assumed it was part of the aging process and that there was nothing she could do about it. But happily, after working with some Gokhale Method techniques, her pain has subsided.

As a result, she now sleeps better and has more energy. She’s even resumed some light housekeeping. To help protect her back while vacuuming and sweeping the floor, I taught her the inner corset technique.

The inner corset: what is it?
Anytime one lifts, twists, or moves their arms or legs away from the body, there is an opportunity to distort the spine. Distortion puts unhealthy stress on bones, joints, and nerves. The inner corset technique is crucial in protecting one's back while in action. It lengthens and decompresses the spine by activating our deepest abdominal and deepest back muscles (transversus abdominis, obliques and rotatores, and multifidi). This muscular engagement forms a “corset,” which preserves the spine through physical activities. Notice how the discs are protected with extra space in the illustration below.

We all have this muscular engagement pattern available. It is automatically activated with activity that poses an immediate threat to the spine, such as jumping off a high place. However, when the threat is low: picking up a grocery bag or vacuuming, this instinctive bracing is not activated. Most back problems are a result of cumulative misuse of the body. Therefore, learning to use the inner corset in daily activities is the key!

Hands-on help from a Gokhale Method teacher is the best way to find the right muscles. This is true of teaching my mom, as well. While working with her, I was able to help her use her breath to engage her inner corset (see below). Teachers often practice this with students several times to create new muscle memory, and I did the same with my mom. 

 
Helping my mom locate the correct muscles by using her breath also helps her build muscle memory.

Vacuuming with an active inner corset
Alas, with her inner corset in place, my mom is now ready for action. She has always enjoyed housekeeping and continues to vacuum and clean at 95! Now she can keep her back lengthened and maintain her spine’s structural integrity while she does this work. Engaging her inner corset allows her arms to move independently of her torso. It’s a win-win: a workout session for the abdominal and back muscles; meanwhile, the back is protected, and the house is clean! 

My mom shows no sign of slowing down now that she’s learned Gokhale Method techniques.

Summary
I am so grateful my mom gave the Gokhale Method a chance. Not only did it help relieve her nighttime leg pain — as I described in my previous blog post — she now has tools to keep her activities safe! To her huge credit, it took an open mind, a bit of courage, and effort to try something new. I am so proud of her. I believe one is never too old to learn a few Gokhale Method tricks. And we never know what changes are possible until we try!