Relieve Low Back Pain | Reduce Low Back Pain | Canada's Leading Authority in Human Movement | Dev Chengkalath

In this final installment of your low back pain fix-it plan, I was originally going to talk about deconditioning and its nefarious effects on your movement system.

I’m still going to write about deconditioning, however, I’ll also be writing about the miraculous GOYA therapy that can be used to fix it and your low back pain. GOYA therapy is so amazing it can even fix a whole host of other ailments, diseases and disorder as well.

That’s how good it is.

But first, let’s start with defining deconditioning.

You are out of shape. You are unfit. It’s that simple. You huff and puff after every set of stairs. The walk down your driveway is considered your daily marathon. Your body can therefore be considere deconditioned.

Severely Deconditioned

You may be carrying a few extra pounds. You may be carrying a few dozen extra pounds. This won’t help the cause either. To make things worse, if you spend 8-12 hours a day sitting, you aren’t going to be working your muscular, skeletal or cardiovascular system a whole lot. At least not according to those all important principles that I discussed here.

That’s deconditioning.

If you’re not in the kind of shape you should be in, chances are, you’re using poor posture, your muscular system is not working on all cylinders, you’re not as mobile as you should be where it counts, and most certainly your deconditioning combined with the above, will lead you to use faulty movement patterns as compensation.

In order to help you fix your deconditioning and all the other causes of low back pain, I’m going to introduce you to GOYA therapy.

The Ancient Art of GOYA

This ancient therapy has been around for centuries. Its history cannot be traced back to one culture or people as it has trancended the bounds of human migration. It has been practiced by the ancient Greeks and Romans, just as it was practiced by Aboriginals throughout the world. It was truly a ubiquitus and fundamental component of everyday life.

Alas, over the last hundred years or so, GOYA therapy has fallen to the wayside. Given up and forgotten. Lost to most. Replaced by pills and potions capable of masking symptoms but unable to alleviate the cause. Replaced by electrodes and mechanical devices.

The easy “solutions”.

This is where GOYA therapy really differs. It’s not easy. It takes time. Effort. Consistency. It’s hard work.

Many people don’t want to hear about it. These people want solutions to their back pain but will stop listening when GOYA therapy is mentioned.

“How can I try to explain, when I do he turns away again, it’s always been the same, same old story.”

Cat Stevens

But there’s also a strong undercurrent, a strong movement of people who want to bring GOYA back.

I am proud to say that I’m one of those people.

Are you?

If you are, stand up and join the ranks.

GOYA: Get Off Your Ass. Now that’s powerful therapy.

Dev Chengkalath

In keeping with the theme of relieving your low back pain and getting you back to the things you love doing, I’m going to be talking about mobility.

What does mobility mean?

Mobility in this context is your body’s ability to move a joint and create range of motion. Some people equate mobility with flexibility. The only problem with that is when dealing with flexibility, we typically don’t take into consideration any of the neurological implications.

Too much mobility is NOT a good thing.

So how does mobility relate to low back pain?

As with everything in life, either too much or too little mobility can cause problems. However, with mobility issues, it depends on which joints are mobile and which ones are immobile.

In the case of low back pain, many sufferers will find they have hypermobile lumbar spines and hypomobile hips. Basically this means your low back moves way too much, more than likely as a compensation because your hips don’t move enough.

Remember, your body doesn’t know muscles. It knows movements.

If your hips don’t move enough and you can’t produce extension there, your body will find a way to recreate that desired movement by forcing extra movement elsewhere. Usually through your spine.

Combine the above with poor posture, weak core and a few adaptively changed tissues and you’ve got yourself a recipe for low back disaster.

With all these problems, your body’s biomechanical movement pattern will be severely altered. And you’ll keep inflaming and irritating the tissue in that area.

Irritated tissue= source of your pain.

Cause and source.

Remove the source, you get temporary relief. The band-aid solution. I’ll bet that’s not what you’re looking for.

Remove the cause and the source can heal.

Permanent solution.

So how do you get from having this problem to implementing the solution?

This is where I recommend Magnificent Mobility.

This amazing product is geared towards maximizing your hip mobility while maintaining your spinal stability. This DVD has everything you need to improve performance and maximize your potential. 

In only 10 minutes.

Flexibility, Performance & Health

And for most of you reading this, I am sure you can find that 10 minutes to dramatically improve your health. Even if it’s during commercials when you’re watching TV. 

Yours in mobility.

Dev Chengaklath

So now that you’ve had a few hours to work on those glute squeezes, how’d they go? 

Were you able to get the muscles to contract when you wanted them to? Were you able to get them to contract to a sufficient level? Were you able to squeeze them hard enough?

Although this may seem like a wasted exercise, I assure you, this is probably the easiest motor control movement you can do to get you on the path to a pain free low back.

It requires no equipment, it’s portable and best of all, it take very little time. 

In this post, I just want to go a little bit more in depth on why the glutes are so important for your back health. 

First off, this group of muscles is one of the largest and strongest in the body (or so it should be!). It’s also one of the major constituents of your core.

That’s right.

In contrast to popular belief, the core is not just made up of the muscles that form your six-pack abs or allow you to rip out all those sit-ups. It’s actually an interconnected network of muscles, joints and tissues that work to transfer energy, create stability and resist various forces such as rotation through the trunk.

As the glutes are one of the largest groups of muscles attached to the pelvis, they play a significant role in creating stability, transferring energy and creating optimal movement in that body region.

Functionally, the glutes’ major role is to extend through the hip and allow your leg to move behind your body.

This becomes important because if you’ve turned off your glutes from all that sitting or those hours and hours of repeated poor postures, your hip won’t be able to extend as far back.

Inhibited muscle=less movement. 

The problem is that your body doesn’t understand this.

It doesn’t know muscles. It only knows movements. 

If your brain says extend the hip, your body will find a way to get that hip extension. Unfortunately, this usually happens through painful or undesirable compensations in the low back and spine. 

So if you’re walking uphill, going for a jog, or doing that all familiar sit-to-stand, and you have inhibited glutes, there’s a good chance that you’re actually compensating with excessive extension through your low back in order to get that full hip extension. 

Over time, or for those unlucky few, instantly, this will cause low back pain. 

Now get back to working on your squat and get those glutes firing!

To your low back pain prevention and relief!

Dev Chengkalath

P.S. If you didn’t catch the squat video, you can check it out here!

Since posture plays such an important role in low back pain, I’m going to devote another post to this subject.  More specifically, I’ll be giving you the goods on how to fix your posture starting from your pelvis. 

Or as one of my professors, Dr. David Magee, used to call it: “The Great House.” 

Why is the pelvis so important?

Why should you care about your pelvis when it’s your low back that’s causing you all the problems?

How does fixing your pelvis, fix your bad back?

If we were sitting in a lecture theatre, and I asked who had heard of the term “core”, I can guarantee everyone’s hand would’ve shot up, or at the very least, everyone would have murmured the answer to themselves under their breath.

My friends, your pelvis posture is directly related to how those famous (and not so famous) muscles of the core function to keep you healthy and at your best. Pain free performance. Living life like you want to. Living life like you deserve to. 

You see, the pelvis is where the spine attaches. It’s where the legs attach. It’s where all sorts of muscles and connective tissue and fascia all attach. It’s where energy transfer takes place.

It’s kind of a big deal.

He's also kind of a big deal

This is where great athletes get their power, their precision and, well, their athleticism. This is also where those low back pain sufferers, or the soon-to-be low back pain sufferers, start down that slippery slope of aches and pains.

Here’s the quick lesson.

If you’re sitting down right now while reading this, have a look and see how you’re actually sitting. 

Is your low back curved into a slouch? Are you sitting on the “sit bones” in your butt? Or are you in the more common habit of sitting on your sacrum (the bone just above where your butt crack begins)?

If you’re in the latter category, it’s time to change. 

ASAP.

This all comes back to those negative adaptive changes. In this position you’ll be tightening and shortening your hip flexors and your spinal erectors. You’ll also be turning off your glutes, those very important bum muscles that are an integral part of your core. Not to mention the weakening of those equally important structures on the front, the abdominals.

Since the body is so interconnected, weakness, tightness, or any other deviation from the ideals in one part of the body will lead to compensation at another. And this is how your pelvis posture is related to your low back pain. Faults in your pelvis become faults through your low back. Something’s got to give at some point.

Now you want to know how to fix your pelvis posture in sitting.

Fair enough.

Here’s the quick and dirty:

1. Actually sit on your sit bones, not on your poor sacrum.
2. Maintain that natural curve in your low back (avoid the slouch!).
3. Elongate upwards through your spine (think tall).
4. CHANGE YOUR POSTURE OFTEN!

Remember, if you take anything away from my blurb on posture, it’s this:

The best posture is the one that keeps changing. 

Now go out and practice your postures. You’ve been learning bad habits since kindergarten, start unlearning them!

Yours in ever-changing postures,

Dev Chengkalath

Have you ever stopped to think about all the things you’re able to do?

Or do you spend more time thinking about the things you’re not able to do?

Riding up the elevator this morning to my apartment, I was carrying a 25 lb box of nutritional supplements that Fed Ex had safely imported for me from the United States. 

There was an older lady who was wheeling her small portable grocery cart who hopped in with me. Seeing me holding the box, she told me that I should rest it against the  metal railing to make it easier.

For me, the 25 lbs box wasn’t what I’d consider heavy. I had no problems carrying the parcel for the 6 or so minutes that it took to get from my car in the underground parking to my place 23 stories up. 

But what she said got me thinking. 

How many times in my life had I tried to make physical tasks easier when I should have relished the challenge of making them harder?

How many times had I taken the escalator or elevator when I should have taken the stairs?

How many times had I circled the parking lot looking for that money spot right by the entrance?

How many times had I taken the easy road when I could have gone off the beaten path?

In my line of work I’ve had the fortune of interacting with some of the strongest people out there. I’m not talking just physically strong, but mentally tough. These are the people who have had the fortitude to face and overcome incredible challenges and hurdles, the people who have had to relearn how to walk, relearn how to feed themselves, relearn life. These are the people that had their movement, among other things, taken from them, through error, accident or misfortune. 

The ones who got it back, didn’t take it for granted after. 

Funny how it takes losing something so precious before your realize how much it’s worth.

How many times had I taken for granted what I am able to do?

What do you take for granted?

Wishing you and yours a prosperous and movement filled 2009.

Dev Chengkalath