Stomach Massage Progressions

Hello, today we're going to look at stomach massage. Stomach massage for me is one of my favorite things to do on the reformer, but it wasn't always my favorite thing. In fact, it was one of the things I hated to do and hated to teach. And I universally go out everywhere I go and people I sit at, bet you don't like selling massage and every Vegas now we really don't. So why don't we like the stomach massage? Well, I think one of the reasons we don't is, is there's a progressive way to get into it that leads step-by-step to success. And for me, I needed to be taken because of my flexibility and my, I was agile and it seemed like I could do anything.

It would have been better if I had been taken back to a beginner's place and moved forward. And so that's what we're going to do today. Okay. Okay, Pat, once you got, so here we have our pelvis and now we've rotated it and we're looking at the bottom and these are, yeah, six. Feel like coloring them in a little there. Yeah, I know. Jenelle if you were going to color in the sit bone, the thing that I started to realize is what is the sit bone? Is that this big gloppy Gump part back here or the narrower part? I mean, where is the exact as well, where is it? Right, isn't it? I would probably consider the whole thing. Yeah, it's the whole thing rather large. Do you think Joe would have wanted us to be precisely in the center?

Probably of the spot. I would think he would. Now how do we find that? I don't know. Well that's, that's, that's the problem of the day. I feel like we're on prairie home companion now talking about the sit bone. So what we've agreed to is overall sit bone is kind of a large amount of real estate. Yes. And what we're trying to do in [inaudible] is find the precise placement for each of us, given our, the shape of our body and where we are in our life.

I think a lot of people will sit behind it and so they'll have a slight posterior tilt, but they're still on it. So that might look like, yeah, kind of. That's a little, oops, I'm sorry. Backwards like of that. Yeah, that's a little, what's your thing? But they would say, I'm still on my sit bone. Okay. And then they could be maybe toward the front of it. Right.

But they're still on their [inaudible]. Yeah. This is very important to organization of the whole body that we get to a place that feels precise for us. And that has to balance our particular curves of our spine. So the only person who can find this embodiment is you. For you in you. For you. Yeah, I'm working on it. Okay.

So let's try a little exercise. Perfect. Called happy dog and naughty dog. Okay. So we're going to now do happy dog. Naughty dog. So, okay. Everybody loves dogs. Everybody should have a dog. So we have a nice little dog. And if you just put your finger on your Coxix, your tailbone. When we were on all fours, that would have been our tail and our pelvic floor muscles would operate our tail. And we could tell, we could tell people when we were happy or when we were angry or whatever. So if you were kind of dog, would you like to be a Labrador?

You're a laboratory. I'm going to be an Irish setter. Okay. Okay. And so I have a big bushy tail and so to you. So let's push it out and it's, we're really happy and you, you have to get kind of up and on the center of your sit bones in order to create space for your tail, right? Yeah. Okay. So now you're happy. So your masters come home and you're really happy. Yeah, I'm a good dog. I'm happy dog. And I get a little pat and then I'm going to get a tree. Oh, but guess what?

My master walked into the kitchen and I got into the trashcan. Naughty dog. So naughty dog is sitting behind. He still owns sit bones. So let's just see if we can show a little really exaggerate. Happy dog. Naughty dog. Happy dog. Naughty dog.

Happy dog. Naughty dog. Happy dog. Naughty dog. Now if we get really subtle and we can start taking it in just to our tailbone, they're so happy and naughty. Now when you do naughty district chest, what happens to your sternum? Well, there's a tendency to also drop it. So in other words, naughty dogs are also not very happy and they're not heartfelt. So it behooves us to go forward in the world with an open heart and a happy dog tail. All right, so there you are. Now for me, when I'm getting in position to do the stomach massage, the first thing I want my client to feel is that they are on their sit bones and they can integrate the exercise, the information in their legs and their feet into a good placed pelvis. And then we work toward what you would call the classical position moving forward to sit right there.

So I'm going to ask you if you'll come over and sit on the reformer. Okay. I just happen to have a pad here. I hope that's okay for you. No, that's good. Okay. Actually. So yes, if Amy does, finds her happy dog naughty dog positions and then we decide that we're going to start stomach massage in the happy dog position first. Okay. So you lift your legs to go to the bar, you will probably do a naughty dog [inaudible] yeah, right. Yeah. To lift up.

Right. Okay. So you have to find a position where you feel like as you sit. Yeah. And I like what you just did. You lifted up, let your tail bone come out. Good. Very nice. Now I was told by my teachers to get as close to the front edge as possible.

That's true. But I'm suggesting that there's a way we can work to get to the front edge so that we're successful when we get there. And so we love the exercise. And number two, there will be people with certain kinds of, uh, spinal dysfunction, um, injuries, whatever, that it is not appropriate for them to go to the edge. In fact, you may meet, need to start moving some of those people back while they're in acute or chronic pain. So you're in a good position. I am. All right. So what I'd like you to do now is straighten your legs. So the next change that I'm going to do in the instruction of this exercise for you is we're going to make coming in the exercise.

So usually if you bend your knees, we all do push out and come in and push out and come in. That's natural. What if I said you're out there and what I want you to do is I want you to start bending from the hip joint, keeping your happy dog coming in, coming incoming, incoming in and pressing out. Now you can put your hands down on the mat and we're going to start in vertical because the thing with the finding the sit bone, it's much more difficult to find it in the rounded position. So I'm suggesting that for some of us we start straight.

Then we moved around. So now she's straight up there. Good. Her dog tail is out. And what I would like you to do now is happy dog, naughty dog with the straight legs. So there's a little exercise where you're actually using your pelvic floor and your lower back, your erector spinae quadratus are probably working. Yeah. Good. Yeah. Now do you feel those muscles back there? If you do not feel them in the rest of the series, you are not doing the exercises. The same. Okay. Very good. Now.

So let's come straight leg in. Just bend in. Come in. That's it. And I'm sorry. Straight back and out and in and out. And two more. In and out and stay. Now let's do the heel part where the heels go down and then they go up, start checking in. What's going on with your sit bones?

There's a tendency to go naughty, right? So naughty dog wants to follow the heels of the [inaudible]. Okay? So you need to anticipate that. All right. And then Ben, then come all the way in and then go out. He'll stay down and up and then come in. And then we're going to go all the way out and stay.

Stay in the happy dog position. Bring your arms out and imagine you're doing spine stretch on the mat and round forward. Good and all the way up. Now as you're killing this round forward right there, the first count one would be happy dog reinforcement rounding and come up and then round forward. Good. Puts your hands down on the front of the Mat. Now see if you can bend your knees to fit the round back inside of the long spine. Yes. So I'm gonna restate that again.

So you go all the way back. Normally what we do is we tell our students to really compress and bring your knees to your chest. What I'm suggesting is that you create the long round back and invite the legs to move into the space. In fact, what I would like to suggest even more is that you're so lifted and rounded in your back that you actually aren't allowed to touch your legs. So yes, so you have to keep working. So let's go out heels down, heels up, and in.

Two more. Out and down, up and in. So there's this constant energy of lifting and rounding. One more and down and up and in, and then go all the way out. Now sit up straight, tailbone, lumbar Scapula, head and neck, arms out. So just like everything else I've done so far, I'm going to ask her to do the twist in the position where she's most stable on her sit bones. So let's just open up and twist and center and twist and center.

Now as you twist and the rib cage goes around, keep the weight equally on your sit bones and center and twist and center. If she's successful at that, then I can say come all the way in, keeps sitting up out of your back. Now let's add and do the full twist and two wis and in twist and in twist and in and twist and in very nice. Now all the way back out again. Now this is really more advanced, but even my beginners can do it from this back position. I want you to start hinting forward from your tailbone all the way out.

Now I don't need the arms to go all the way up by the ears, but along die long diagonal, but I want to feel like the fingertip and the tailbone. That's the line. So I've got to have a very happy dog here. So start, start coming in and then out. Good. And then in and out and shoulders are sliding down your back and, and, and out and then come all the way in. Amy, that was fantastic. You deserve a break. Thank you.

That was great. Thank you. So, oh good. That's what I was going to ask you. How did that yeah, feel it. Feel it feels good. It feels different, but it feels as though I will be able to move myself this way more successfully. Um, it's, I feel a little bit more, uh, accomplish that. Like the, the, I will be honest, this is not, it doesn't really feel great to me to start there. I know that would be a goal, but I also know that I might not quite ever get there and that's okay too. And see that to me is an important, I might not ever get there successfully or in the with the way it's supposed to be done. So I'm, I'm quite satisfied with not not getting there.

You know what I'm saying? Like this, this feels good. Like I'm okay. And what I'd like to say too, to our audience is that bloody perfection is not a plot. He's principal. Somebody quoted me as having said that once. And so I think we need to remember that we, we do the best we can and we always are working forward. But our bodies, where we're in, we're humans, we live in a world. And so perfection is probably not something we're going to attain, but enjoyment and pleasure within the process.

And not defining myself as, oh, I'm a person that has to move out here because I can't, or I only do it in here because that's the way it's supposed to be. To invite ourselves to pleasure of doing what helps us feel our body. So we did a great job. Thank you. Thank you.