For those of you that know me, i have been immersed in a graduate degree program at San Francisco State University for the past year. Now, i suppose i’ll preface by saying that this is by no means an attack on any one individual, however i seek it to be an observation of what i believe to be a failed system of education.

The Traditional model of Education…

1) Sign up for classes each semester
2) Sit in a class for 1-3 days a week
3) Maybe do homework assignments, some projects related to the course material
4) Standardized testing periodically to check for retention of material

This model does not show the student how to apply the knowledge, it encourages book memorization as well as the ability to regurgitate facts, and maybe apply some concepts, in a standardized testing environment. This leaves those exiting the program with little understanding of how to apply this knowledge in an open setting. Graduate programs likely just produce more researchers, not necessarily more and/or better practitioners.

The Constructivist model of Education….

1) Receive ALL materials for the coursework of the degree
2) No class lectures, only open forum times for the students and faculty to meet, discuss the material, and ask questions of the academics in regards to how to traverse the course material. This encourages accountability on the part of the student to have read the material and formulate specific questions to help them teach themselves, as opposed to lecturing, which is not as effective
3) Internship or field experience required before entering the degree program as well as during the degree program. One must have the ability to apply as well as learn material simultaneously. Knowledge is useless without its proper application.
4) No time limit on the degree. People can take as much or as little time as they’d like. This takes the pressure of trying to jam material into one’s brain, allowing those that are slower to learn more time to absorb, think about the material, rethink, and apply. Our society’s emphasis on expediency comes at expense of others with practitioners working on half-truths, poorly understood principles, and little application.
5) Everyone will be allowed access to the material who wants it without having to get into the university, however the degree will require one to the work correctly. Also, the student can turn in the work as many times as he/she would like. Monetarily speaking, the student would have to pay each time they turned it in so that the professor grading the work is compensated for his time. This, in theory, takes the pressure off of having to just get it right the first time.

It’s not a mystery why so many people drop out of graduate degree programs, especially in the field of exercise science. The students are not encouraged to understand and apply simultaneously. At the same time, the system does not support self-accountability with personal support. If you are not doing the research that the professors are doing, chances are, you’re shit out of luck.

from Tynjala’s paper titled Towards expert knowledge? A comparison
between a constructivist and a traditional
learning environment in the university….

“According to Geisler (1994), during general education students operate in both
problem spaces, content and rhetoric, with naive representations. In the early years of
undergraduate education some students begin to work with more abstract representations
in the problem space of domain content. At the same time, however, their
rhetorical problem space remains basically naive. Late in their undergraduate education
or in graduate school, this naive representation of the rhetorical problem space
undergoes in some students a major reorganization and abstraction process, where
the rhetorical dimension of expertise emerges as distinct from domain content. This
growth of an expert representation of the rhetorical problem space is the “nal stage in
the acquisition of expertise. It is only when both the domain content and the
rhetorical process of a “eld are represented in abstract terms that they can enter into
the dynamic and mutually transformative interaction that produces expertise. **Knowing
that++ and `knowing how++ are linked with each other. Only a few people develop
362 P. Tynja( la( / Int. J. Educ. Res. 31 (1999) 357}442
integrated expert knowledge of this kind, although, as Bereiter and Scardamalia
(1993) have pointed out, schooling could be organized in a way that would promote
expertise in everyone.” (Tynjala, p. 362-363)

What is even worse is that those that do not make it into a graduate program in exercise science, for example, choose to go around it by seeking outside education through certifications, certificates of purported expertise in a specific area, and trade schools. These schools and certification seminars are stripped down versions of education, removing the fiber of critical thought, research, and problem-solving, leaving only the sugar-filled pamphlets of quick-fixes and algorithms for getting results for clients. These people are receiving knowledge second-hand, at best, from industry “experts”, naive to the fact that much of the research being disseminated could largely fall prey to the biases, opinions and interpretations of the person delivering the information. Wouldn’t it be great if, as a free service offered by universities, people could attend classes about how to critically analyze literature and then apply it?

As the dilution of information spirals down from researchers, to field experts, to novice practitioners, the mess of confusion, contradiction, and frustration leaves a broken system that has failed to do what it purports to do. What are we doing to ensure quality learning for ourselves, our friends, our colleagues, and our clients?

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(image: http://robertsontrainingsystems.com/img/userPics/image005.jpg)

The topic of core training is a rubix cube for me. I pick it up, play around with it for a bit, and then put it back in the drawer for a while. We all have our own ideas and beliefs about how we address the core problem. Core stabilizing, pilates, front and side planks done till your eyeballs bleed, and constantly contracting the abdominal musculature to maintain neutral spine at all times during training.

Some questions…

Does a neutral spine guarantee safety and even core control?

If the core is indeed “weak”, how much strengthening is needed for that person, and how does it relate to their function?

What could be potential causes of a weak core?

My musings about the problems with traditional core training and where we should be heading more towards:

Just tensing the muscles to maintain neutral spine is not enough. Abdominals are phasic muscles, which are meant to contract and relax. If chronically tensed, this will affect digestion, bloodflow, muscle recovery, respiration, posture, and de-stabilizing of the deep stabilizing muscles of the body (deep fibers of the psoas, multifidus, paraspinals, rotatores,etc). As an end result, this may do the opposite effect of what we seek to do. Teaching “Core awareness” and “Core control” as opposed to “Core strength” and “Core Stability” would be a better approach.

Core training should be from the ground up, making sure all the joints are working well together, functionally, along with the aforementioned awareness and mindful practice. What about the feet? Are the feet sending the right sensory input up to the core to allow it to respond to movement changes? I guarantee that most people’s feet aren’t as functional as they think, and the overly-padded shoes don’t help.

It would be disadvantageous to go with the reductionist approach of just telling someone to maintain neutral spine when a fitness coach’s purpose, i believe, is to encourage an exploration of the myriad of movement possibilities held within the human animal. Releasing fear by not being afraid to move outside of neutral is a true celebration and liberation of the human experience. The more movements a person can do under control, the better off the body will be. This, of course, doesn’t mean that someone should do heavy back squats with 500 pounds, however the body is designed to go into spinal flexion, for example (e.g.-grabbing something off of the ground).

Traditional Core stability training is a reaction meant to control the physical body and the torso to “protect”. However, this is a fear response which further spirals the body downwards towards functional movement inhibition. Function, the way the body’s joints work together as a unit, and in the body’s designed postural alignment, is more important than any one muscle group.

I believe a movement practice should be to make smarter, more functional bodies which transcend the “core” by itself.

“When one picks out anything in nature, he finds it is attached to the rest of the world” -John Muir

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The iliopsoas muscle has always deeply intrigued me. It’s shear size and length is impressive alone, but it’s function and purpose within the body is often a hotly debated one…

Some anatomists call it a “hip flexor”, having its primary purpose to move the legs during walking and running. However, this seems to only be the tip of the iceberg with much of its function being shrouded deeper beneath the surface deep within the body. I like to look at the iliopsoas as a comic book superhero of the body, and just like many superheros, it is often wrongfully accused for crimes it didn’t commit all the while trying to protect its citizens (the body). From the outside looking in, the psoas looks to be a menace to our body’s muscular ecology, always tightening down on the pelvis, causing hyper lordosis (excess arching in the lower back), low back discomfort/pain, groin problems, etc. However, like many superheros, what if we didn’t completely understand the greater purpose that our superhero has been fighting for? Could it be that the psoas is simply reacting to changes elsewhere in our body and in our psyche to protect our structure?

The saga continues…

Fitness trainers, physical therapists, etc., are like the police force, trying frantically to control the actions of the iliopsoas by enforcing rigorous routines of stretching, pelvic tilting, and abdominal bracing to maintain neutral spine at all times. This order imposed on bodies that are chronically in chaos seem to be fraught with discontent, at best.

Let’s take a look at the anatomy first:

(http://www.thepilatesacademy.com.au/assets/images/iliopsoas.jpg)

-it attaches from the T12 vertebra and all of the lumbar vertebra, wraps through the pelvis and then meets at the lesser trochanter of the femur. Some suspect that, on average, the psoas group has enough contractile force to hold up a volkswagen! When we talk about core strength, we would be remiss to forget about the Psoas.

Function of the Psoas…

-Not just a hip flexor, although it certainly does do that
-Guy wire of the body, helping with proper alignment of the bones (when the bones stack on top of each other in good postural neutral, the muscles don’t have to fight to hold it up, thus avoiding fatigue and tightness…remember that muscles often get tight because of instability)
-Functions as a counter-balance to anchor the body when the abdominal muscles are doing work
-Hydraulic pump assisting with respiration, pumping of synovial fluid through the spine, massaging of organs to aid in digestion

In her lovely compendium, The Psoas Book, Liz Koch outlines in beautiful detail the beauty of the psoas muscle and how it relates to the body’s function. She talks about how our culture of exercise focusing on external or “show” muscles comes at a price to our deeper structure. Over emphasis on conditioning the abdominals without access to the deep stabilizing systems held within the body, the psoas reacts by tightening further, thus creating stress and strain on soft-tissue structures, referred muscle pain, and stress to the diaphragm and other viscera. She even delves into topics ranging from emotional states and how they relate to psoas function, women’s menstrual cycles, and even sexual function! According to Koch, and i agree based on my observations with myself and my days doing therapy, the psoas does not respond well to stretching, as it seems to be too harsh of a stimulus. The psoas should be released via gravity and mindful awareness. This may sound like smoke, mirrors, and snake oil, however those that have not experienced a true psoas release would do well to undergo the experience and see for yourself. Her website is coreawareness.com and she regularly has podcasts, psoas retreats, and wellness workshops to help people re-establish and re-discover their deeper self. I highly recommend her book, as she talks so much more colorfully about the psoas than I ever could.

Most of my friends and colleagues know that I don’t like to focus too much on one muscle, however, if there was one to focus on, I think the Psoas would be it. Just like a superhero trying to do good and fend off evil from a city, often times the plight is that the very people in which our superhero is trying to protect retaliate negatively. Perspective, in the case of the psoas, is important in understanding how the psoas relates in function, both through physical, mental and emotional means. This is a good lesson to be aware that muscles don’t perform just one action; this is a “systems” approach to the body, which limits the ability for the person/practicioner to understand scenarios in which the muscle doesn’t act the way in which a book says it does. In this regards, an open mind and a keen eye trained to see function and the possibility of something that may not be in a book is key to cultivate long term. Why are the muscles reacting the way they do? Could it be that the problem isn’t the site itself?

What is in store for our hero now? Will he be doomed to live a life of isolation deep within the bowels of the body? Or will he establish rapport with his fellow muscles to work together in improving movement and, thus, quality of life? I vote for the feel-good ending.

CR

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I attended a show last night at the Concourse exhibition center in San Francisco. It was a charity event where athletes from UC Berkeley are pitted against dancers from the Oberlin Dance College in San Francisco. The events range from relay races to obstacle courses, jousting, and climbing. Some of the events were questionable, and i’m sure folks reading this could come up with a more accurate assessment of tests to display athleticism than what was presented last night. However, it was interesting to see the athletes compete against the dancers.

The take home point…

The dancers kicked the athlete’s asses.

This got me to thinking about how we cultivate athlete’s in this country, our societal movement quality and quantity, and the lack of general movement skills that these particular athletes didn’t have. This is not meant to be a cut on the athletes, nor is it a truly fair representation of athleticism because this is a nebulous term, and the events were not exactly a wide-sweeping measure of all around athleticism.

With that out of the way, the dancers exhibited much more body control, coordination, and strength to weight ratio than their Division I Athlete competitors. There is much validity to the training of a dancer that could be extrapolated and utilized for athlete’s of all sports. Dancers probably won’t have the speed and strength of a college athlete, however cultivating general movement quality should be a pre-requisite of all sports.

Can you balance on one leg and move around without falling over? Do you have the range of motion to move effortlessly through space? Are you strong on a relative vs. absolute basis? By this i mean that the athlete needs to be strong for his/her size, not just able to bench press 800 pounds. Dancers swept in all of these general skills, as well as what appears to be a better adapted sensory system which allowed them to move so effortlessly.

Most athletes now are coming more and more from years of sitting on their butts, playing video games, and specializing in sports early on. In the turn of the 20th century, the foundation of movement in physical education came out of dance and swedish gymnastics. Coupled with this was more movement as a part of everyday life…walking 5 miles in the snow to school every day, hay bailing for cash in the summer, etc…just like grandpa used to do. This element developed and cultivated quality movement before whatever sport was chosen later in life. I hope someday we can return to a society not fearful of gymnastics or viewing dance as a “waste of time” and we start to look to beautiful movers a little in regards to how to cultivate smart, as well as strong and powerful bodies. In the early days of the iron game, weightlifters were able to jump over hurdles, do full bridge backbends, and balance on one hand (see: http://www.lostartofhandbalancing.com/home.html). What happened to learning new skills and perfecting movement quality? Has our society become so expedient that we’ve stripped away the core movement that is celebratory of the human animal’s versatility for super-specialized sport skills like throwing a baseball?

The athlete that can move uninhibited by range of motion limitation, can move under control, AND have tons of strength and power in reserve is a scary athlete indeed. I foresee in the future a large portion of amateur and elite athletics returning to the basics and doing off-season training focusing on general movement skills to restore function to human body and make a smarter, more sensory-aware body. Could it be better to put down the weights 4x/week plus sports-specific practice for 2 sessions a week of general movement skill conditioning?

I guess i just want to see more linemen doing somersaults, handstands, and arabesques…

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Part of being a fitness professional, or any professional for that matter, is to “acquire knowledge” to help us better serve the populations that we work with. This, for most health and fitness professionals, comes in the form of certifications, licensing, DVDs, books, college courses, etc. However, there comes a problem when we try to “know” too much.

Not to discount knowledge, as it is our raw material, or pool from which we draw from. Knowledge is the tool we use to enable our clients to build upon the goals they wish to achieve. Some only have a hammer for which everything in front of them is a nail. So, more tools are better, right? What if we imagined a scenario on the opposite end of the spectrum, whereabouts another trainer, for example, uses a hammer, screwdriver, powersaw, kitchen blender, sewing needles, and a physioball to hammer the nail home? The nail might get where it needs to go, but how much time was wasted? Could it have been done more efficiently? Tons of folks fall into the latter category, unleashing a plethora of functional assessments coulpled with a laundry list of esoteric exercises that leaves the client more confused than when they walked in. Many times, it also confuses the trainer…some have coined this “Paralysis by Analysis”.

Therefore, we should throw “knowledge” back into the pot and stir until out boils a new understanding of what we actually know. It is these deductions of reason, these a priori assumptions will help cultivate an awareness of how to use knowledge properly.

“Knowing” is not a stagnant, fixed entity. Knowledge is contextual and requires our attention based on the time the knowledge is being applied. To say that a hammer works on a nail all the time would make sense based on “Theory”, however, what if that nail, at a certain point in the future, is made of wood and will shatter when struck by a steel hammer? Conventional wisdom might say to use a different hammer. But what if you didn’t have another hammer? How about Macgyver-ing it by wrapping the hammer in a towel and gently pounding it into place. Much of working with the human body is art, not just science. Creative solutions for problems is part of what makes this industry so dynamic.

What we should be training ourselves to do is not to look for fixed systems, rule-based approaches, or algorithms to dealing with the human body. We should be training ourselves to be problem-solvers, to look at things objectively, and skillfully come up with creative solutions to solve those problems when they present themselves. Systems and rule-based approaches are a great start, but moving towards free-thinking and creative problem-solving will ultimately provide better ammunition for times that leave us all baffled as to how to solve those particular conundrums.

To become good, follow the rules. To become great, follow the rules better than anyone else. What about becoming the best at what you do? Could it be a matter of innovation and creativity; the ability to solve problems creatively that no one may have seen before on the fly?

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[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HHwXlcHcTHc&hl=en&fs=1]

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As new diet books and articles come out, we throw ourselves back into the Matrix of confusion when it comes to what we should be eating. We adhere to all of these rules put on by self-proclaimed diet dictocrats: Low carb, low fat, high protein, eat a grapefruit before a meal, don’t eat after 7pm, don’t mix carbs and fats together, don’t eat cooked food, be a vegan, be a raw vegan, eat only fruit…you get the idea.

These are all rule-based systems that lead us down the rabbit hole of confusion and frustration over what we should or shouldn’t eat. In order to see past the confines of rule based systems, we should look at the bigger picture in assessing our individual nutritional needs.

I think a great place to start is by asking the following:

What do you want your food to do for you?

Most diet “system” has some validity to it, however it may not fit the specific needs of you at the present time. If you just ran a marathon, it may not be a good for you to eat a giant steak with blue cheese and no carbs. However, the beautiful thing is that your body would tell you that if you listen in. Contrarily, eating a bunch of carbs, especially refined carbs while sitting at a desk all day probably isn’t the best choice either.

The body does not adhere to “rules” in the traditional sense, it simply responds to the stimulus you give (or do not give) it and sends a signal to you saying what it needs at that point in time. If you learn to listen, it will tell you what you need. And then, you can transcend the walls put up by fad diet books to see that rules prevent possibilities, and the possibilities are vast indeed.

So what is it? The blue pill of systems-based nutrition or the red pill of self-discovery through instinctual eating? I guess the answer lies in how far down the rabbit-hole you want to go, right?

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Have you ever heard your own voice? Before you hastily answer that question, stop and think about it as i further clarify that question. Have you ever heard your own voice devoid of ambient noise, background chatter, wind, etc? Chances are you haven’t unless you’ve entered one of these:

An Anechoic chamber is a room that can be as large as an airplane hangar in size and is a place where no ambient noise is present. These are the quietest places on earth. They use them to test radio frequencies and for testing the true characteristics of speakers without echo and ambient noise interfering. Pretty wild stuff. I have never stepped foot inside of one of these rooms, however i imagine the sensation would be like witnessing a painting in a gallery where the paint floated still between the frames with no adherence to any kind of canvas or equivalent surface. It must be as if your voice would just hang there with no reference to outside noise coloring the tone. It would just be your voice occupying that space.

So what are you getting at, Charlie?

After sitting on the idea of such a room, i started thinking about thoughts and how we manifest our thoughts in light of others’ influence. This can be a very good thing, as it is good to bring in outside influences when turning those decisions into actions. We need others to bounce ideas off of, however i also believe it to be important that we are acutely aware of our own internal voice first, our instincts, if you will. In regards to health and fitness, we often make things too complicated. We assess the needs of clients and ourselves and assign protocol that may not match directly with those goals. Our instincts may tell us one thing, but outside pressure from other sources may tell us otherwise.

For example: Client A wants to get his whole body stronger. This client typically lifts weights with isolation bodybuilding exercises for 3 sets of 12-15 reps 3 times a week. He hasn’t seen gains in years and now wants to work with a trainer to get bigger and stronger. So, he enlists the help of a trainer to get stronger. This trainers instincts tell him that his client needs to start lifting heavier weights. However, somewhere along the line, because of outside influence and fear of being judged, the trainer steers the ship of program design off course.

In his head, he’s thinking…

Heavy Press for sets of 5 reps
Heavy Pull for sets of 5 reps
Heavy Squat for sets of 5

However, in light of pressure from other trainers, colleagues, and the trainee (either perceived or actual), he thinks it may look too simple. So, instead, he caves and does this…

BOSU Ball Dumbbell Overhead Press with one leg balancing
Dumbbell lunge matrix with side lateral raises
One-arm dumbbell row with t-spine rotation on a BOSU ball
Wall Squats with Physio Ball to Bicep Curl
Dumbbell Close-stance squats on BOSU to Tricep Extension
Core plank sequence on Physio ball

You get where i’m going with this? The latter program may have all these cool and trendy exercises, however the trainer has lost sight of the goals of the trainee. Not to say that the above exercises are bad, however they don’t efficiently match up with the stated goals of getting stronger. Even though something like a Bench Press, Bent over Row and Squat are not as trendy or, as some may say, not “functional” enough (whatever that means), those compound forms of exercises are the lifts that the client can put the most load on his body with; heavy compound lifts will be the most efficient way to get the client to where he wants to go. As Dan John, one of my favorite strength coaches of all time, once said (or similarly stated), the reason that world-class programs are so great is because they are simple, and simple works!

All things being equal, the simplest solution is usually the best solution (Occam’s Razor).

The lesson: Trust your instincts first and keep things simple. Look first not to what you can ADD to the program, but what extraneous things you can take away. Put yourself in the Anechoic chamber of thought first, and hear your own voice before adding to the fray of outside influence.

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Many people have asked me about The Egoscue Method therapy and how i incorporate it into my sphere of practice. For those that have read Pete Egoscue’s books The Egoscue Method of Health Through Motion and Pain Free are a step ahead of the rest, however more general info can be found on the website www.egoscue.com.

In a nutshell, The Egoscue Method therapy is a way for others to seek pain-free movement and eliminate movement limitations by restoring their body to it’s designed posture. The body, regardless of individual differences, has an optimal alignment, and when there are deviations in this optimal alignment, muscles start compensating for others and, over time, dysfunction, limitation and pain are the result. In a perfect world, we wouldn’t sit for 8 hours a day at a desk job. Our bodies are designed for movement, and the most high-quality and variable movement possible. However, this just isn’t the case. We sit more now than we ever have, and it shows in our lack of function and posture. Slouching shoulders, duck feet, rounded upper backs, forward heads are just some of the postural deviations that keep people from realizing their true health potential. Even breathing, circulation, fatigue, digestion, etc. are affected negatively by poor posture.

From the outside, the exercises may seem too simple, however they are remarkably effective at restoring imbalances and helping others achieve pain-free movement. Think of it as a movement vitamin, providing vital movement nutrients that we don’t get in our everyday lives. It also provides others with a simple and effective way to fix themselves and understand the reason for why they are in pain. It’s a way for others to self-correct themselves without the use of drugs or hands-on therapy (although there is a place for those, as well, and Egoscue is not always a replacement for the aforementioned methods of treatment).

For athletes, i see it as an essential component to recovery and efficiency which will provide the necessary framework for long term gains in strength, power, speed, agility, and all the other fun stuff that comes along with training athletes. In fact, i believe that athletes nowadays should focus less on strengthening and lifting and more on harboring general movement skills. A great way to do this is with a program that Egoscue developed called “The Patch”. More info can be found on www.patchfitness.com. Also, Frank Forencich’s Exuberant animal site has some stellar ideas on where our industry needs to be headed towards (high-quality varied movement in a play-like format).

For those that have more questions, i will not have answers for you, however i will have more questions to help guide you in the right direction should you require it. Achieving greater movement is a journey, a process that needs mindful awareness, and somatic forms of therapy like Egoscue are a great way to do that.

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Michael Pollan, journalist and foodie, has coined the term “Nutrition-ism” to mean that food is viewed as a nutrient, or for its nutritive value, instead of simply as food. We eat for many reasons, not just to sustain and nourish our bodies. This is likely an end result. What if, instead of focusing on how much protein, carbs, or fat ratios we are getting, we focused on getting the most QUALITY nutrients we could get? Is a vitamin fortified candy bar better than some raw almonds and an organic apple?

On the same plane of thought is the notion of exercise. We are told by doctors, fitness experts and health gurus that we need to exercise to maintain health, look good, and feel good. In the spirit of Michael Pollan, i have decided to coin a new term: “Workout-ism”. “-ism” is a great suffix because it signifies ideology, even religion in some sense. In this country we look at working-out/exercising as a way to keep our bodies healthy. However, much like this idea of nutritionism, what if we just participated in high quality movement for the shear enjoyment of it? Much like we did when we were kids? When movement feels good and is intrinsically enjoyable, we don’t think about “i need to do this because it’s good for me”, we do it because it’s fun!

What if instead of telling ourselves to workout with the same old routine day after day, we changed our mindset, at least a couple of days a week to “I’m going to go outside and play”? Go for a hike, get some friends together and play soccer or flag football, go swimming, go find some kids to play with (they are experts in play-ism).

When did being healthy become so boring and adult-like? What about doing things for fun? Are we going to continue to prescribe exercise and nutrients like doctors prescribing beta-blockers, or are we going to teach ourselves to enjoy moving and eating?

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