Back Pain and Bioenergetics

Next to the common cold, lower-back injury is the most prevalent affliction of modern men and women. The belief is that most people will probably go through some "dis-ease" regarding their backs at some point in their lives simply because the back is involved in almost everything that we do.

The problem goes much deeper than how we use or misuse our lower backs. The reality is that the small of one's back literally is a fulcrum from which we either experience balance-- ease in our lives-- or we experience an imbalance and "dis-ease." The reason for this is that this fulcrum is that point at which we meet the stress of gravity from below and the stress of duty, obligation and demands from above.

If we do not, cannot or will not support ourselves to say, "No!" when needed, then our bodies do it for us. Frequently, prior to their back injuries, clients report a situation that feels to them like an impossible bind. So, strain and push come from the psyche, as well as the body.

Back injury also has been attributed to overweight and/or weak stomach muscles that exert a constant pull against the back, tugging it out of alignment.

This is not the whole story. Many people literally do not "back" themselves up. Rather, they "gut" their way through life, which may have other ramifications for ill health, such as ulcers and colitis.

Many back specialists recommend strengthening the back muscles. Their thought is that the back must support our whole body structure. However, our backs were never designed to literally support our body structure.

The back is the energetic motor coordinating center for us to either aggress-- move out toward what we want-- or resist that which we do not want. The true support for our body is our feet, legs, and pelvis. The conventional wisdom is that the discs in our back act as shock absorbers. If you understand the back, from an energetic view, the disks of our back are like silicon washers that mitigate smooth, easy movement to reduce friction.

The true shock absorbers of our body are our knees and our ankles. They literally help us take the bumps and jostles of life. These joints are like psychosomatic crossroads. They mediate between the forces, physical, as well as psychological, that flow through them.

They reveal a great deal about the way an individual is dealing with the flow and motion of his or her life. When they become chronically tense and blocked, the flow and motion of our life is interrupted. You then become extremely susceptible to injury and "dis-ease."

Pain tells us to pay attention. How have you abused yourself, negated yourself, denied yourself? We all need to remember, where there is pain there is life, and where there is life there is hope.