Where We Store Tension In The Body

26:04

Where We Store Tension In The Body

by Maia Thomlinson

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5

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talks

Activity

Meditation

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Everyone

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3

As we move through life, it’s quite common to accumulate tension in the body - this is where we store our stress, how our body expresses unmet needs or suppressed emotion. Yet, we rarely take the time to tend to it until the pain becomes too great to ignore. In this practice, you will learn four of the most common places where we store our tension, and some simple tools to begin to release what you’ve been carrying.

Pain Awareness Heart Space Awareness Chakra Awareness Tension Stress Emotional Health Body Awareness Self Healing Breathing Techniques Grounding Yoga Jaw Tension Grounding Techniques Hip Openers

Meet your Teacher

Maia Thomlinson

Winnipeg, MB, Canada

Meet your Teacher

Maia Thomlinson

Winnipeg, MB, Canada

Transcript

Hello and welcome to the space. My name is Maya and I'm so happy to be here with you today. So today I wanted to get into some of the locations in the body that I see that we store a lot of tension and pain. I have been working in a physio clinic for the last four years as a physiotherapist aide and so I've seen a variety of different bodies come through the clinic and Through that experience, I've recognized these different patterns. I also have a background as a dancer and a circus artist, So I'm very familiar with the body. I've been studying movement for more than 20 years. And during that time, Yeah, I've just. . . Seen a lot of injuries in my own body. I've seen injuries in the people around me. And sometimes those are chronic overuse. Sometimes those are, Of course, Injuries that happen in a moment. And so we can store pain in a lot of different locations in the body. Today I'm just going to get into four of the most common ones. Of course, You may have specific injuries yourself that you'll want to get support with. And I would encourage you to see this video as really just a jumping off point. Of course, It's not a substitute for medical advice. And yeah, I just wanted to share what I've witnessed and what I've experienced. So. A few weeks ago I was helping put heat packs on a patient and I was commenting to her about these patterns that I see. She was dealing with some neck tension and some upper back pain. Made the comment to her like you're not alone. And I think she said something like, Oh yeah, That makes sense. You know, We're always on our phones, So we're always looking down, Right? So then I made a comment as well that there's just other places in the body I tend to see a lot, Which is the hips is another one that we tend to see a lot of in the clinic. Ends. I think sometimes it's nice to hear that as a patient, That you're not alone, Or even just a human. You know, When we're going through these experiences with pain, Pain is so individual and it can make us feel very isolated, But the truth is, Most likely what you're going through, Somebody else has gone through it as well. And once you're aware of the different locations in the body where you tend to store that tension, Which is going to be different depending on your lifestyle and who you are as a person, Where you tend to have weaknesses or where you tend to carry your stress. Once you are aware of that, It just gives you the tools and the awareness to. . . Take care of yourself a little better. It's like we're always going to have these places in our body that are a little more fallible. And so we need to tend to them. We can't just leave them be as annoying as that might be sometimes. But If you don't tend to the pain in your body, If you don't tend to that tension, It will continue to get worse. With that being said, Let's get into the four areas that I tend to see a lot of patterns, A lot of repeating tension in the people that I see through my work at the clinic. So the first one we're going to talk about is the jaw. Surprisingly, There is. . . Specific conditions of the jaw that we will treat through physiotherapy and that main one being TMJ. So that is when we accumulate a lot of tension in the jaw and of course, That that can affect so many different things. Nothing in the body is isolated. So if you're having a lot of tension in the jaw, It's very likely that you're having a lot of tension in the neck and the front of the throat. So energetically and emotionally. Of course. I can never see pain in the body as being separate from the energetics and the emotions of it. I also have a background. Studying Reiki and spiritual modalities. So for me, Everything is connected. Things are very, Very, Very rarely just purely physical. So with the pain in the jaw and the front of the throat, It often indicates that there is truth that you're not feeling safe to express. It's either you're not being truthful with yourself, There is somebody in your life that you're not being truthful with. Sometimes this can also just be that you're in an environment where you don't feel safe to express yourself. You know, You're kind of holding back on what you feel like you really wanna say, Especially if you don't agree with some of the things that are going on in that environment. Specifically, This can happen if your work is very stressful for you or you don't feel like you are supported in that environment to just truly fully express who you are. And. Of course, We're always gonna have areas in life where we feel more or less like ourselves. We can always see the lack of tension. If you've ever had a conversation with somebody you really trust, You'll see how your voice just drops, It deepens. And also some of that tension begins to loosen because you don't feel like you have to brace against the response of the other person. You feel like you're going to be received well. Regardless of what you're saying, If it's messy, If it's imperfect, You trust the other person. So when there's a lack of trust in the recipient of whoever you're expressing to, Then that tension will tend to accumulate in the job. Now this of course has a very strong correlation to the throat chakra. The throat chakra is how we communicate, It's how we express in the world and we often go through life and we'll have maybe a period of decades where we are not expressing our truth and then at some point it's just going to have to come out. So it'll either come out through pain in the body or it will come out through an explosion of you know when you get to that point and you just can't hold it in anymore and that can be a symptom of not being in flow with your throat chakra. So what we can do to tend to this pain, This tension in the jaw, Is very simple to start with. You can just take your two fingers. And you're going to massage the muscles along here. Now, For some people, This is not going to be very tight at all. For some people, You're going to find a lot of tension and a lot of pain, A lot of tenderness. Really. . . One of the most medicinal things we can do for ourselves when we are in pain in the body is to bring our hands to that part of the body. Touch heels. And. . . With a part of the body that's so strong and also so sensitive. As the jaw. Having that self-touch can really bring some familiarity and some warmth to the area. You can also, Of course, Put heat packs along the jaw. This is something we use quite frequently in the clinic. Heat tends to release tension so anywhere that you're having pain in your body that can be a really supportive tool that you can just use at home doesn't have to be complicated just make sure that that heat pack isn't too hot. So the next body part I'm going to talk about is the neck and the shoulders I would say. Probably most people in the modern world have some pain here. We're looking down at computers, We're looking down at our phone all the time. And also many of us just don't feel safe in our lives and our bodies. Even if you are well taken care of, If you have all your needs met, There is very likely some area of your life where you're carrying some extra stress. Our world in general is not always set up in a way to support us and what we need individually. Tension in the neck and shoulders tends to show up as you're carrying the weight of the world. This is especially prominent if you are a caretaker of any kind. In your work, In your family life, If you're a parent, Of course, If you're carrying small children or a baby, That tension is really going to accumulate in the neck and the shoulders because you're going to be hunched forward. It also tends to show up if you're not, Again, Feeling safe in your life and in your body. If you're bracing against some kind of perceived threat, We'll have this tendency to just hike the shoulders up the tiniest little bit. And it's so small that you probably won't even realize you're doing it. I know I will be washing dishes sometimes and I'll just notice, Oh, My shoulders are up. I just need to let that soften and relax a little bit. So with the neck and the shoulder area, A lot of it is just speaking with yourself and being like, Hey, You're safe right now. If you are in an environment where there is no immediate threat to your well-being and your safety, You can teach your body, Hey, We don't have to carry that tension right now. It can also be a good reminder to yourself or a good indicator of like if you're feeling a lot of that tension in the neck and shoulders, How can I put down some of what I'm carrying? Is there a way that I can call in support for myself to just alleviate some of this tension and pressure that is building up in my body? Um. . . Yeah, So those are the kind of things I would say about the neck and the shoulders. One thing to be mindful of if you're experiencing a lot of neck tension and you have been on your phone a lot lately, If you've been doom scrolling, For example, The further forward our head tips, The heavier it becomes. So if your head is kind of bent, Resting lightly above your shoulders, You have your spine aligned, The head won't feel quite as heavy as if your head is down here. It becomes like a bowling ball and it's so heavy. And we think of how often we're just looking down at our phones like that. So if you can be more mindful when you're using your phone to just bring it up in front of you a little bit more instead of looking down. At your hands like this. So, One thing that I love to do with the neck and the shoulders is a very simple neck stretch. There's many you can do, But I'm going to stick with this very simple one. You're going to take your head and you're going to look to one side. You're going to look down into the armpit. And whatever hand you're looking towards, So if I'm looking towards my right side, Then I'm just going to take that hand and I'm going to find the ridge of the back of my head and I'm going to pull very gently. So you don't want to be too aggressive with this. The neck is a relatively delicate part of the body. And then you're gonna stay there and you're just gonna breathe. So you're probably going to feel some tension along this part of the neck. And yeah. We generally say hold this stretch for two times 30 seconds. If you do that every day for a week, You're definitely going to feel a difference. And. Again, I would say it doesn't need to be complicated. It's just reminding your body you're safe to release tension. Even as you're doing this stretch, It's a really good time to take that opportunity to breathe. Breathe, Which we often forget to do, Right? When we're feeling stressed, We'll tend to bring the breath up into the chest and the shoulders. So again, Allowing that to drop, Allowing that to settle, Reminding your body that you don't need to brace, That you're safe in this moment. So that tension is allowed to relax. So that's the neck and the shoulders. Again, Most of us have tension there, So if you do, You're not alone. The next part of the body I'm going to speak to is very connected to the neck and the shoulders, So you may have tension in both areas. Um. . . But they do have kind of different emotional significances. When we look at the neck and the shoulders, It's often this bracing against vulnerability. The neck is the most vulnerable part of the body, And it's also one of the most important parts of the body. It's, You know, Our pathway to breath. It's our pathway to supporting the head, Which is so important for our well-being just on so many different levels. So again, When we're stressed, When we're feeling unsafe in our bodies, In our life, We're going to have that slight rising of the shoulders, Just allowing that to soften. The area that's very connected to that is the back of the heart space. So you can imagine if you're having a lot of tension in your neck and your shoulders and your head is always down like this, It's putting a lot of strain on the back of your neck. Like the upper part of the spine between the shoulder blades. And. If you want to visualize this for yourself, You can find your sternum, Which is this this bony part in the middle of your chest and the back of the heart space tends to be directly behind that like on the back of your body, And up a little bit. T4 is often where I'll see a lot of Tension for myself and for people that I have encountered in the clinic, T4 is the fourth vertebrae of the thoracic spine. And energetically, This really correlates to the heart chakra. So if you're carrying any grief, If you have lost someone recently, Also though, If you're not feeling supported in your life, There tends to be this grief that emerges in our body when we're not feeling supported and loved and held in the way that we crave and we yearn for, Which is so natural and so human. So. You're probably going to be feeling the tension and the pain in the back of the heart space. It can also come up. Yeah, When we're not feeling supported, It can come up when. We have a lot of big emotions in our body and we're not taking time to process it. We're not taking time to clear out the heart chakra. And specifically when our heart is feeling vulnerable. When we're in a vulnerable space, Like we're having all those big emotions like grief, Sadness. Even big joy, And we don't feel safe to let it fully express in our lives, We will tend to feel pain at the back of the heart space because we're bracing. It's kind of like you're putting a wall there. To protect yourself. Again, A lot of the time when we're having pain and tension in the body, It is because we don't feel safe in our bodies, We don't feel safe in our lives. We don't feel supported in the way that we need. And so the body will brace and depending on your specific life experience and depending on. Your specific energetic makeup, If you're a very heart-based person and you just have such a sensitive, Loving heart, You just want the people in your life to be good, You will likely feel that pain in the back of your heart space. Because there's this extra vulnerability around this fourth chakra. Now, What we can do for pain in the upper back. There is many different things. Massage and physical touch tends to be very supportive there. If you have somebody that you trust you either go to for a massage or if you have a loved one who can just rub some oil or even just rub their hand over that part of the body bringing warmth to it and also allowing them to support you in that way. So again physical touch brings healing to the body because it reminds us that we're not alone and it can alleviate some of that pain and that tension. The other thing I would really love to do for a pain in this part of the body that seems a little unrelated. Is to just lay on the floor and put your feet up on something. So you can put them up either against the wall, If you lay with your bum to the wall, And then you put your legs up at the wall. Depending on how flexible your hamstrings are, You're gonna have to be a little closer or a little further away from the wall. But you can really gauge that depending on your personal body and just what you need. Um, If you have lower back pain, You can also do this. Find a chair or your couch and you're going to put your bum laying right up against the couch and then just have your legs kind of like at a 90 degree angle. So I'm sure you can visualize that. If you have the couch here, Put your legs on top and then your legs are at this 90 degree angle and then your body is kind of laying down here. So you want to make sure that you're on a comfortable surface. If you need to put pillows down on the floor. Or if you have a yoga mat, That can be really supportive. And then you're just gonna stay here and you're gonna breathe. So this one specifically, You need to stay here for five to 10 minutes to really get the benefits of it. That inversion will bring blood flow back to the heart space and it's also a really soothing way to calm your nervous system. When you're in that position, You are fully supported by the ground beneath you and you're fully supported by these different surfaces. There is nothing that your body needs to fight or brace against. So that is a really beautiful opportunity to have this conversation with your body again, Where you're telling yourself, Hey, You're safe here. There's nothing you need to brace against. There's nothing to respond to in this moment. Even if your life feels very stressful and out of control, If you can take these five minutes for yourself and relax and let yourself be held by the floor, By the earth. Anytime we're down on the floor we're connecting to the earth element and just like Mother Earth in general, Which can be so soothing and grounding and supportive for nervous system that feels all that stress and that tension in the upper body. And we're just bringing the energy down. We're just letting ourselves relax and be held, Which is what we need to allow that tension to release. You can't force tension to release. If you do, It will tend to come back to that part of the body. The biggest way over a long period of time to retrain your body is to Create containers and spaces for yourself where you feel safe to let that tension soften rather than forcing yourself to release something that doesn't want to release because it doesn't feel safe. And I will say as well, As you're going through all of these tips and you're incorporating it into your life, Be patient with yourself. You may notice a 5% reduction in tension in your body. It's not going to fix itself overnight, Especially if you've been carrying that tension in your body for decades, Which as we grow older, Older in life, As we grow up into our adulthood, We do tend to accumulate these patterns in the body. Because we're not paying attention to the body. We're not living in a society that really values that. That really values honoring. Our well-being and our physical. Vitality in the way that would be required to Be mindful of those patterns. Many of us don't have the mental capacity to constantly be thinking about that unless you have a job or a lifestyle that allows for that, Which is so beautiful. Taking these five minutes to do one thing for yourself, For your body. Over time that's going to accumulate and you're going to begin to build more trust with your body and just your body is going to be like, Hey, Maybe I am safe here. Maybe I don't have to fight quite so hard to keep her safe. So the fourth part of the body that I'm going to talk about here is This is the hips. This is. Many of us store, Again, A lot of unmet needs down in this part of the body. The hips are correlated to the root chakra, Which when we look at the root chakra, It's all about safety. It's about financial security. It's about those very primal things that will tend to make us feel insecure, Make us feel unsteady if we don't have those needs met. And so many of us tend to store. Emotion in the hips. You can think of. The depth of those primal emotions like rage, Like suppressed desire, Those things will tend to sit in the hips if we're not tending to them and taking care of them. So. That part of the body can just accumulate a lot of tension because we are sitting, We're standing, We're walking all the time. We're not always necessarily. Paying attention to those patterns that are moving through our body, Right? And also the topics that we associate the root chakra with, Those tend to be very emotionally charged topics, If you're not feeling safe. In your life in your environment if you're not feeling safe financially if you're not feeling safe in your relationships specifically intimate relationships romantic relationships All of that will get stored in the hips and so what we want to do is we just want to bring more movement to the hips. I'm swaying my body now because this is one very simple way you can start to loosen up that area of the body. Even if you're sitting you can just very gently sway your weight from side to side and you can feel how that weight shifts from one sit bone to the other. And. . . You're just feeling your rigidity in that area of the body begin to soften. So when the hips are tight, Then we're often gonna get pain into the low back, We're gonna get pain into the glutes. There is also this correlation between how strong or stable those muscles of the body are and then the pain that's going to Um. . . Radiate into other parts of the body. So for example, If your glutes, Your hip, Your buttocks muscles are not strong enough and they're not stabilizing properly, We're going to get more pain maybe in the front of the hips. We're going to get pain into the sacrum. And. . . This area of the body is really the foundation for our center of gravity. It's our foundation for how we're going to move through life. So we really want to take time to tend to it. I would say. For most people here, You could take a two-fold approach. Pilates is really supportive. If you look up just very simple Pilates hip abduction exercises, Things like that. You can also look up. A yoga vinyasa flow that's. Specifically focusing on the hip area of the body, So hip openers. I'm just going to name some exercises here that we would maybe think of like pigeon stretch. We have figure four. We have just windshield wipers. So you're just going to have your feet planted on the floor. You're sitting and your knees are bent and you're just going to sway your knees from one side to the other. So these are just different ways that you can bring a little more spaciousness into the hips. And once you feel more spaciousness there, You're able to access your strength in a new way. So something that's really interesting that we see in the body is that when we're super tight in an area, We can't always access the fullness of our strength. So if the muscles are too rigid, They have accumulated too much tension, We're not going to be able to really benefit from doing squats, For example, Or even those hip abduction exercises in the same way. As we would if we're also stretching. So a lot of people will lift weights and they'll go to the gym and they want to become strong, Which is great. I'm not going to deny that at all. But if you're not stretching and you're not releasing the muscles and the tension in that area of the body, Then it's going to limit you. It's going to limit how far you can go in building that strength. So we can think about that in terms of life as well. If you are rigid in the way that you move through the world in your ideas of how you're going to feel safe and fully supported, You're going to be less resilient to all of the things that life is going to throw your way. Whereas if you can have some suppleness to your strengths, You're going to be so much more able to meet the challenges and different things that you have to face in your everyday life. That's a little bit about places that we store tension in the body. Again, That's the jaw, Then we have the neck and the shoulder area, We have the back of the heart space, And we have the hips. Depending on your personal lifestyle and experiences, You're going to have tension and pain in other parts of the body probably as well. Looking at these four areas and seeing if there's one that specifically stood out to you today. That's a really good starting point of like, Hey, Can I care for this part of my body a little more? Can I get the support that I need to feel more fully expressed in myself. Because when we feel safe in our bodies, That's when we're able to truly step into our gifts. We don't feel safe and at home in our lives and our bodies. It's really hard for us to express the light and vitality that wants to come through us. I hope that was helpful and if you have any questions. I am. Likely going to make more videos like this and I would just encourage you to step onto your movement journey and your healing journey with a lot of self-compassion and patience and just remembering that a little bit goes a long way for any pain or any tension that you're having in your body. And also remember that it's very likely, If you're having that pain and tension, That there is an emotional root beneath it. And in order to truly find healing in yourself, You're gonna have to tend to both. I'm sending you lots of love and I will see you all in the next one.