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Published Article COMPRESSION / SUSPENSION THERAPY FOR DANCERS (tm) Published in Contact Quarterly Magazine Fall 2001 By Erika Berland, L.M.T., R.M.T.
Compression/Suspension Therapy for Dancers evolved out of my many years of training as a professional dancer and working with dancers and athletes as a movement and massage therapist. This technique is part of a broad approach to movement training and bodywork which utilizes all the systems of the body: skeletal, muscular, organ, endocrine, nervous, fluids. For this article I will focus primarily on the skeletal, muscular, and organ systems as they relate to movement patterning. My underlying premise is: Prevalent movement patterns that are part of the training of many dancers, whether "release"-based or reflecting more traditional modern or ballet influences, can lead to stress and injury, especially in the older dancer, if not reeducated. These movement patterns are:
These inefficient movement habits can be repatterned by employing a combination of hands-on work and movement training. My work draws primarily on the educational principles of Body-Mind Centering (R), developed by Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen, with support from various massage therapy and movement techniques such as acupressure and Bartenieff Fundamentals(tm). I have synthesized these disciplines with my own understanding of how to develop the dancer's body for maximum expression (choice), efficiency, and longevity.
As babies we crawled upon the earth and eventually with sheer determination pushed ourselves ever higher. We pushed to reach beyond our immediate surroundings in order to explore and receive feedback from our world. This movement progression illustrates the necessity of the early patterns of grounding as a support for all movement that reaches into space and beyond. In this paper I explore the relationship of the grounding elements such as compression, flexion, and the push patterns to the patterns of suspension, extension, and reach that connect us to space. As dancers it is essential that we integrate these early developmental patterns and allow these fundamental ways of moving to support powerful and long-lasting dancing. COMPRESSION THERAPY FOR THE JOINTS When I was performing, teaching, and training as a dancer, I never left the house without first performing my daily routine of deep, passive stretching.1 These sessions, usually about an hour and a half, were performed first thing in the morning. I would not have dreamed of taking class without first having gone through this routine. I once asked a well-known movement analyst if she thought this ritual was necessary to "warm-up," and she said that if I thought it was, then it probably was! At the time I agreed, but I believe it contributed to chronic sciatica and other joint problems that I suffered in the ensuing years. Many of my colleagues have also accrued an impressive array of joint-related complaints such as disc problems, hip replacements, arthritis, etc. I certainly don't blame overstretching as the cause of all of these complaints, but there is a relationship between the laxity of the ligaments that can come with continued deep stretching and the lack of integrity in the joints. In my own dance training, there was in fact an overemphasis on "reaching" and "extending." Many dancers of my generation were "over-reachers." More recently in my practice, I have been treating the next generation of "over-releasers," encouraged by such forms as Contact Improvisation and Release Technique. Where we stretched, these younger dancers "let go," sometimes allowing weight to fall into the joints and, in its extreme, leading to the same lack of joint stability. In response to this, I have been working with techniques to restore a sense of energetic connection within joints that have become disconnected through patterns of overextension or imbalanced overuse. Joint compression can begin to restore the tone of the ligaments, energize the proprioceptors 2 for joint clarity and awareness, and allow the free flow of energy to pass sequentially through the various joints, thus distributing the workload more equally throughout the body.
When a joint becomes hyperextended or "locked," it prevents smooth sequencing between all the other joints in the chain of movement activity. For instance, if I hyperextend and "lock" my elbow joint, the result is more stress at my wrist and shoulder since the elbow joint no longer actively supports the joints above and below. There is a sense that the energy "stops" and doesn't flow (sequence) in a balanced way from wrist to elbow to shoulder to ribs, and eventually through the entire body. Hyperextension also distorts the angle of compression at the joint so that all the other joints end up compensating for that distortion. Dancers in particular tend to hyperextend at the elbows and the knees in their effort to fully extend the limbs. But these "bridge" joints between the distal and proximal ends of the limbs need to be free to respond to the feedback they get from the distal end (such as the wrist or ankle, fingers or toes) or to a proximal initiation (shoulder or hip). Locking or stopping the energy at this midpoint or bridge joint prevents clarity of movement initiation and energy flow through the whole limb and torso as movement is sequenced and carried throughout the body. If one restores a proprioceptive connection through compression while inhibiting hyperextension at the joint, the result is increased range of motion, release of stress at the compensating joints, and a more efficient pattern of movement. Because ligaments connect bone to bone, when we use manual compression at the joints, we are in effect working with the ligaments. When compression is used at a joint, the ligaments are put on slack, allowing them to release, reorganize, and regain some of their energetic tone. Contrary to what traditional therapies suggest, I believe that ligaments can be retoned and healed, by energetically connecting them end to end. Although these retoning techniques have not been subjected to scientific study, my own experience of working with dancers whose ligaments have been stretched to the maximum level is that compression at the joints brings a sense of relief as the ligaments become more actively engaged in supporting the joints. When the joints are more actively supported, the dancer often feels a lessening of muscular tension in the large muscle groups. The large muscles no longer have to substitute for the role of the ligaments (holding the bones together) and they are free to do what they were made to do... move the body through space. COMPRESSION AND SUSPENSION SUPPORT IN THE BODY
Although we have been discussing compression chiefly at the joint level, compressive forces play a much broader role throughout the body. As soon as we are born from the weightless, aquatic environment of the womb, we must make an active relationship with the forces of gravity as they affect our body. To paraphrase Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen: The infant bonds first to the earth and then to other human beings. This first experience of the forces of compression via gravity is the basis for grounding in the body and the way we eventually become grounded in our verticality. As Ms. Cohen further states in her book, Sensing, Feeling, and Action , "On the basis of this bonding with gravity/Earth, we can then leave it." So developmentally, compression precedes suspension, or we could say, compression supports the suspensive forces. Experientially though, we never leave behind our relationship to the earth. For every beautifully extended, suspended limb there is a grounding element in the body acting as a counter-support to the extension. By working with the basic reflexes and developmental patterns to reawaken these initial, more primitive responses to gravity, we tap into a primary source of support for more effortless suspension. 3 ORGAN TONE AS A BALANCE OF COMPRESSION AND SUSPENSION FORCES IN THE BODY Tone is a word we tend to associate with the general resting state of a muscle. If a muscle has well-balanced tone it can fully condense and lengthen, expressing the readiness of the muscle to respond and relate to the body's inner and outer environment. We might be less familiar with tone as an expression of the resting state of our vital organs. The soft tissue of the heart, lungs, and internal viscera helps support our musculoskeletal system from the inside out, giving volume, fullness, and tremendous vitality to our movement expression. Developmentally, organs are toned and strengthened through the compressive forces of gravity. As the organs yield to gravity, this primary organ tone is developed. Suspension from gravity and support of the organs are a natural result of this initial compression. When I work with dancers I use my hands to apply a gentle compressive force to the organs. If I am concentrating on the lower body, underneath the hard sheath of abdominal muscles, I will often find the intestines and reproductive organs lacking in vitality and tone or tightly contracted and indistinguishable from the hard-ness of the muscle tissue. Dancers are so used to bypassing the organs in the pursuit of muscle strength that locating, feeling, and condensing the soft tissue has a powerful effect on enlivening the dancer's sense of deep, effortless core support. The first step to organ support, as with the joints, is for the dancer to gain sensation of their organs. One of the techniques I use is to support the limbs and to alternately move them towards and away from the torso (compressing into the organs, and lengthening out with gentle traction) in a rhythmic, pulsating motion. As the organs become toned through this gentle stimulation of compression and traction, they become more actively engaged. They begin to support our structure in the same way that the pillars of a bridge support the bridge. The bridge itself is the suspension support while the pillars are an example of compressive support. For a suspension bridge the balance of these two interdependent, supporting forces provides maximum stability. For the body, the organs interact with our skeletal container (ribs and pelvis) by adjusting, shifting, compressing, and suspending in response to the movement of our entire body. This provides maximum support, moment to moment, as the moving body seeks to maintain a balanced state. At the same time, we avoid the rigidity that results from simply gripping our "insides" as we search for equilibrium.
I find this pattern of bypassing support from the ground up most prevalent in dancers complaining of lower back or sacroiliac problems. Because of years of externally rotating the legs in the hip sockets (without concurrent internal rotation), the angle of compression of the femur bones into the joints tends to bypass compression to the, lower organs and instead compresses the sacroiliac joints or lumbar spine. Once the legs are repatterned so that the femoral condyles fit snugly and globally in the sockets, the angle of compression at these joints changes. Now the legs can directly "converse" with the intestines, bladder, uterus, etc., massaging them through movement, expressing their "organic" qualities in the movement, and finding a buoyant support for the lower back and pelvic bowl. A new alignment is now possible which stimulates and vitalizes our deepest core. Habitual patterns of external muscle tension can be released. FLEXION AND EXTENSION Related to the underlying tone of our muscle and organ systems are our fundamental movement patterns of flexion and extension. In my work with dancers I am often aware of a deep imbalance between these two primary patterns. Because the movement we try to reproduce as dancers is often perceived as going beyond one's kinesphere-extending, reaching, and visibly moving through space-we often unconsciously end up emphasizing patterns of extension in our dance practice. This can be at the expense of the flexion patterns which are part of the compressive element in the body. These patterns, such as pushing from any of the surfaces of the body that are in contact with the earth, are less visible but they offer a strong and grounded support for the extended limbs. Whole body flexion or "physiological flexion," where the limbs fold in around the navel and the front of the body compresses, is the developmental forerunner of whole body extension (where the limbs extend out from the navel and the back of the body condenses). This flexion develops in utero as the walls of the uterus begin to compress the developing fetus. At birth, a healthy infant has fully developed flexor tone and does not develop full extensor tone on the back of its body until about six months of age. Stimulating this flexor tone is the antidote for stressed, unsupported limbs and spine. Dancers are all too familiar with the deeply ingrained pattern of lifting the chest and thrusting the ribs forward. Sometimes there is additional hyperextension at the lumbar spine, such that organ tissue is compressed in the back and "falls out" the front, forcing us to grip the external abdominals against the pull of gravity. To remedy this, my work with dancers includes lots of stimulation to the flexors along the front of the body. In the beginning this is encouraged by spending time prone, on the belly, so that the sensory receptors in the skin, muscles, and organs in the front of the body are stimulated by the texture, touch, and pressure of the supporting surface, in this case the ground or earth. Lying on the belly encourages flexor tone, lying on the back encourages extensor tone. Usually if we lie face downward on our bellies, we image the body as being in a state of relaxation or perhaps sleep. In this case, we are reversing that image and allowing a sense of aliveness or wakefulness to penetrate our underlying surface, deep into our organs. We could be said to be "listening" with the entire front surface of our body and hugging the earth like one of those suction toys we place on car windows. If we allow that toning process to completely penetrate through to our organs, our limbs will begin to curl around our navel and we find ourselves in a deeply flexed fetal posture, or physiological flexion. It's important to become familiar with this whole body flexion as a way to heal the imbalance created by overuse and constant movement initiation by the extensors. As we progress beyond whole body expressions of expanding and condensing and explore more complex patterns such as homologous (both arms or both legs initiate), homolateral (same arm and leg initiate), and contralateral (opposite arm and leg initiate) movement, we experience how every movement embodies the interdependence of flexion and extension. This continual sequencing, moment to moment, between flexion and extension, between the core and periphery, provides us with a seemingly endless stream of movement and creativity. We never "run out of gas" as this cycling of energy through the body's systems continually renews and transforms us. PUSH AND REACH Just as flexion precedes extension, "push precedes reach" is a basic principle that is part of our developmental movement history. Having been born from a watery environment of lesser gravitational pull on the body, we adjust to the stronger sensation of gravity on all our bodily systems by "yielding" and, in effect, being drawn towards the earth. Bonnie Cohen describes this as bonding with our ground and establishing one's fundamental base of support. By yielding through our tissues and trusting the support of the earth, we can further respond by beginning to push away from this underlying support. By pushing from the part of the body that has fully yielded into gravity, we establish the power to reach beyond our kinesphere into outer space.
When we push, our tissues literally condense, making us feel denser, heavier, and more substantial. This earthy quality exists on a continuum with the more rarified and spacious qualities of suspension. To sum up, compression relates to the development of flexor tone and flexion is connected with the ability to establish strong push patterns. In the same way, suspension relates to extension and to the establishment of the reach patterns. When the dancer's "reach" beyond her kinesphere is fully supported by the strength, power, and "connectedness" of the push patterns; when flexion and extension behave as yin and yang; and when the compressive forces in the body equal the suspensive quality of reaching into space, then the dancer is able to avoid strain and chronic injury and express the richness inherent in her body's natural movements. CONCLUSION In my work, I encourage dancers to reclaim their developmental heritage and learn to trust in their supporting surface. This means momentarily giving up the pursuit of the external image of extension and flying for a less visible connection to our basic ground. Unless we feel supported, how can we fully open and extend ourselves? As dancers, how can we fully connect to space and open our hearts to an audience without the full support of the earth? For many dancers of all traditions, these principles are automatically integrated, expressed in the dancer's natural physical ability. But when chronic injury becomes a reality, we must be willing to work "from the ground up," reestablishing the fundamentals of coordinated, healthy movement. To contact the author: Erika Berland. Email: ekberland@comcast.net NOTES 1 - Passive stretching: releasing one's body weight into gravity to stretch a muscle area (e.g., hanging the torso over the legs while sitting, etc ) without simultaneously countersupporting and stabilizing the muscles around the joints (and thereby protecting the ligaments from overstretching). 2 - "The 'proprioceptors', located in joints, tendons, muscles, and ligaments record information about the position of the body in space, its movement' and the relationships of body parts," (Wisdom of the Body Moving , Linda Hartley.) 3 - See "Alphabet of Movement: Primitive Reflexes, Righting Reactions and Equilibrium Responses, Part 1 and 2," by Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen, in CO 14:2 and 14:3, or also included in her book, Sensing Feeling and Action. REFERENCES Sensing, Feeling, and Action: The Experiential Anatomy of Body-Mind Centering. Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen. Northampton, MA- Contact Editions 1993. [Available thru CQ] Wisdom of the Body Moving: An Introduction to Body-Mind Centering Linda Hartley. Berkeley, CA: North Atlantic Books, 1989 1995 [Available thru CQ] |
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