The Key to Keeping Your Summer Sport Alive

You know what you love about summer, summer sport!

Swimming, hiking, kayaking, sailing, gardening, floating down the river. Staying out late on the porch soaking up the longest sunsets of the year. Walking through the garden past the biggest blooms that practically block your path. It’s a time to slow down and a time to be outside, which generally means more movement.

This is about how to keep that movement going. Finding your groove within your groove.

And it’s much easier than you think.

You are already maintaining your spine with your online classes, live or on demand. So check that box. Good work. Now you have your sport, your activity, your “I gotta get out there and do THAT!” moments. But sometimes, because we don’t necessarily do these activities all year, there’s a little conversation that happens between you and your body.

- - You: Ready?
  - Body: Ummmm. Maybe? Sure?
  - You: Awesome!! This is going to be so fun!
  - Body: Yep. Okay. I’m here. What are we doing?
  - You: That Thing We Love.
  - Body: Yeah. Um. Okay. You know it’s a lot of work on my end, right?
  - You: You’ll be fine.
  - Body: Okay. Is it okay if I send you little messages when things aren’t going so well?
  - You: Absolutely. NOT.
  - Body: Okay. Could you possibly do anything to help me out?
  - You: Depends.
  - Body: On what?
  - You: Seriously, how demanding are you going to be today??!

So yeah. It goes like that.

Since we can’t separate Body, Mind, and Soul (there’s a reason it’s an expression), we need to acknowledge the triplet that lives within us and not let one get too far out of control over the others. Easier said than done? Yes, probably. Otherwise the self-help shelf at the bookstore would be a lot smaller.

But here’s how we’re going to do it.

Step One: Definitely do Your Thing You Love.
Step Two: Find a way to weave your corrections into Your Thing You Love.
Step Three: Do those corrections sporadically throughout, and your body comes back happy. Your mind comes back happy. Your spirit gets filled up instead of depleted.

Sound like a plan? Good.

Here’s the thing about scoliosis: your spine is always along for the ride, whether you invite it to the conversation or not. The good news is that your corrections don’t have to stop when you leave your mat. They can live inside the activities you already love. Here’s how to find them.

Biking

When you need to push more through one leg for your corrections, come to standing on your bike pedals. One leg is bent on the higher pedal, the other is straight on the lower. Push through that straight leg and get the pelvis correction going.

When seated, grab the handlebars and pull them toward you. Let the elbows bend and point out to the sides to balance the shoulders.

Gardening

On all fours, weeding in a quadruped position? Grab the weeds with the hand on the side of your convexity and derotate as you pull. Use your non-pulling arm to push into the earth and open up the hollow side of your spine.

When you stand up to move to the next patch, take that moment. Hands on hips, find your pelvic correction, elongate through the crown of your head. Ten seconds. That’s all it takes to reset before you go back down.

Paddling

Pull back on the paddle on the side of the convexity while derotating. As you pull back on the hollow side, use the force of the water to help open it up.

If your primary curve is lumbar, push through the concave side. On a stand-up paddleboard, this is easy. In a kayak, sit on the sit bone on the side of the lumbar hollow and stretch both arms overhead with the paddle, creating length through the spine.

Hiking

Interlace your fingers and place them on top of your head. Elongate. Open up the ribs and take the weight of the shoulders off your spine. Do this one. It’s a good one.

Find a low tree branch. Grab it and stretch long. Stick your tailbone out and let it wag. Depending on the height of the branch, your torso will be more or less parallel to the ground, or you’ll be half-hanging with your hips dropping toward the earth.

Swimming

First, enjoy the length. The weightlessness. This feels like freedom of movement like no other.

Start by pushing off the pool wall, or the bottom of the river or sea, with your arms overhead in torpedo style. Push and float through the water. Put your feet down and try again. This is excellent for finding length. Add a kickboard or boogie board if that helps.

When you move into a stroke like freestyle or backstroke, locate your convexity and concavity at the shoulder level. On the convex side, derotate as you bring the arm behind you. In freestyle, that happens at the beginning of the stroke. In backstroke, derotate as the arm goes overhead and approaches the water. The shoulder comes into alignment as a result. Do not force it. Derotate the spine first, and the shoulder follows.

On the concave side, as you push the arm through the water, use that push to open up the hollow. For a lumbar convexity, reach longer through the leg on that side as you kick.

Keep coming back to your torpedo push throughout. It keeps your length and builds a very long spine.

Sailing

A sailboat is full of things you can use to elongate. The halyards, a sturdy handrail, whatever is available and solid. Grab it, bend the knees, let the tail reach behind you, and elongate.

If you are steering while seated, place the arm on the side of your largest concavity in a straight, extended position and rest that side of the body on it. Let the concavity lift. This works wherever your largest concavity lives, thoracic or lumbar.

Kayaking

Kayaking is a natural fit for Scolio-Pilates corrections, and here is why. Every stroke gives you a correction opportunity on both sides.

On the convex side, derotate before pulling the paddle back. On the concave side, open the hollow as you press the paddle through the water. The convex side will feel like a mini-extension, the concave side like a mini-flexion. Mini is the keyword here. You are creating derotation from the curves, not flexion and extension of the spine. These are two separate things. Keep them separate. And keep the spine elongated throughout.

This will get you started. And if your sport isn’t on this list, bring it to us. Tell us what you love to do and we’ll help you find the corrections hiding inside it.

Join the Scolio-Pilates Community Board and ask us anything. We’ll help you sleuth out the answers to doing Your Thing You Love, all summer long.

By fall, you’ll be having a very different kind of conversation with your spine.

You: Want to go do that Thing We Love?
Body: Yes! I got your back. Let’s do this!!!