Welcome home! Please contact lincoln@icrontic.com if you have any difficulty logging in or using the site. New registrations must be manually approved which may take several days. Can't log in? Try clearing your browser's cookies.
Keeping your back straight
Deshy
Veteran
I am used to meditating while leaning on a wall but during retreats I do not get to lean on anything. Is not leaning on anything more beneficial to the meditation? How do you manage to sit long hours without any support to your back while keeping your back straight at the same time? :eek:
0
Comments
Thanks for the reply Jeffrey
This link will send you to a similar thread where I provide some weight training exercises and isometric exercises that may be helpful.
http://newbuddhist.com/forum/showpost.php?p=108321&postcount=21
With metta
A strong back helps maintain correct posture, a weak back might not...
It's a bit of both, which is why I added the note about posture. Everyone seemed to be focusing on muscle!
My posture used to be terrible to the point where I used to hunch over. I had to correct my posture, using muscles that I never realised I had, but my posture came first. No matter how good your muscles are, if your sat (or stood) in the wrong posture, you can actually do more damage than good. The pains you get in the back can indicate what is due to posture, and what is due to muscle. Believe it or not, but the pains feel different. Through eperience (and physical therapy) I'm amazed at how many people sit incorrectly without realising, and the smallest of adjustments takes away a hell of a lot of ache.
Nios.
Actually I am not having any aches. Well I don't sit long enough for aches to develop
But I have this tendency to hunch over and get comfortable. Keeping the back straight is very hard. Is it through practice that you get a grip on it or is there a specific posture that feels comfortable from the beginning?
Completely relate to what you're describing here. I sit for 30 minutes every night and I don't have any pain myself, but I always end up hunched over no matter how straight I start out the session.
My position is constantly changing. I know you're not supposed to move when you meditate, or at least not much, but I can't help to adjust as my body becomes tired and uncomfortable in a certain position.
Sometimes I notice that my back get's straighter and in a better posture towards the END of the session tho. Which is weird.
For some reason, I am one of those dumb people who have the notion that "real" meditation is done in the lotus, half lotus or burmese positions, not a chair. And I admit that I would be devastated if for some reason I would have to forgo my sitting in the Burmese position, to go for a chair position.
I'm aware it's ridiculous, but that's how my conditioned mind feels right now. I may end up meditating in a chair in the end tho, as my hip seems to be acting up lately. It might be because I'm over-doing it with the stretching exercises tho. My body is so off kilter too and that doesn't help.
This is what I do as well. I don't automatically straighten up when I notice the slump. I try to listen to what my body is saying and what it wants to do, and then out of this consciousness of body, comes an adjustment that will bring me to a straighter position, which is easier to mantain, rather than an artificial one. I do this as many times as I need over a session and usually I become more straight-backed near the end of my meditation time, than when I started.
I sit on two pillows so that my hips are higher than my knees. This is the position I learned from the start and I've experimented with less/more pillows, but two seems to do the trick best.
I don't darken the room, because the kind of meditation I practice requires you to have your eyes half open and to see clearly. And I don't burn candles because it would only distract me from my focus and give me yet another sensory input that I have to process, and this is not what I want.
Sometimes you just have to stop making excuses and just DO IT. Or else if you keep waiting and waiting for the "right time" to come along, you'll never do it, as you'll always find some flaw in the present that allows you to keep telling yourself that it's not the right time to meditate still.
I think that once you start and get into it, once you start practicing often and make it a strong habit, you will love it, as it's a chance to get to know yourself better, see things more clearly, strip down from all your normal mental patterns and a perfect time to just let go and BE.
to sleep
Well I sit on my bed :eek: Shame on me. I think it's better to get on the floor and use a cushion to sit on
:eek: It's supposed to be a meditation session
Lol, I can relate :tonguec:
Good point; thanks.
I get it's all about practice
I have been attending ten-day (and longer) retreats where I sit up to 14 hours aday without back support. I have been doing that for 25 years.
You get used to it. Everytime you feel yourself slouching - straighten up.
kind regards
Ben
Also seated row works lower back (http://www.exrx.net/WeightExercises/BackGeneral/CBSeatedRow.html) but again, take it slow... even though it does not target the lower back (lower back is a synergistic muscle group) But the upper Back is usually quite strong and can easily outpace the lower back... So just because the upper back can pull it doesn't mean the lower back can even in its diminished capacity as helper muscles...
I second this, start even with as little as 5lbs on each side. and add a small amount each workout to get used to the weight / increments
14 hours a day :eek:
Ben, I'm impressed. Keep it up friend
I'm actually attending another 10-day retreat starting tomorrow.
kind regards
Ben
Good to see you on this forum too.
May your retreat be fruitful for you!
With Metta,
Guy
Its great to see some old friends here too!
NB is a great forum, you've got a good thing going here!
metta
Ben
The Dali Lama has said that he make a suptle swaying motion. Not noticible, but as if moving with the energy.
Note to self-- Constriction is another form of resistance of that which is.
exercise... especially push-ups is very helpful for keeping the back straight. it is good for back pains too.