Full Class Lecture
Topic 7: Move like Water: The biology of our Extra Cellular Matrix and how to flow into our Vinyasa Flow Class Structure
The Extra Cellular Matrix
Since day one of this training, we’ve talked about the space between the stars, the experience beyond the literal constellation of our posture. We saw that according to physics, we are mostly this space, 99.9% roughly. In our bodies, this is the space between our cells, and is known as fascia.
In the world of physics, this space has yet to be defined, known mostly as a theory of Higgs Field and dark matter. In our body’s, though, this space is being described primarily as the connective tissue of our body, defined as the Extra Cellular Matrix. “Extra cellular” meaning that which surrounds the cells, and “matrix” meaning that it encompasses and integrates everything within it. As researcher Camilla Nordin writes, “The body consists of cells and the matrix outside, between the cells, the extracellular matrix (ECM). Fascia is the ECM and the cells maintaining the ECM.”- Camilla Ranje Nordin, (https://fasciaguide.com/fascia-anatomy-physiology/embryology-of-fascia/)
Like we saw in the earlier space versus stars ratio, this ‘space’ of the connective tissue is the most abundant tissue in the body, more abundant than muscle, nervous, and epithelial. The “space” of fascia is not empty of course, but is actually 4 gallons of watery collagenous ground substance, resembling egg whites, with it's own team of worker cells keeping the tributaries flowing in the form of interstitial fluid, half of which rushes past every cell of your body everyday, “transporting nutrients, and playing a role in tissue remodeling, inflammation and lymphedema…inerstitial fluid flow is vital to maintain healthy tissue” (11, Lesondak)
ECM is like the inner ocean of our bodies. All the cells that we have require space around them and this space is filled with an inert fluid that protects, cushions and holds the cells and tissues in place. The ECM has several substances that allow for repair to take place, but the essential job of it is to facilitate the smooth actioning and function.The watery ground substance can be as liquified as a cup of water in some areas, thicker like a bowl of jello in others, or harder yet like the thick fibers under an orange peel in yet others. This variable density is the result of the collagen component within your fascia, which makes it less like water itself, and more like a gel, or mucus, or egg white.
Collagen is an incredible structural protein, a triple helix strand, much like you would see in a strong rope or cable, which makes it both incredibly strong yet flexible— as fascial researched David Lesondak writes, "Gram for gram, Type 1 collagen [the kind of collagen that our fascia is composed of] is stronger than steel, thus it can withstand tremendous force and still be able to bend with the wind.”
Conscious Movement keeps your fascia flowing, and without movement, it tends to crystallize, harden, and become a thick binding agent. This was originally documented by fascia researcher Gil Headly in the early 2000s, in his famous “Fuzz speech”, where he showed that fascia can become a physical fuzz, and eventually just become hardened tissue.
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So we see a very simple maxim emerge from this advanced research: Move it or lose it. Or as Movement enthusiast and pioneer Ido Portal once said “move, or one day you may not be able to.”
Gotta let it flow if you want it to grow: Our Fascia requires movement to Flow
As we've seen, our Fascial network is like a flowing river, with infinite tributaries allowing it to rush past literally every cell of our body, and it is up to us to keep that river flowing through conscious movement. Taking a glimpse at our composition of fascia, we see that it itself is mostly water, or ground substance, and a small portion of our fascia is cellular. These are the Guardians of the river, the essential worker cells known as the Fibroblasts.
Fibroblasts are the most abundant cell in our fascia, you can picture them like inter tubes floating down a rushing river. Their job is to literally eat the old fascia, repair existing fascia and spool out new fascia. “Fascia responds according to mechanical Supply and Demand…Fibroblasts spool out collagen or eat it, all based on signals of pressure and vibration, like a cellular public works department…Lack of Regular Movement or total immobility will give no stimulation which will have a negative impact on the formation of Matrix”
We also see movement has been proven to be essential for cellular health as well. Cell biologist Donald Ingber showed that cells themselves must be stretched and moved in order to live and unfold according to the body's needs. Quite literally he found that “cells that were appropriately stretched thrived, whereas cells that became too rounded [died].”
How do you stretch cells? That’s accomplished through movement. Fascia is like a spider web, movement translates through the whole body. The more the body participates in the movement, the more of the body is affected by it.
And there’s more— he showed it was actually movement and stretching of the cell that allowed them to “differentiate themselves in a tissue-specific manner…Thus Mechanical restructuring of the cell…tells the cell what to do”, which means that the cells programmed themselves according to how they were moved around by the ECM. This means that our cells are listening to our body’s movement through the fascia. These vibrations inform the cell on how to respond to it’s environment, as well as tell the cell’s how to grow. This is perhaps a simple explanation of the often repeated maxim, “motion is lotion”— motion not only improves cell health, but helps them understand and adapt to their environments more readily.
They do this via a protein that attaches the cell to the ECM called integrins. The integrins provide two functions, one, they literally attach the cell to the ECM. They also act as tiny ear drums, picking up the vibrations of the fascia and informing the nucleus of the cell. “It’s as if each cell in the body was plugged into the ECM so that it can also monitor the environment by listening to it” These mechanical vibrations are caught by the integrin and brought into the nucleus of the cell, where they inform gene activation.
So a vibration through the fluid of your ECM is heard by the integrin and transmitted to the nucleus of the cell. “The Integrins Tensional pull cascades through the cellular cytoskeleton through the nuclear envelope to the nucleus whereupon different genres will activate and express themselves in response to the changes in tension.” Which means that movement is not only critical for cell health, but also for the cells to adapt and express themselves to their current environment.
The Surrender of Generating Inner Flow
So if all we have to do is move more to feel better, why is it so challenging? Swami Rudrananda taught that most of our discomfort and tension is the result of inertia, our inability to keep moving on both an inner and outer level. In fact, he taught that movement was one of the most challenging and difficult qualities for a person to accept in life, as they require us to surrender inside and out. Our usual M.O. is to brace up, protect and crystallize when we encounter a challenge, not relax, surrender and keep moving… yet that is what we are taught at both a biological and spiritual level is best for us. As Swami Rudrananda teaches:
“While in threatening situations, all thoughts and ideas must be kept flowing so that the energy will present a solution. Usually the feeling within a man upon being threatened is to protect the image of himself. As a man develops, he attracts situations which are a test of his growth. Because the situations are a threat emotionally, he cannot stay open and perceive that which challenges him, and therefore he closes and rejects them. Inner work and surrender require a situation to be kept in a state of flow. Because the student does not close to the situation, new insights become apparent every day. It is through this change of pattern that man frees himself…There is usually inertia in a man that leads him to maintain his patterns, regardless of his discomfort and lack of harmony. Movement and change are the most difficult qualities for a person to accept as essential for life. Usually his whole purpose is to make a situation secure and free of change.” Rudi
So we see the pendulum of this analogy swing from one end of the spectrum to the other-- from seeing the purpose of movement for a predominately physical purpose in the case of martial arts, to movement as a metaphor for an energetic process in meditation. Let’s take this one step further in an attempt to bring these two levels together directly in our asana practice.
Zen master, poet and artist Paul Reps was a dear friend of Sri ShambhavAnanda and a frequent guest at the Eldorado Yoga Ashram in Colorado. He moved incredibly well all the way into his latest years of life, and although fascia had not yet been a keyword to associate with movement, we have found that his poems on movement are quite literally a page out of the fascial informed movement handbook, even down to the cellular level description. The poem he wrote, which would go on to become one his most famous, revolved around the phrase, “Smooth Motion Cures Commotion”— in it he tells us that smooth movement requires sustained focus, and it itself moves us away from our troubles, both physically, mentally, and spiritually.
Instead of reading this quote while sitting still, I want to use it as a bridge for your homework. To incorporate this philosophy and science into your teaching practice, we want you to apply it specifically to your empowered vinyasa, the final vinyasa in your class sequence.
As we know, our final vinyasa is a time to explore more intuitive movement because we have already done the sequence and postures anywhere from 2-4 times. The pathways are there, and we can expand our teaching to tap into this most subtle layer of smooth moving.
To explore this, we would like you to do your empowered vinyasa from a space of personal pracitce, just doing the vinyasa with all of your focus on feeling and experience-- and really trying to feel what comes through, where you want to move, how you want to move.
This should give you a way of interacting with your vinyasa from a more subtle level, and a theme may begin to shine through, not through the mind, but through your experience.
You will then take some notes on this experience, and let it inform your theme and cues for when you teach. To make this even more interesting, though, we're going to record you doing this, so that you can watch the recording on your own and practice cueing over it in a way that would allow your students to have an experience like you were having.
To ensure that this experience is deeply felt and experienced, I am going to read the Paul reps poem about movement as you do your vinyasa, to provide clear instruction and inspiration.
THE EXERCISE:
“Smooth, as if to some silent music. Slowly, evenly, in unbreaking motion. Feel, a motion about to move you. Can you move smooth? You can and do, using fine and finer nerve muscles. Can you open a door silently, can you walk without hurry worry? Can you turn around and then move surely yet softly?…Walk inside a room, inside your skin, inside nerve-muscles, moving only the nerve sheath slowly. Like walking on air. As you move continue experimenting with smooth self motion, spontaneously generating non-repetitive, fresh. Do not accept ANY stale second-hand motion imposed on you by another, or by you…If the world ship sinks, will save it? Yes you will, move smooth. We each has some special bind: neck stick, shoulders rigid, jaw set, knees stiff, feet bound, face ominous. Then we move against it, fighting ourself, looking old, souring juices, our blood flow blocks, creases appear signaling imprisonments. Learning we may unknown the world in us, our bones, sinew, ligaments respond. What could be easier than to move? Experiment, discover some best way to make a given motion with least effort-- no matter how long it takes. Simply to feel a congestion and keep feeling begins to release it. Our pills and potions and non-herb foods back up on us when we forget to move. Considerately moving, you are your own best friend. Unknot world in you….Smooth motion cures commotion…Not fast, not slow, invisibly evenly. As old garments falling away, nakedly innocently, is this how new humans are born?”