Exerpted From
"Callanetics for Your Back"
by Callan Pinckney
Callanetics exercises are designed to teach you a technique that will make it possible for you to never again have to put pressure on your back. You will learn how to contract specific muscle areas while relaxing your back and your entire body. Most of the exercises actually stretch the spine at the same time they strengthen and stretch other muscles. Usually these are the muscles which can relieve the work load placed on the lower back. When muscles are weak or are pushed beyond their capabilities, they tire easily and are unable to do the work demanded of them. It is then that the muscles of your lower back begin to take over, resulting in stress to that area.
This can be remedied with the right kind of strengthening. For example: When the muscles surrounding and connected to the pelvis and the lower spine are equally developed, the lower back will be better protected. We all now know that we must strengthen the abdominal muscles to help relieve lower back discomfort. However, for me, that's just part of the picture. I believe all muscles from head to toe play a very important role in supporting the lower back, and for this reason my program includes exercises that strengthen all of them.
The expression "strengthen your back" has always presented a real problem for me because it seems as though I'm forever being told by doctors that my back muscles are extremely strong. I don't have to strengthen my back any more than it is already because doing my Callanetics exercises over the years has sufficiently strengthened the muscles of my back. In addition, the back gets strong from all the moving, bending, reaching, etc., of everyday life.
Your back is working long hours. It's overtaxed and over tensed. What it needs is not strengthening, but s-t-r-e-t-c-h-i-n-g. It needs to be more supple, more relaxed. I feel that the majority of other current exercise routines that supposedly " strengthen the back" actually put stress on the back.
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