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Class 4 Theory

     Today our goal is to release the ribcage to realign the arms and neck. Let me begin by telling you that the ribcage is a phenomenally flexible structure. Most ribcages I work with, however, are rigid and immobile. Most people breathe as if they have not much space at all in which to store their breath. This need not be. Your ribcage is capable of great movement and the structural integrity of your physical body depends on it!

Bones of the Ribcage

Let's take a look at the bones of your ribcage. As you can see, the ribcage is really a 3 dimensional structure. The ribs attach at your spine and come all the way around to the front (most of them) and attach to your sternum. Now one might think by looking at this that the ribs are pretty rigid. This might be the case, except for the fact that the ribs stop being bone and become a more flexible cartilage about two inches before they attach to the sternum. Your ribs are capable of moving upwards, downwards, forwards, backwards.  They are highly mobile.

     The ribcage is one of the largest structures in the body and a great deal of musculature attaches to it. We spoke of the pelvis as being one of the great hubs of the body for muscular attachment, well the ribcage is the other great hub of the body. I can think of at least 13 muscles that attach to it off the top of my head. The ribcage and how it communicates with the pelvis is largely responsible for the whole structure of your body. Your ribcage also serves as the main platform on which your head and neck must rest. This is why it is so important for your ribcage to be open. It creates a wider base of support for you head and neck.

     The shoulder girdle sits on top of and is supported by the ribcage. It forms the base of the neck and is formed by the balance in the height of the clavicles (collar bones) and the scapulas (shoulder blades). The clavicles attach to the top of the sternum and then attach via ligaments to the scapulas. The two (clavicle and scapulas) form a girdle of surface area for the musculature of the neck and arms to attach to. In general they should be of about the same height on the body. People who have a collapsed ribcage, however will often find their clavicles displaced much lower than the scapulas. This is a similar idea to the pelvis tipping anteriorly (spilling the soup out the front of the bowl). Can you see why?

The humerus is a long bone that forms the upper arm. It attaches in a fossa (rounded out hole) on the scapula and then to a bone called  the ulna down at the elbow joint. It is held in place mainly by ligaments and musculature. Beyond tension in the musculature of the arm, the position in which the arms hang is highly dependent upon the structural positioning of the ribcage and shoulder girdle. Remember that they are the base of support upon which the arms must rest.

     To talk about the muscles of the rib cage can be an involved topic because so much attaches to the ribcage. Let's begin with the deepest muscles of the ribcage : those that attach in between the ribs or the intercostals. The intercostals  are the muscles that attach rib to rib (see picture). Every time you blow air out of your lungs, these muscles must contract to help you do it. When you take a full breath, these muscle must expand and stretch. If you seldom breathe fully, you can rest assured these muscles are chronically shortened and must be released.

     Remember down on the bottom of the 12^th rib, the Quadratus Lumborum attaches and goes down to attach to the back of the pelvis. When you need to get more air in your lungs, this muscle will contract to help your ribs spread apart even more by pulling the 12th rib downwards. Can you see why? A similar thing happens at the top of your rib cage where some of the muscles of you neck attach. Your scalenes, which attach deep within your neck on either side, contract at the at the top of a very full breath to help lift your first two ribs and allow more air to enter. These scalenes attach at the cervical spine (neck part)  and go down, underneath the clavicle (collar bone) to attach to the first and second ribs. So you can see already that breathing is a full body experience.

     Your diaphragm is an umbrella shaped muscle that lines the bottom of your ribs all the way around your body front to back. When this muscle contracts, air is sucked into your lungs much like a straw. Upon contraction, the muscle lowers itself into the abdominal cavity pushing your belly slightly outward and giving your internal abdominal organs much needed movement. As your diaphragm muscle relaxes, you find yourself exhaling as the muscle rises naturally back up into the ribcage. The diaphragm creates a sort of vacuum like suction between the contents of the abdomen and the contents of the rib cage. This rhythmic action of breathing is constantly changing the pressures within the abdominal cavity and rib cage and has a large effect on blood pressure and heart rate. As you breathe in expanding your rib cage, you'll notice your heart rate speed up. As you exhale, it slows down. There are muscles that attach to this diaphragm indirectly (via connective tissue) that operate your legs. We'll get into that when we study the core. I just want to show you now how your entire body is involved in your breathing.

     Your arms are attached to your ribcage through musculature directly and via the shoulder girdle. You may as well think of the scapulas as part of the arms. The only reason they exist is to provide more surface area for the muscles of the arms to attach to. Let's look at the scapula section of the arms first. The scapula is just draped in musculature. There are muscles that lie on the lateral border of the scapula, on top of the scapula and even underneath the scapula. Depending on where they attach on the humerus, most of them rotate the arm one way or the other and almost all of them assist in extending the arm backwards. Can you see why? On the medial side of the scapula (the side closest to the spine) are the Rhomboid muscles. These muscle attach the scapula to the spine. Underneath the scapula on the medial border attaches another muscle called the serratus anterior. This muscle goes underneath the scapula and attaches to the ribs. The Rhomboids and the Serratus are in a constant balancing act with eachother. The rhomboids want to pull the scapula towards the spine while the serratus wants to pull it away from the spine. Generally when there is dysfunction, the rhomboids lose. How can they compete with all that musculature trying to pull the scapula away from the spine? People may have pain in between their shoulder blades and assume their rhomboids are too tight, but usually that pain is coming from the rhomboids being overstretched. This is a great example of agonist versus antagonist in musculature. Two muscles that do opposite actions having to find a balance point. For one to shorten the other has to lengthen. Do you see? The trick is to release the muscles of the scapula that are pulling it away from the spine. The less pushing and pulling in the body, the better. When the rhomboids lose, the scapula can start to wing outwards and the shoulders start to round forward. Please take some time to look at the picture of the muscles of the scapula. Try to guess what each one would do to the arm if it contracted.

     On the front of the arms the musculature is slightly less complex. There is one muscle underneath the big pectoralis major called the pectoralis minor. This smaller muscle attaches to a bump of the scapula that sticks out from underneath the clavicle called the corocoid process. It has the effect of stabilizing the scapula to the front ribs. Above that is the big Pectoralis Major. This muscle attaches all along the ribs, sternum and clavicle. It then attaches on the arms in such a way that it flexes and rotates the arm inwards and forwards. Along the arm itself lies a relatively large muscle. You have the brachialis lying underneath the biceps. Both of these attach to the bones of the forearm and go all the way up to the scapula making them great flexors of the upper arm and the elbow joint. On the other side of the arm is a muscle that can extend both the upper arm backwards and straighten the elbow joint. It is called the triceps. The triceps have attachments on the forearm, humerus, and scapula. Capping all this is the deltoid at the top of the arm. This  muscle starts on the humerus and then spreads up to attach to the clavicle and the scapula. If you look at the fibers of this muscle you will see that it is very versatile. It can flex the arm forward, extend the arm backwards, raise the arm out to the side, rotate the arm inward, and rotate it outward. Take some time to study the anatomy picture I've given you so that you understand how these muscle work together. The picture is only a posterior view. This deltoid muscle comes around to the front as well attaching to the clavicle. Stare at them until you can see what actions they would perform on the bones if they were to shorten and contract.

     So as you can see, freeing up the ribcage is about freeing up the arms, neck and low back as much as it is about freeing up the actual ribs. We need to open the front of the rib cage, keep the arms from rotating forward and loosen the muscles of the head and neck. Now it is not so hard to unglue the connective tissue and lengthen all this musculature, but the ribcage is in movement every moment of your life as you breathe. It responds to the way you feel. We can release all these restrictions, but unless you make some changes in the way you use your ribcage, arms, back and neck, you will soon find your structure right back where you started.

     Have you every noticed how a person stands when they are depressed. Their head hangs forward creating excessive curves in their spine and their ribs are invariably collapsed in front. 

Why do they do this? 

     They do this because it would be virtually impossible to feel any sustained depression with a completely open, proud rib cage. Conversely, it is very difficult to feel energetic and happy with a collapsed ribcage. Try these two positions and see how they affect the way you think and feel.

     So if having an open lifted ribcage makes us feel happy and strong, why do we ever collapse it to begin with? This question has many possible answers, but there is one answer I would like us to look at. The world can often seem like a very harsh environment. A lot of us learn at a very young age that if we don't stay on our guard, someone might cause us pain or embarrassment, or shame, or guilt ; or we may hurt someone's feelings and make them mad, or we may mismanage our money and not have food, or the person we love most may betray us…. The list could go on forever. We are taught to be forever on the look out for these eventual disasters so that they don't hit us too deep. We become almost defensive and our body can often shut down because of it. We close off our heart to make ourselves less vulnerable. Maybe as we go about our life, we see someone who's heart is open, who has an open carefree ribcage. We see this person as different from anything we could ever be. We make excuses for that person. "Oh he had it easier. He has money . Or she has a better body than I do. She is more educated or has better social skills…." We make excuses because we believe that there is no way we could live that freely. Some of us don't even believe we deserve it. Perhaps we have hurt others and feel guilt. Or perhaps we were raised around others who agreed that we didn't deserve it. 

     Well I would like to tell you that it is your birthright to feel happy and free every day of your life. The only thing keeping you from it is the fact that you wont open up to it. You don't open up to it because then you would feel vulnerable and there would be a sting to that. But can you really go on living all closed off? What kind of life is that? How can you have anything to offer to others if you cannot give to yourself? If you cannot open up your heart to give and receive for the sake of your own happiness and unlimited joy, then I would like to suggest you do it for the sake of others. The world can be a dreary place. People look so neurotic and unhappy. Give them something brilliant to look at. Allow yourself to shine so brightly that they want to feel that way to! All you have to do to live this way is let go of your body and give in to the blissful happiness that already exists inside of you. You can have physical freedom. Just let go of your body and it is free! It is that simple. Cling to nothing and give yourself to feeling great. Stop focusing on your physical and emotional problems and give yourself to how you want to feel. Be vulnerable. Make vulnerability your best friend. I'll let you in on a little secret. You're really no safer with your muscles all knotted up and your chest collapsed. In fact, you are worse off! You cut yourself off from your freedom and you still have to deal with the ugly sides of life. Be free!

     Your ribcage forms a base of support for the structures that lie on top of it (head and neck and shoulders). When your rib cage is collapsed, it becomes a very narrow base of support and the head neck and shoulders fall forward off it. This is balanced out with a sway back (lumbar lordosis) in the low back. This places most of your weight on the backs of the heels of your feet causing gravity to feel very heavy. You lungs are like balloons that can fill the rib cage up. The amount of air you carry in your lungs actually determines the size of your ribcage and therefore it determines the size of the base of support for the head, neck and shoulders. Most people breathe shallowly on top of a collapsed rib cage. This means they take in very little air per breath and their rib cage is collapsed leaving the upper structures unsupported. Breath is life. Oxygen is free. How much life do you want? Breathe deeply. 

     The truth is, however, that as we are performing a task or are very concentrated, we will still breathe shallowly. This does not mean we must have a collapsed rib cage. If the air in the lungs determines the size of the rib cage, then fill your lungs with air and breathe shallowly on top of that. Maintain the integrity of your rib cage by controlling how much air you have in your lungs. Make it huge with air! It will be a vital factor in balancing out the rest of your body and allowing you to feel weightless within gravity.

     I would like for you to spend time this week learning about your holding patterns and what kind of structure it is going to take for you to feel the way you want to feel. Spend time first figuring out how you want to feel in life. Then close your eyes and stare at it with every inch of your being. Feel how you wish you could feel all the time. When you are really feeling it and the feeling is strong and coursing through your body, open your eyes and quickly look at what had to change in your physical structure to feel that way. Memorize the structure and recreate it to feel that way again any time you want. Try moving around with that new structure and performing various tasks from it. You will quickly begin to be able to control your emotional states through your physical body. Remember the word for taking a breath is inspiration and the word was not chosen randomly. When you feel inspired, your rib cage is in full glory! It opens on the front, back, and sides three dimensionally and the musculature has to let go. Live your life inspired! Let's begin the lab.