Slow Burn Paradoxes, Part 1.
If you’re walking around with uncomfortable shoulder and neck tightness, the last thing you’d likely want to do is work those muscles hard - but it’s exactly what you should do. Here’s why:
If you’re like most folks, your shoulder and neck muscles are painful because they’re doing too much contracting. Maybe your life stress is causing you to volitionally tighten your neck. Or perhaps you’ve got poor posture. Whatever the case, you’ve got achy, spasmy muscles - muscles that are constantly tight; contracted.
Muscular contraction requires energy (ATP) - not to mention a copious sprinkling of calcium ions. If we can exhaust a muscle’s store of energy (as well as stowe the release of calcium ions), muscular contraction becomes impossible to sustain. Therefore, the muscles relax.
And you get the relief (temporary as it may be) that you desire.
Over time, we seek to strengthen the muscles of the shoulder/neck complex, so that they’re better able to withstand the rigors of your everyday life (whether it involves chopping wood, lifting children, or holding your head up) as a long-term goal. Tension relief is an incidental (but not accidental) side effect of that long-term goal.
If you’re like most folks, your shoulder and neck muscles are painful because they’re doing too much contracting. Maybe your life stress is causing you to volitionally tighten your neck. Or perhaps you’ve got poor posture. Whatever the case, you’ve got achy, spasmy muscles - muscles that are constantly tight; contracted.
Muscular contraction requires energy (ATP) - not to mention a copious sprinkling of calcium ions. If we can exhaust a muscle’s store of energy (as well as stowe the release of calcium ions), muscular contraction becomes impossible to sustain. Therefore, the muscles relax.
And you get the relief (temporary as it may be) that you desire.
Over time, we seek to strengthen the muscles of the shoulder/neck complex, so that they’re better able to withstand the rigors of your everyday life (whether it involves chopping wood, lifting children, or holding your head up) as a long-term goal. Tension relief is an incidental (but not accidental) side effect of that long-term goal.
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