So the first and foremost exercise for healing my shoulder is…resting. On my back. For as long as I can, as many times a day as I can. It’s an Egoscue exercise called Static Back and I’m beginning to see it as a metaphor for my life.
How often I’ve thought nothing would improve or heal unless I was doing something! And, hopefully, a lot of something! I’ve been thoroughly conditioned to that way of thinking and it’s driven me to accomplish a lot of things in my life, for sure.
But what about the flip side? I haven’t been very good at the “resting” part of the equation. And as I lay in static back, I have lots of time to reflect that pushing, pushing, and then pushing some more eventually results in imbalance, pain, injury, and dysfunction.
Sigh.
I’m finally ready to stop. To listen. To rest and release.