The benefits of Walking Back to Health

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Everywhere, there is certainly movement on this expanse of trees and grass and temples. All ages–from 9 to 99–are here, practicing Tai-chi and Sword Arts, swinging their arms, rubbing their kidneys, rotating their waists, and hanging from low-hanging tree branches (to stretch their spines).

Amid all this, is one thing that produces me rub my sleepy eyes and look again: teams of women are walking backwards inside the lane. This: walking backwards, calmly and confidently.

This ancient exercise (yes! It becomes an exercise!) is among the treasures of Chinese health practice, addressing issues of balance, leg strength, back strength, and posture. It may seem simple, but the logic behind why it is just a good practice are profound. Once you a couple of:

1. As our bodies age, our fear of falling causes us to react wrongly. When babies fall backwards, they merely plump down to a sitting position, however this tendency disappears once we mature. Many falls wind up going backward because we arch our backs. Walking backwards rounds that portion of our back we arch, and encourages ‘forward’ muscle use.

2. Everything that is wrong regarding your posture originated from walking forward! Slumping, slouching, rounding, arching…those behaviors. Walking backwards reverses these habits.

3. From an energetics standpoint, walking backwards actually re-frames consciousness in our bodies. The simple explanation is always that our attention tends to favor top in our bodies for the exclusion of what is behind us. Chinese health and martial exercises both encourage ‘whole body’ awareness for ‘whole body’ health. Walking backwards results in a ‘sensor’ to integrate this area.

4. Walking backwards actually engages completely different sets of muscles. This will be relevant especially as our bodies age, because we lose flexibility and our range of motion often diminishes. Through the use of different muscles we exercise parts of the body which need attention.

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