Movement

Everything has a twist to it. Beans and climbing plants grow with a twist looking for something to hang onto. Water goes down the plug hole with a whirlpool or vortex. A mother in labour contracts her uterus with a twisting action to squeeze the baby out into this world. The baby emerges in a twisting motion. The fluids in your body also flow with a twisting motion. The craniosacral fluid from your brain flows down your spinal chord in a twisting motion. Your tendons that attach muscles to bones have a twist like a rope. Rope makers have always known that a twisted rope is stronger than the individual collection of strands. Network cables are twisted to cancel out resistance from the electromagnetic field. An electromagnetic field is created when electrons passe through a collection of wires. Some of the strongest muscles in your body, for instance the pectoral muscles, twist their fibres before anchoring to the top of your arm bones. Even your bones have a twist in them. If you look in detail at the neck of the femur you will see a twisted pattern to the layers of bone. Bones develop along lines of stress. A new born baby only needs one proper bony joint, between the base of the skull and the neck. The rest of the bones develop out of cartilage or membrane. Weather systems come over us a huge twisted pattern. They are called cyclonic or anti-cyclonic. In the Northern hemisphere a cyclone rotates counter - clockwise into an area of low pressure. It comes from the word Kuklos (circle) or Kukloma (wheel or coil of a snake). Some of the early symbols show a snake coiled around a stick. To some it is the wheel of life; to others, like in the Mosaic code, it is the curse of death. Deer cannot see above them. That is why when we go hill walking we see lots of deer but the stalkers don't see very many. If they started stalking from the top of the mountains they might see more deer. If you watch deer gathering into a herd in a large open space you will see them forming a spiral. Deer farmers know this so they build their corals to catch the deer in this way. Perhaps sheep farmers should try the same? 

As a boy I was determined to make water go down the plug hole the other way. We did not have central heating so the bath was a welcome soak when the frost decorated the window panes. I noticed as a little boy that water always went down the plug hole in an anti-clockwise manner. I used to stir the water to make it go the other way. It did it, just, but looked uncomfortable. Someone told me that I should try the same experiment in the Southern hemisphere. Perhaps you would let me know which way it goes? Could the same apply to plants?

The origin of this twisted action is DNA itself. DNA is the series of codes that pre-determined organic matter. It is built into proteins that look like doubled coiled helixes. Because your body is made up of DNA the movements in your body will follow the same patterns. 

How can this twisting motion help us? Yoga teachers know that to create strength you need to create opposite and equal forces. By consciously creating opposing rotations you create tremendous strength. Try this - place your hand on your lap, now lift your hand up until your arm is straight, uncomfortable is it not? Now lift your hand twisting it outwards as you lift it upwards. the palm should land up facing the ceiling like a dancer carrying their partner. You create a more graceful and easier movement on the shoulder. Now place your hand on your lap again. This time push the arm back behind your chair. Now push your arm back as if you were giving a waiter a tip or handing over a relay batten. Do you feel the difference? When you lift and create an outward twist you create strength. When you take your arm back with an inward twist you keep your shoulder secure.