The weakest point is the source of action – BKS Iyengar

Dealing with injuries, pain and specific functional issues in your body

I’ve often wondered about the beauty and timing of words and phrases in one’s life. If you are someone who reads and re-reads the same books, you might identify with this.

It’s the same phrase that gathers dust during your teen years; gets back into your head discreetly, almost like peripheral vision. You ignore it, yet again, as you turn into a toffee-nosed adult (whatever adulting means). You ask the phrase to go away, calling out its irrelevance and then it happens…You are ready – ready to accept it because of who you are and where you are on your life journey.

I slipped and fell at home, on one of my “sleepy and tired” days. Hurt my humerus bone. I had to wear a sling for 5-6 weeks. I couldn’t ask for worse timing from Mr Fate (not sure why he is masculine at this point, never mind 😉). I was working hard on building strength in my upper body and was starting to feel really chuffed about where I had reached.

Sad and might I say, a bit temperamental, I continued with my personal yoga practice, with my sling on. An over-excited, eight-year-old boy watched me practice yoga with my sling and began to hum a jingle “Broken Shoulder Yoga!” The boy was convinced that I should be on YouTube.

And then one day, as I was marinating in one of my poses, it all came back – The weakest point IS the source of action! 

Now for simplicity purposes, let’s consider BKS Iyengar’s quote as-is. I assume you will face an injury, pain, sprain, accident at some or the other point in your life (yes, all ye who read my blog are assumed to be earthly beings). During such phases of your life, you can deal with your fitness in two or more ways.

One, you can choose to pay attention to the part of your body that is the “weakest point” OR the “weakest point” could be the source of “action” for an entirely different part of your body.  Before I sound any further gibberish, let’s try and bring it home.

Scenario 1

You lie down and do a Scorpion Stretch or Salamba Kapotasana, wonder why you are unable to look like a decent pigeon. Your Surya Namaskars/Sun Salutations aren’t free flowing like the rest of the class. You blame it on gender or the breakfast you ate that morning and go back to your sport or rigidity. The last expert you meet tells you that you have tight hip flexors.

Showing flexibility in your approach to fitness (ahem! Now that’s a good start) you begin to work on specific exercises to release your hip flexors. This would be addressing the “weakest point” head on.

Scenario 2

You perform Warrior 1 (Virabhadrasana 1) you could receive the instruction on how your front leg needs to externally rotate. You perform Warrior 1 (Virabhadrasana 1) and notice your knees collapse inwards. (Well, that’s if I have your attention in the first place) Or your squats clearly reveal the inwardly collapsing knees.

This could be a reflection on how poorly your knees are holding up and you could set out to strengthen your knees with a bunch of exercises, as in the previous scenario. Or the big OR ….

…It could be that the weak knee is an indicator of some other “action” that is required within your body. In other words, the knee maybe the “weakest point” and therefore, is the “source” but the “action” maybe required somewhere else; maybe at your hips.

So, the next time you do Virabhadrasana 1, watch if both your hips (left and right) are equally aligned from the front end of your mat. Check if your quadriceps are engaged. If your core is not engaged enough while performing this asana, it in turn affects the equal alignment of your hips, which could result in an inwardly rotated knee.

As yoga teachers, we commonly observe mis-alignments, imbalances on either side of the body, that are imprinted, over and over, due to habits (poor posture, injuries, just for the heck of it– fitness regimes, fast instead of accurate exercising)

The wiser ones in the Yoga community start with meditation and centering, precisely because of this. It allows you to connect with your body, get steady and focused, so you know the root cause and you can recognize action/reaction/opposing forces and therefore address specific performance issues in your body.

This quote from BKS Iyengar could also change the way you define your fitness regimen.

If you are nursing an injury, it is probably an opportune time to work on other areas of your fitness. I am often surprised at how people give up on their health and allow further deterioration to occur, because of an injury.  I look at it as a golden opportunity to work on the other parts of your body. An injury doesn’t mean to give up. An injury means Mr Fate (my male character is back 😉) has now given you an opportunity to strengthen something else.

Have a rotator cuff injury? You can still run and/or strengthen your legs.

Have a torn ligament on your knee? You can still work on strengthening your core using your own body weight or even on upper arm strengthening.

I got more familiar with myself, my body structure and alignment issues, while on the sling. I also decided to make core while the sun shines. Improve my spinal flexion, build my core strength further through body weight exercises.

I still can’t get over the fact that a 6-week hiatus where I didn’t use my shoulder, caused my muscles to atrophy so much, that it took more than 6 weeks for it to get back. Imagine what happens to the parts of our body that don’t get exercised, on a daily basis – how much of “minute atrophy” are we facing over time?

If you need further inspiration, so you can stop moping over your injuries and/or pain, watch Pieter Du Preez, and I hope you can then get on with it.

The weakest point is the source of action. It is potentially like any other problem in your life, philosophically speaking 😊. The answer just might lie somewhere else.

P.S. This article is to goad the ones who are inconsistent and/or hurried in their fitness routines with little/no self-observation. The author does empathize with folks who have serious injuries/ailments, where she then recommends the development of the mind muscle through meditation 😊. She won’t let you go, will she?