Movement Anatomy for Freeing the Thoracic Cathedral

18 min. video accompaniment to "Architectural Home of our Hearts"

An amazing amount of freedom is waiting to be discovered right here in the bones, joints, and muscles that form the home of our hearts and lungs. Let’s find it together.

Our thoracic cathedrals are awe inspiring structures of vitality, love, and presence. How we think about them matters. With a little attention we can free them from their limiting self-concepts. We need to let them know they are not “cages”.

This regal structure—containing our heart and lungs—offers an astonishing amount of refined and critical movement to our alive embodied selves.

Let’s look at the actual movement capabilities and open our hearts and minds to a more accurate perception of this light and spacious cathedral.

Our thorax is designed to protect and to move. It is able to resist force, to yield to it, and rebound when necessary. The qualities and multiplicity of its bones and joints distributes forces globally through the whole structure absorbing shock while maintaining its supple integrity.

Your thoracic structure can differentiate its movements for increased subtlety and articulation; for example, breathing practices.

It can also unify and condense through itself to create more strength; for example, lifting or bearing weight.

The differences are dramatic and the effects in body and mind are profound.

Along with our organs, our thoracic cathedrals contain the radiance and light that emanates from our heart centers. Like a glorious cathedral perched high on a hill, the heart’s light shines through its shapes and forms.

The next video in this series will be a 50-minute gentle practice for finding and freeing these structures in our own bodies.

Following that we will explore the thoracic diaphragm in depth.