Saving my neck
I don’t want to end up like the giraffe in the picture: a crick-necked invalid with blotchy skin. As I grow older the blotchy skin is probably inevitable, but the crooked neck/back is avoidable I hope.
The trouble is that for a living I do a mixture of two things:
- Bent double over a laptop, twisting my fingers at unreasonable angles in order to reach a keyboard shortcut
- Bent double over a guitar, twisting my fingers at unreasonable angles in order to reach a wicked chord
Both these activities lead to my back muscles being tensed in an uncomfortable position, with little movement to get blood flowing to the muscles. As an added bonus, my finger muscles are also generally making the same kind of not particularly relaxed movements every day.
So what’s the antidote to all this physical self-abuse?
The idea I’m trying at the moment is juggling.
I’ve been able to juggle for a little over a year, and several of my friends are fanatical about it (working for little while in a backpackers hostel in Amsterdam is a surefire way to get people to help/force you to pick up the basics), but I hadn’t done very much since the first months when I first picked it up.
Recently, however, I realised that juggling is the antithesis of the activities that are determined to wreck my spine:
- Rather than crouching forward, to juggle you really need to stand quite upright; if you lean forward you end up throwing the balls forward, which eventually leads to either dropping them or running after them into traffic or something.
- More related to guitar playing this, but juggling requires very relaxed, fluid movements of the arms and shoulders. While fluidity is essential to playing rhythm guitar well, it’s impossible to avoid tensing up somewhat during the pacy irish reels we play – there simply isn’t enough time between beats to led your arm lollop along. So juggling should hopefully help counteract the stiffness I’ve been getting in my upper back.
- Despite the fact that you’re constantly grasping in the air to catch a ball, juggling requires you to relax your hand muscles too. Catching a ball when you juggle isn’t about holding it tightly; if anything, it’s closer to forming a cup shape for the ball to nestle into.
So, that’s the summary of why I think juggling might help. I’ll keep you posted on whether or not it is the miracle cure I’ve been looking for.
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Tags: back pain, fingers, juggling, programming, repetitive strain, stiff shoulders