the importance of the neck

hi

the last time i was thinking about the importance of the neck in the body.

there are several guys who identified the neck as one of the major causes of health problemes, i think, especially in europe.

therapies like atlasprofilax (and thats only one of many, like atlas therapy after arlen, ... ) developed in europe which claim to adjust the atlas to the right position for the rest of your life. (i dont believe it, but who knows....)

hey there were also guys in usa who seem to be really familiar with chiropractic, but especially about this topic about the neck i found nothing as profound as kuklinski in germany.

kuklinski is a guy who claim that a lot of chronical diseases are caused by a traumatic event to the cervical spine. doesent matter what kind of accident somebody had (like falling from a horse, a batch to the head; every accident goes to the weakest part of the body, the neck) the effect is an instability of the neck, which leads to problemes you never would identifiy with the neck. (attention: i only tell you theories of kuklinski!)
the process he's explaining is really profound, i can't tell it all around (here are 2 german sources:
http://www.amazon.de/Schwachstelle-Genick-...4578&sr=8-1
http://www.amazon.de/Das-HWS-Trauma-Ursach...578&sr=8-2)

the main theory is, that an instability of the neck, maybe caused by a simple accident, creates many symptomes you never assumed that they are realeted to the neck. his therapy suggestions are mainly strenghening of the neck, correction of the spine (like dorn therapy, osteopathy, and stuff like that) and vitamine therapy (mitochondrial medicine) (a main part of his therapy is, that he claims, that neck instability causes the production of NO (nitric oxide) (...which is treatable with a program of supplements, where he have a rigorously plan.)

one of his main discoveries is, that vitamin b12 stop the production of NO, which is mainly caused by neck instability as he claims).
the plan of him is that you start one week with vit. b12, then one week minerals (trace elements and electrolytes like k, mg, zn, se, fe), then vitamines (b group, e, c, d, k), then omega 3 acids, then coenzym q10..... (the important part he claims is, that you take the vitamins in that order, because some of the vitamines need others to absorb themselves.)

whatever, i think stabilisation of the neck can also play an important role in taoist meditation or meditation at all. approximately the neck is one of parts of the body taoists speaking about the 3 gates. (mco and that stuff)

if you take supplements or not (kuklinskis's theory is really profound), doesnt matter, but stabilitstation of the neck may make a difference in your meditation practise, especially when you stay long time before a computer.... (also when you don't meditate :-)

i tried it out and it felt like opening up the nervous system. it seemed to be the missing part of the energetic integrity (maybe i discovered my weakness....), but since i did the exercises i'll present (btw...also exercises like the contraction of the pelvic floor, which creates an upward flow of chi through the spine got more naturally and freely), it seemed to open up my energetic system fully. so the neck seem to be a part of the body lot of people seem to have problemes with, so its worthwhile to look at it.

a really good start point you can make, is, to start stabilising your neck (also when you're doing neck mobility exerises like scott sonnon's ---- neck mobility is only possible with neck stability and strenght!!! and by the way, i find scott sonnons exercises maybe a little bit stressy for the neck, but thats only my opinion : http://www.chiropraktik.ch/Deutsch/Gym/GefHalswUeb.cfm
this website shows exercises which are maybe contraproductive to your neck)

good exercises to stabilise the neck are the following:

http://www.kiessecker.org/index.php/Nacken%C3%BCbungen

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pa9UO_pmQE8...feature=related

http://www.dorn-method.com/index_files/Sel...lfeUebungen.htm

http://images.google.de/imgres?imgurl=http...ficial%26sa%3DN


but there are lots of isometric (and others) exercises to find in the www.....another really important one is retraction (thats the movement when you make a double chin and go to the back...hold it for 5-10 secounds and then release......)

when you do that kind of exercises (mind my words: the neck is maybe the most instabile part of the body!) you will annul the process of creating NO and other chemical by-products which are created by an instabile neck.

another problem lots of people have is a contraction of the short muscles of the neck like showed here:
http://www.chiropraktik.ch/Deutsch/Themen/TdM_Apr98.cfm

in american websites a probleme which is also really often mentioned is the loss of the cervical curve, really interesting indeed.

lots of products are on the us-marked to remove a loss of cervical curve like that:

http://chiropracticmassagesuperstore.com/t...tion_device.htm

or cheap chinese products, which also relax the deep short neck muscles like:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewI...:EOIBSA:US:1123

or products like that:

http://www.posturepump.com/

http://www.neckandheadacherelief.com/conte...ache-relief.asp

like i said, maybe the neck is my main problematic part....but i dont seem to be an exeption....

there are even more products out there to maintain the cervical curve or strech the neck, but the most important part, in my opinion is, to stabilise the neck with exercises! (attention: loss of neck curve may also come from other parts of the spine....so muscular stabilisation of the abs and the back also can be benefitual (maybe pilates or something like that....) and contribute to the stabilistation of the neck....

i did good experiences with it, maybe you want to contribute something to that topic....

feel free to....

cheers

lao

what's wrong with nitric oxide? that is a vascularity enhancer, right? why would that be bad?

This post has been edited by joeblast: Jan 1 2008, 03:34 PM

IMO more important than the neck is the abdominal region. Tension in there and it affects the entire body, and not only that the energy balance of the internal organs.

That makes Chi Nei Tsang the most important Taoist health maintenance practice.

Good luck.

I've been dealing with neck and abdominal tightness for most of my adult life. Sports injuries in school and auto accidents haven't done my neck or back any good at all. General stress of being married with children and living the American dream got my belly screwed into a nice tight knot. My experience is that they're both important and getting them unblocked and loosened up are vital to relaxation. Used to see a chiropractor (US) about once a month years ago. I stopped playing tennis when it just simply wasn't fun anymore, and my back and neck immediately started to heal. Getting serious with yin yoga has opened up my shoulders which in turn helped my neck. Just recently got acquainted with Chi Nei Tsang through the Unwinding the Belly book, and it is paying nice dividends.

Later edit: Picked up one of the memory foam contoured pillows several years ago, big help for the neck,

This post has been edited by Eric23: Jan 2 2008, 05:25 AM

There are different types of Nitric Oxide. There's the type that relaxes arteries and increases blood flow and there's another type involved with the inflammatory process. I'm not a biochemist, but I was interested in this and did a bit of reading on it. I found out there were different types or processes of NO when I tried to understand some of the contradictions I was reading about. It's a very complicated subject. It seems when NO is present there is a bit of inflammation going on, so in some respects it's a bad thing.
I also think if you're taking substances to increase NO production, whether for sport performance, meditation, relaxation etc, it's important to take antioxidants too. At least until someone can explain all this better so it's understandable.
T

proper neck alignment and posture begins at the feet

its a really complex topic, i dont know that much about it, but some points what NO does:

the normal functions of NO in the body are for example: it lowers the blood pressure through vessel dilatation. --> relieves the heart

NO in the immune cells is part of the imune system and kills bacteriums and parasites and so on.

NO in nerve cells plays a role as neurotransmitter in the brain.

NO in mitochondria regulates the oxigen consumption in the cell.


when you have a continuous inflamation (which you have, if you believe kuklinski, when you have an instability of the neck) than there is too much NO in the body.

if you have permanently too much NO in the body the body doesnt produce new NO for the processes i described above, because the body think, there is still enough. for example the inflamation NO disables the production of NO for the vessels. in the worst case that can cause a cardiac infarction.
also NO leads to an increase of cholesterin, which contributes to the process...

too much NO creates Citrullin, which needs to break down, but as it is too much it connects with proteins especially in the joints....the rest you can imagine....

through another complicated chemical process it disturbs the metabolism of the thyroid.

and an important point in his therory is that too much NO leads to mitochondropathy, where the mitochondria are damaged or destroyed, so that the energy production cant take place.



and logical, the neck is not the only important part of the body....a strong back and abdomen contribute to a proper alignment of the neck and a good stucture in general as well, i said this.

i only mentioned that the neck maybe is the weakest part of the body, easy to harm also through relatively harmless accidents and for me it made a difference to strenghten the neck (and i also did strenghtening exercises for other body parts, like situps, pilates moves and so on before....)


iam wondering if somebody here tried out devices like i mentioned to restore a normal neck curve....does that make sense??

regards
lao

This post has been edited by laotse: Jan 2 2008, 06:56 AM

One useful neck exercise is to hold a wine cork between your teeth. Length ways.
It's sort of a jaw exercise, but it's all connected.
Start with a white wine cork and work up to red.
Best to do in shower, as you do drool.

whats the difference between a white and red wine cork? :-)

Red is longer, apparently!

i've never seen that, at least not in germany.... but, ok.
thank you

This post has been edited by laotse: Jan 3 2008, 11:34 AM

Yes, proper alignment is always important : Tongzi Gong

Intu-flow has some pretty good neck movements
for oiling and freeing.

In every system the neck is recognized in some way ... as a tricky area / a "gate" / a tendency for "psychic knot" / special relationship with sexual energy, lower center. Interesting topic.


I've been playing with the isometrics, and like them. I find that I can also do repetitions of the isometrics. That is, press on the hand/s for a count of 5, relax, then again for a count of 5. Three reps each of the four positions. I like it, feels good.

I think it's a really interesting point that Sonnon's approach works pretty much exclusively on neck mobility, and neglects strength. At the very least it seems that they should be balanced.

And that perhaps Sonnon's neck movements are too extreme for most people. I don't have enough experience to really have a grasp of this area... but it seems at least if someone has some latent neck instability that Sonnon's could push it over the edge, and that strengthening would be a good element to include with maybe some much more modest neck mobility work...

Curious if others have more to say about their experience...
(Where's a chiropractor tao-bum when you need one?)