Amazing Benefits Of Walking Backwards Everyday You Never Knew About (Heal Pain, Posture & Stress)

1. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee0:00

   Lawrence, you work with some of the best athletes on the planet. You're an amazing movement coach. You're so much more than that. But one thing you recommend to a lot of your athletes is backward walking. Why?

2. LLLawrence van Lingen0:15

   I think, um, there's a lot that goes on with backward walking. If I had to distill it out really simply, I think it's basically an antidote to modern life. I think it introduces an element of play into our movement. It's grounding. Um, it changes the timing of your walking. So I think we s- spend a lot of time in flexion, a lot of time sitting, and it's a really, really good way to sort of open up your posture and create length and space and kind of get the chair out of your posture. Um, but there, there's a lot to unpack in backward walking. It's just, it's something that you should just try and do and experience for yourself.

3. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee0:51

   What are some of the benefits that people can get if they start backward walking?

4. LLLawrence van Lingen0:57

   For a lot of people, it down regulates your nervous system, so it can be very calming, and, and that's, that's amazing in and, in and of itself to find a way that can kind of quickly ground you or calm you or, or change your autonomic nervous system. Um, and then the other one, it, it kind of decompresses your lower back and pelvis and creates space in your joints. When you're stepping back and you put your whole weight through your leg, you almost learn to trust the, the tensegrity, which is like a fascia word, the internal sort of structure of your body, and you learn to put your whole weight through your leg. Whereas a lot of time, people are, are kind of hurried and rushing and taking the next step, and there's a lot of tension in their movement. It really frees up tension from your walking and running.

5. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:36

   Yeah. It's really interesting. I think most people listening to us right now will have heard the benefits of walking more.

6. LLLawrence van Lingen1:43

   Yeah.

7. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:43

   Like, they-- You know, we all know, don't we, where... that we should be trying to walk more in society, and the modern world has made it harder or certainly more difficult for many people to get basic levels of low-intensity movement that we would have had for much of our evolution.

8. LLLawrence van Lingen2:01

   Yeah.

9. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:02

   But there's very few people who are talking about backward walking, right? Which is, which is super interesting for me. You've told me before that some of your athletes will actually do a bit of backward walking before they go to bed. It helps them switch off. It helps them calm down. And so there's this relationship, isn't there, between the way we move and our body's stress levels.

10. LLLawrence van Lingen2:25

    Yeah, totally.

11. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:26

    You know, can you talk a little bit about that?

12. LLLawrence van Lingen2:28

    Yeah. Um, I mean, this is something that I'm really immersing myself in at the moment, and, and it's... because it's so powerful when you get it right, and it makes such a big change, and it's this relationship between your parasympathetic nervous system and your sympathetic nervous system. So, you know, for, for clarification, I think most people are pretty familiar with these terms now, but your parasympathetic's rest and digest, and your sympathetic nervous system would be sort of like what we need to in an emergency state. So it's fight or flight or fawn or freeze. And I think a lot of people are overstimulated in the modern world, and so can tend to be a little bit wired or a little bit anxious and a little bit uptight, and, and we really do need to calm down and down regulate. And you're seeing this incredible interplay between your autonomic nervous systems and the way you move and the way you breathe, and, and if you get it right, it's so incredibly powerful. Um, and so we really do want to sort of learn how to down regulate the stress at the end of the day so that you sleep better, so that you wake up and your next day is better. But also in that moment, learning how to move with more ease, learning how to move in a more relaxed manner, learning how to move in a more grounded manner, then walking becomes rehabilitation. And so your forward walking gets so much better if you, if you walking and it's a creative act and you're thinking and you're thinking better on your feet. Whereas, you know, on, on another level, you could be anxious and, and angry and stomping along or tr- you know, rushing to get somewhere and having a sense of anxiety and time pressure. And, you know, those are not the same walking, and I think modern pe- modern life can pull you into a state where you're not really aware of, of... You're just in a ch- constant state of reacting. You're always late. You've got deadlines. You're always rushing somewhere. You're not immersing yourself in the wa- in the walking itself. You know, you're not extracting all the gold from walking that there could be. So I think that's kind of where I'm playing around with it at, at the moment, is trying to get people more centered, more embodied, more in themselves, and then you move better and you experience life better and, um, you make better choices, and people around you react far differently to when you're calm. So it's just life-changing.

13. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee4:42

    Yeah.

14. LLLawrence van Lingen4:42

    It's much more than movement.

15. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee4:44

    There's a couple of interesting themes there for me, Lawrence. Okay. Um, firstly, this idea that many people these days are chronically stressed.

16. LLLawrence van Lingen4:54

    Yeah.

17. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee4:54

    Okay? So they're chronically in the sympathetic part of their nervous system, which is the-

18. LLLawrence van Lingen5:00

    Yeah

19. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee5:00

    ... fight or flight part-

20. LLLawrence van Lingen5:01

    Yeah

21. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee5:01

    ... as opposed to the parasympathetic, that relaxation part.

22. LLLawrence van Lingen5:04

    Yeah.

23. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee5:04

    Okay. I think many, stroke, most people listening would go, "Yeah, yeah, I, I kind of get that."

24. LLLawrence van Lingen5:10

    Yeah.

25. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee5:10

    Okay. "I'm too busy. I'm too stressed. I'm looking for practices that help me de-stress." And what's interesting for me is I think a lot of people, when they think of, you know, winding down their nervous system and switching off, a lot of the time they're thinking about doing less things or maybe practices like meditation or journaling, right? And again-

26. LLLawrence van Lingen5:38

    Mm

27. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee5:38

    ... nothing wrong with those things, right?

28. LLLawrence van Lingen5:40

    Yeah.

29. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee5:40

    But you're talking about a particular movement practice, backward walking, as a way to down regulate.

30. LLLawrence van Lingen5:48

    Yeah.

Episode duration: 2:07:13