Reaching and Lifting

Many fitness articles focus on exercises exclusively, but this only goes so far. Instead, I want to talk about how exercises are performed and shed light on the concepts of reaching and lifting as they relate to grounding. 

All three are fundamental to posture, movement, and strength and help us understand movement more comprehensively. 

When reaching, lifting, and grounding are integrated, the whole body grows more connected, ultimately improving alignment, function, and athleticism. 

In order to define reaching and lifting, it might help to try these movements. For reaching, think in terms of sending a body part, like your head or your hand, away from your body, into a place in space. Can you fully extend into reaching through the end of your fingertips or the very top of your head? 

When you reach, is there a change in other parts of the body, or does the rest of the body stay unaffected? For many students, exploring reaching is literally a body-changing experience, as reaching gives the feeling of space in the body and provides a deeply satisfying stretch. 

is a little bit different because, unlike reaching, which emphasizes intention into space, lifting implies a change emphasized by the inner contents of the body, like lifting the rib cage off the pelvis or lifting the top of the neck up and backward to relieve tension in the thoracic or mid-back. 

Notice the difference. How does lifting change your alignment? Notice how lifting creates the feeling of space in your body. It can literally take the pressure off of body parts, like the pelvis and the shoulders, that feel compressed or as though they are carrying lots of weight,.

Now let’s couple lifting and reaching with grounding. Grounding, “plugging in” to your base of support, provides support for the body, from its bottom to its top. When grounding is integrated with reaching and lifting, you will discover increased whole-body connection that makes kettle-bell swings easier and safer, rock climbing more fluid, and the time at your desk less taxing.

To be clear, you can reach and lift without actively grounding yourself, but this can feel unsupported, especially over time. People often actively reach and lift; however, they will end up feeling groggy and uncommitted, or looking weak and disconnected. 

Next time you practice yoga, run in the park, or lift weights, notice when you are grounding and when you are lifting or reaching. Play with reaching through the crown of the head as you run or lifting your navel out of your pelvis when you dead lift. 

Pay attention to how it changes the power in your exercises. What a difference with such a small change!

Colleen Culley, certified Laban Movement Analyst and registered Somatic Movement Educator, teaches movement and fitness in New York City and upstate New York, including at Cornell University and the Children’s Aid Society. For more information, see Moveintogreatness.com.