Walking is Just Falling and Catching Yourself

Science proves that we have to fall to move forward.

Discover Magazine reports, "Each step we take is really a tiny fall, a mathematical model suggests. The random-looking variation in our footfalls is actually a series of corrections. Our strides are all screw-ups—but thanks to the fixes that happen without us knowing, our walking routines look like a perfect ten."

Scientists at Ohio State University's Movement lab put motion-capture markers on people's feet and pelvises, with cameras tracking them as they walked on treadmills at various speeds.

The results of the study show that our pelvis directs us, and then our feet catch up and place themselves where they need to be, so that we keep our balance. "With each stride, we start to fall, and 'we are constantly making little corrections to be stable,' Wang says".

The researchers wrote in their paper, "the pelvis 'knows' much more about the future foot position than the foot itself."  More than 80% of the side-to-side variation in foot placement could be predicted by movements in the pelvis beforehand.

It seems that scientists can demonstrate, in part, what the Hindus believe about our bodies having centers of energy. The first three are found within and just above the pelvis, and are basic to our lives. If we are out of balance here, the upper torso with its more evolved chakras, can topple along with the bottom.

Notice that the familiar symbol of the hexagram, or "star"-- at the level of the heart--  is between the body and the mind. This symbol actually is not representing an astral star at all, but is two super-imposed triangles symbolizing the heart's mediation between the upper and lower states of existence. One triangle points to the lower chakras, the other points to the higher, and is considered where the heart-mind makes its point of decision. Will I live for the lower three or the higher three? In her book, The Chakra Bible, Patricia Mercier interprets part of this symbol's function as "mentally, it governs passion, and spiritually it governs devotion."

While it is easy to think of the "higher" chakras as being of higher value because of their placement, the subtle fallacy of this idea is easier to see if we turn all of this on its side. If the human body's chakras were depicted horizontally, as along a tiger's spine, or depicted on a body in repose, then the concept of a hierarchy of superior and inferior states dissolves more easily. Understanding can be rooted as well as liberated.

"Sleeping Buddha" Photo image: arts.cultural-china.com

Dreaming can be the body's contemplation without the mind's interference

Western religion or psychoanalysis usually presents the opposite proposition when it comes to problems in our forward progression. They practice upon the precept that we have bodily symptoms and syndromes due to emotional and spiritual ills contracted during childhood. From this standpoint, the task is to get the conscious mind to recall these traumas, so that they cease to express themselves through the body. Eastern philosophy posits a different theory of affliction-- that many of our feelings of disease can be located in energy centers of the body that aren't actively engaged-- regardless of the reason behind the disengagement. The work of healing becomes more comprehensive, then. The body is called upon to help restore the mind, as often as the mind is called upon to restore the body.

Maslow's pyramid of self-actualization seems more similar to the diagram of the chakras, yet its graphic shape suggests upward progression toward a self that is more activated at the top, than at the bottom. Most of us have experienced a flow of these states, having a need for problem-solving, belonging, or creativity simultaneously with feeling hungry or cold. The process of intellectual and spiritual development happens because of and along with bodily development. Although we may recognize this abstractly, we often resist listening to our "Netherlands" as Roger Ebert liked to call them. We might think of them as cruder parts with impulsive urges that have to be brought under control by our more presentable, sociable, and spiritual upper or "better" half.

To use an example of experiencing creative engagement with the body, I'll relate an experience from my own past. During college, my drama teacher demonstrated that motivation from our characters needed to come from our guts-- he would put his fist on the area of his navel and show us how to walk, gesture, and talk as if each movement originated and was pushed or pulled from there-- rather than from our minds, our mouths, or even the chest. He had us do exercises of moving and delivering lines from our guts versus our heads, and it was exhilarating to see students act with more power and focus in our deliveries. Our entries upon the stage weren't tentative-- we owned it. That rooted state then created the connection with the audience, because our more energized presence commanded it.

Classical Philospher Loving Wisdom and maybe also the sound of his own discourse

That connection of our libido with the world is frightening and troubling as well as exhilarating, both to feel and to witness. We've tapped into power, and it always threatens to careen out of control. Western philosophy and religion is predicated on the idea that our bodies are a mass of libidinal impulses to be mastered, a cluster of symptoms from the id or the traumatized ego that require suppression, or an earthly burden to be shed as the soul is liberated. By contrast, Eastern philosophies teach that the body has its own wisdom, and where we go astray, as both mice and men, is with our minds.

Scurry on to Part 2 of Falling and Catching Yourself