Better With Bentley

Get More From Your Cat/Cow 🐈 🐄

The Cat/Cow is meant to move your spine through full flexion (rounding) and extension (arching). It looks easy, but if you get into the details the Cat/Cow can be a challenging and effective tool for spine health. Here are a few of my tips to get more from the movement:

1) Strong Base: your hands should be roughly under your shoulders, and knees roughly under your hips. A strong base allows us to focus specifically on moving the spine instead of tensing up the hips and shoulders to keep us stable

2) Fully Arch, Fully Round: if you notice the natural curve of the spine, the upper back rounds and the lower back arches. This natural curve is important for a few reasons, but for this movement we want the spine to fully move in both directions. The upper back will want to resist arching, and the lower back will want to resist rounding

3) Move Your Head: the neck and skull are part of the spine, and we need them to move too! This will feel strenuous at first if the neck isn’t used to moving, but there are a number of muscles running from the skull, across the neck, down the spine that we need to consider for spine health

You will always make time for the things you put first ☝🏻

Each person’s priorities are different - some will value their health, family, career, friends, finances, free time, education, or personal enjoyment above everything else.

We will spend time and energy making space in our lives for these things at the expense of these other components of life.

When we say we want to lose weight, save more 💰, read more, spend more time with family & friends - we are saying that these have not been a priority in our lives, at least recently.

And we may truly want more of these, but not enough to change the lives and priorities we currently have. I may want to lose more weight, but not enough to stop eating out and drinking 3-4 times a week. I may want to read more but I would rather watch my favourite show or sleep in an extra half hour.

If there is an aspect of your life that you truly want to change, it’s time to look at what you put first in your life.

Something about a sunny morning run that feels so good!

How are you making the most of the sun this long weekend?

Been working on my back bridge for a while - starting to finally extend through my upper back instead of all through my lower back! Pretty pumped on how good these are feeling (despite how they might look 😂)

I’ve practiced these on and off for 2 years now because (1) they look cool to me and (2) practicing this move has helped me open my hips, wrists, and shoulders a tremendous amount.

Fail To Grow

Going off of ‘s story that I shared yesterday, failure can be scary embarrassing, and messy. Failure can also open your eyes to something you couldn’t have dreamed of before.

Now, don’t be a total failure 🙃 do the things that set you up for future success, but plug a few risky ventures into the equation. Consider that muscle tissue grows when it fails to withstand the load and begins to tear.

This squat workout was different for me because it gave me incomplete rest (I have a tendency to rest too long 😝) 4 reps of squat, rest 90 seconds, and repeat for as many sets as possible until my legs give out.

My body learns how to organize itself under fatigue, my nervous system fires in a novel way, and my legs get f*ckin fried

Now time to rest up and get ready for the next beat down 🥊



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