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Have Lifelong Wellbeing Newsletter |
April 2025 |
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Welcome to the 127th edition of the Have Lifelong Wellbeing monthly newsletter!
If you are a new reader, please know it's my life's passion to erase pain from the world and empower lives to age with strength, truth, wisdom, and joy. This newsletter is a cherished labor of love and I thank you for allowing me into your inbox each month. I'm humbled by your trust in me to provide content of value and I will continue to strive to that end.
- Eileen |
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This Month's LIVE MELT Class: Tone Your Arms & Legs
April 8th at 5 pm Eastern Recorded if you can't make it live
Join us for a new MELT Class each month! Purchase 5 classes and get a class FREE! Special discount for Academy and paid level Private Club members. |
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On-Demand Virtual Classes
For those with a challenging schedule ~ recorded classes to access 24/7, INCLUDING an effective four class series for Urinary Incontinence done on your feet and an Age Well With Strong Bones course! |
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APRIL EVENTS FOR HLW ACADEMY STUDENTS |
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Monthly Reward Event
April 1st at 12 pm Eastern
Special topic, guest speaker, training the first Tuesday of each month. April's was an Exercise Ball Workout for Core, a Specialty Class.
Student Choice Workout
April 1st at 11 am Eastern
The first Tuesday of each month is a unique workout created solely for submitted student request(s). Taught LIVE with Q&A.
Office Hours with Eileen
April 2nd at 12 pm Eastern
This month's teaching: Healthy Sitting - What it means and why it matters for lifelong wellbeing. ~15-20 minute teaching followed by Q&A on any pain, aging, nutrition, or health topic! |
| Click Here for Academy |
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This Month's Article |
Core Power |
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Before we begin this month’s NL, I want to thank the over 500 wonderful peeps who registered for the Unlock Your Core Power event in March. I was greatly inspired to write about the core this
month in response to the misunderstanding I see that abounds on this subject. |
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There are seemingly countless resources promising the best core workouts with unending titles such as, “27 Awesome Core Exercises for Athletes to Build Strength and Fight Back Pain” OR “20-Minute Core Workout" OR "The Best Core Exercises for Strength" ...and the list goes on and on and on and...
The million-dollar questions are:
Before we delve further into these questions, let’s define the core so we are not comparing apples to oranges. Then we will discuss why a strong core even matters if you don’t have a
desire to enter the Olympic Games.
Definition of Core
If we look at Miriam Webster and focus on the body, we see this definition:
"the muscles of the mid-region of the torso"
What about what we see written on mainstream websites? This is completely dependent on which website you land on as a resource, and there’s a LOT of them...
One site states: “Your core is a complex set of muscles extending well beyond your abdominals.
These interconnected muscles, stretching from the pelvis and diaphragm to the back and hips,
provide strength and stability to your upper and lower body. They include the pelvic floor muscles, traverse abdominals, erector spinae muscles, and obliques.”
Another states: “The core is a lot more than just the “six-pack.” In fact the core consists of muscles from your chest down to your upper thighs, in every direction all around your body. Meanwhile, the muscle that causes the six-pack look is just one muscle, called the Rectus Abdominis.”
Yet another states: “Your core muscles go beyond your abs. The tissues that wrap around your torso help stabilize your midsection while you run, jump, play with your kids, lift weights, and everything else…”
So, it seems most resources are clarifying that your core is not just your abs. Yay!!!
It’s listed as:
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Abs
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Trunk
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Low Back
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Pelvis
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Hips
I won’t list all the muscles that are included in these body areas. The critically important area they are missing is your ankles. Say what? Yes, I wrote your ankles.
Your core is actually from your nose to your toes since everything is connected to everything else. Your ankles impact the function of everything above so, technically, it’s truly from your toes up…and your body responds to your head movement so it’s truly from your nose down…
A strong core matters for life AND seeing yourself as a W-H-O-L-E body, not just a torso, is key to success. Why does this matter for you? The connection between a weak core and poor aging is profound. 1 in 4 adults report falling every year and 37% of those who fall report injury that requires medical treatment or restricted activity for at least a day.
A weak core is related to increased risk of falls which is the number one cause of death among adults ages 65 and older.1 I am not writing this to scare anyone. My goal is to empower you with the solution to this life-threatening problem since what's taught mainstream may NOT be the best answer for you.
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Let's look at what online experts actually recommend to do for a core workout. After a fairly deep dive into a LOT of sites the recommended exercises are observed to follow a particular
pattern.
If you’ve been following my content for any amount of time, you may be able to see what concerns me with this list fairly quickly. If not, let me explain.
Most of the workouts are done:
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lying down on your back and/or stomach
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movement is mostly done in only one plane of motion
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a lot of sites recommend the plank/side plank which is taught static (no movement)
Why does this matter? I’m so glad you asked!
Authentic Training for REAL Human Function
If you’ve been following my content for any amount of time you’ve likely read or heard about
authentic human movement. You may or may not be aware of the fact that so many exercises are performed in a way that your body isn’t really designed to perform. Let me explain with a
very well-known leg exercise.
Your quads are REALLY good at controlling your body weight as you lower yourself down a step (or a curb or off a stepstool). This means they are ideally designed to get longer as your knee
bends and increase in tension as that happens, controlling the movement and the weight of your body.
So I want you to tell me why we sit in a machine and straighten our knees against resistance in a
gym? This is shown clinically to create a lot of shear force in the structures of the knee and potentially cause injury over time. Hmm… |
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So, what is authentic human movement? It’s REAL-LIFE movement that we perform while
housecleaning, gardening, walking, hiking, running, lifting, pulling, pushing, swinging, throwing, squatting, dancing, biking, and playing pickle ball, tennis, baseball, or golf.
In case you’re thinking you would want to strengthen your quads as shown above if you need to kick a ball better; please understand this. You actually ‘load’ your leg to kick forward by
swinging it backward first. You then ‘unload’ the power created in the backswing to kick the ball
with power and force when your leg swings forward.
Your core works in pretty much the same way. You ‘load’ your core in a myriad of ways throughout the day as you live your life. That ‘loading’ is what provides you with strength and
power for real life.
To bring the authentic concept into core training, do you do much throughout your day that requires you to hang out on the floor and lift your head and shoulders off the floor?
The majority of the exercises taught for the abs or the core are done lying down; yet we don’t spend our days lying down, do we?! I’m thinking you agree with me when I state we need our core
to work when we’re upright swinging a pickle ball racket or lifting a heavy pan out of the oven or
dancing with a grandchild or…
None of those activities of real life are performed lying down.
There are a plethora of resources showing how to do crunches. Yes, sit ups are still recommended by some; yet even mainstream is now teaching that sit ups risk back injury and there are better ways to train. Ergo: crunches are highly recommended as part of a core
strengthening program.
Are crunches R-E-A-L-L-Y authentic? And do they load your core before unloading? |
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I think we’ve already established lying down doing exercises isn’t the best way to train for real life. Let’s move on to what ‘loading’ means.
Eccentric Core Loading
Loading a muscle is asking it to get longer under tension and control the movement that was
initiated. Try holding a glass in your hand with your elbow bent. Now slowly straighten your elbow and control how slowly you lower the glass. That is ‘loading’ your biceps as it’s getting
longer under tension and controlling the movement you initiated.
If you’re using a hand weight you are loading the biceps to lower the weight and ‘unloading’ it
bringing the weight back up as the elbow bends. Loading the muscle first creates power more efficiently in the muscle to be unloaded to lift the weight.
Now, back to crunches…
Since crunches don’t really ‘load’ your muscles by getting them longer first and then unload the
power created from the tension of getting longer, they’re NOT really ideal. A crunch asks the front of your body to get shorter against gravity from a neutral position. There's no getting longer first. They also tend to aggravate a lot of people’s necks. If your core isn’t able to shorten against gravity to lift your body up you will very likely yank on your neck and strain yourself.
I also want to bring you back to the thought of authentic human function. When do we need to do
that movement for any reason during daily life? Getting off the floor or out of bed requires us to rotate first...
What we really need to be able to do is stand up straight and tall and reach our arms overhead to
get something off a high shelf or change a light bulb in the ceiling. THAT movement requires the
front of your body to ‘load’ as you bend back slightly and lift up your arms. That loading is what
keeps you from falling backward while you complete your task.
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Try this. Stand and lift one arm straight up toward the ceiling while your other hand is resting on your trunk just below your chest. As you lean back slightly, you’ll, hopefully, feel your core engage.
On the flip side, an inability to load in that movement is why so many lean forward when walking as they age. Core weakness forces them to lean forward so they don’t fall AND reaching up overhead puts them at increased risk of falling.
This translates to learning to ‘load’ your core in an upright position while you lengthen those muscles and control motion with strength and power. You can learn to do this while holding on at
first for safety until your muscles have strengthened enough to keep you safe.
This brings me to the next important thing to know when training your core. We don’t just lean
straight back in real life. Quite often we are turning when we lean. Perhaps to see what’s behind us as we’re reaching up? That could happen.
Movement in 3 Planes
The reason we don't look like robots when we move is because we use three planes of motion with pretty much every move we make. Unless we're in a dance contest and we specialize in 'The Robot'.
The golf swing is a perfect example of the need to move in all 3 planes of motion at the same time. You bend backward, rotate, and side bend during the back swing to load the muscles, preparing to swing the club forward to hit the ball. You are 'loading' the muscles to prepare for power in your swing. Core power. |
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The same goes for swinging a tennis racket, pickle ball racket, or baseball bat. Even pitching a ball or throwing a frisbee requires loading first in all 3 planes of motion to load before unloading.
Shouldn’t we train in all 3 planes of motion?
We’ll finish this topic in May’s newsletter with the following:
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The Core LOVES to train in 3 planes of motion
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Everything is Connected to Core Function, Even Incontinence
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Hidden Core Saboteurs
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Next month: Core Power Part 2
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References:
1. https://www.cdc.gov/falls/data-research/index.html |
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Would you like to locate the core issue(s) of your pain, balance deficits, or weaknesses and learn how to address them with powerful (safe) self-care methods so you can move without pain and age without decline? You can work with Eileen one-on-one! Just ask a question or schedule a consultation via Zoom by clicking the button below.
You CAN resolve pain and age independently by training authentically and nourishing well. |
| Click Here to Learn More |
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Recipe of the Month: French Toast
With Easter fast approaching, a special breakfast is often much appreciated on that day.
Top with your favorite maple syrup or fruit jam or simply frozen berries thawed overnight
and blended with some agave nectar. This one is modified from Dr. McDougall’s vast
recipe resource. I suggest chick pea flour as it’s a wonderful ‘egg’ replacer. If you don’t
have this, but have some flax on hand, you can always make a ‘flax egg’. See below. I
also always increase the spices; often doubling the recipe amount. That’s your personal
choice. Enjoy!
Adapted from Dr. McDougall
Serves: 4-6
Mix all ingredients together (except the bread) with a whisk. Preheat a non-stick skillet to medium-high. Quickly dip bread into mixture and place on skillet for about 3 minutes each side.
Repeat with remaining bread until mixture runs out. If you do not use all of the mixture,
you can easily refrigerate and use another day. It will keep for about 5 days in the
fridge.
Flax Egg: mix 1 Tbsp. flaxseed meal with 2 ½ Tbsp. water. Let rest for 5 minutes to
thicken. Use in place of 1 egg in recipes. This works well in many recipes, but not
perfectly in all recipes as it doesn’t bind and stiffen during baking exactly like an egg
does. In case you're not aware, baking is like chemistry... |
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Want peace & joy instead of fear & stress? |
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