Blog 40 Xmas coming, holiday on the way

This week already the last lessons at Bayadère before the Xmas break. 2019 passed by like a whirlwind.

On January 6, lessons will start again, 2020 is impatiently waiting to make its entrance!

Monday evening I hurried tot Bayadère and came a bit too late. Lyda was giving a special lesson about stretching. Very interesting for a rusty person like me. Educational, because she explained to us the works of lengthening and contracting of the muscle fibers. And of course, after the information, she walked the talk. Not easy for me to perform the exercises she wanted us to do, because I came in late after a tough day at work, no chance to do my warming up. But heck, I gave it a try.

Passive stretching, active stretching, dynamic stretching, PNF stretching. Use Google and find out what it means. There are different opinions about what method of stretching is the best. The most practical solution to this riddle is to try and discover what method suits you best. 

In my opinion, it is not short muscles and connective tissues that make me tight; no, it is my nervous system. It's the muscle software that interdicts my muscles to slide out to their true full length. Muscle software is based on previous experiences like sitting all day or performing monotonous labor. I think my nervous system picked a fixed length for every one of my muscles in my lifetime and is thereby programmed to keep it that way. Whenever you reach too far compared to this self adapted standard, the stretch reflex kicks in and reins your muscles in. 

And things like fear and tension tighten the muscles up too, so they will resist lengthening. 

Lyda made us do a mixture of passive and active stretching. First passive, then bouncing, followed by passive. 

I want to deepen my knowledge of this stretching. One of the books I read right now is "Relax into stretch" by Pavel Tsatsouline, a Russian sportsman. He advocates PNF stretching: create flexibility through muscle tension.

I am astonished that in most of the ballet books that I've read, nothing is said about stretching. While so much flexibility is needed in doing the ballet exercises.

The Thursday lesson went on in a very relaxing atmosphere; we practiced jazz ballet and did joint mobility exercises. And after that a game, in two groups we pictured a few scenes of a fairy tale, the other group had then to guess which fairy tale we were depicting and vice versa.

During this vacation, I will not write a blog. It's time for some relaxation, visiting family, and reading books. I'll continue my daily exercises on flexibility and visit the gym to do my workouts. Oh, there is still so much that I want to know and to learn.

See you in January! Have a nice Holiday! My blessings to you!

I invite you to give a comment on my blog. Or to contact me at the e-mail address: bert.jonker@movetoballet.com if you have a particular question or issue you want to share with me.