Original Body Exercises: 2009

Sunday, June 21, 2009

14 - 256 variations of the bending upper-body

Original Body Exercises are meant to train your body in many different ways. Several of these exercises are not widely known and give practice to muscles that you commonly don't use. Practice these and other exercises for some time daily to increase the flexibility and strength of your body and for better health and ability. These exercises are excellent preparation for dance and martial arts.

Do as many reps as you feel comfortable with. Then after some time repeat, relax, and repeat again.

To prevent injuries never overdo any of these exercises.

In this exercise we bend the upper-body as far as possible in different directions, in a standing position. Practice the body bending in 8 different directions, to the sides, forward and backward and diagonally. Combined with different foot and leg positions this amounts to 256 variations.

a. Fig's 1 and 2 show foot positions, feet close or farther apart.

b. Fig 3 shows the legs with bent knees. Practice all these exercises with your legs straight or bent in the knees.

c. Fig's 4 and 5 show two of eight feet positions. Your feet stand next to each other, one foot back and one foot in front, and one foot in a diagonal position in relation to the other.

d. Fig's 6 and 7 show two of the eight possible bending positions.

Feet closer or farther apart - 2

Legs bent in the knees or not - 2

Feet positions in relation to each other - 8

Bending in 8 directions.

2 x 2 x 8 x 8 = 256. Exercise all of these variations in several reps.

Wednesday, June 17, 2009

13 - Relaxing and stretching in unusual body positions

Do as many reps as you feel comfortable with. Then after some time repeat, relax, and repeat again.

To prevent injuries never overdo any of these exercises.

This exercise is to relax muscles in your body and also to stretch them. Take an unusual body position, either lying on the floor or sitting. Now relax all the muscles of your body. Check all the muscles, from top to toes and back again, to relax them and let them sink down as deeply as possibly, pulled by gravity. Keep this position for a few minutes.

a. In fig 1 is shown an example of an unusual lying position. The arms are crossed underneath the chest.

b. Fig 2 shows an unusual position of sitting on the floor. The right leg is stretched and resting on the left bent leg.

c. Think of other unusual position and practice these. You can also do this exercise while sitting on a chair and, for example, let your head hang between your knees.

These exercises are a perfect help for stretching your body without the danger of injuries. It enables you to discover tensions in different parts of your body and to release these tensions.

12 - Falling on your hands

Do as many reps as you feel comfortable with. Then after some time repeat, relax, and repeat again.

To prevent injuries never overdo any of these exercises.

These exercises are meant to learn falling into different directions, to the front, the sides and the back. There are many other techniques for falling and this one is not necessarily the one to be applied always. For example, in many situations you might want to roll your body and then stand up again. The advantage of this technique of falling however is that you land on your hands and you can rather quickly stand up again in one movement while your arms and legs act as springs.

Note that your knees and bottom or hips never touch the ground!

Main technique: While you fall go down through your knees, bend your knees so you assume a lower position. This aspect of the exercise is very important. You need to do this with the exact correct timing.

a. The beginning position is normal standing (not shown)

b. Figures 1 and 2 show the falling in forward direction. Before your knees touch the ground, push yourself up again to standing position.

c. Figures 3 and 4 show the falling to a side. Before your lower leg touches the ground, push yourself up again to standing position.

d. Figure 5 shows the lowest position of falling to the back. Before your bottom touches the ground, push yourself up again to standing position.

Repeat these exercises many times so they become a reflex and you will be able to perform in a real and unexpected fall.

11 - Stand-up variations with stool

Do as many reps as you feel comfortable with. Then after some time repeat, relax, and repeat again.

To prevent injuries never overdo any of these exercises.

These exercises are all variations on the normal stand-up in which you stand, go through your knees and stand up again. You do these variations with the help of a stool. The stool stands either in front of you, to your back, to your right or to your left. You make stand-ups either with your weight above the leg on the stool or above the leg on the floor.

Shown in the figures are only the down positions. In the exercises you need to make reps by standing up from these down positions.

a. Figures 1 and 2 show the down positions with the stool in front of you.

b. Figure 3 and 4 show the down positions with the stool at your back.

c. Figures 5 and 6 show the down positions with the stool at your left. Do the same exercise with the stool at your left side.

d. More variations: Do stand-ups with one leg on a stool standing in an angle of 45 degrees, to four different sides.

e. You can also do all of these exercises with a chair, which is higher than a stool.

f. Variation: Do all of these stand-ups with your body weight in the middle above your legs.

I regularly do training sessions together with friends who learned Shaolin fighting. It is their habit to do 3,000 stand-ups as a routine each day. Normal stand-ups give you good training, but the variations are even better as they give exercise to many different muscle groups in your legs.

10 - Leg-lift variations

Do as many reps as you feel comfortable with. Then after some time repeat, relax, and repeat again.

To prevent injuries never overdo any of these exercises.

This exercise is done lying on your back and lifting your legs in several variations. You can do this exercise with one leg at the time or with two legs together.

a. Figure 1 shows the first beginning position. Your legs are spread as wide as possible.

b. Figure 2 shows the second beginning position. Your legs make an angle of about 30 degrees.

c. Figure 3 shows the third beginning position. Your legs are together.

d. The figures 4/6 show the end positions for the beginning position in figure 3. You lift up your legs or one leg and do this in three different ways: Your foot normal, your foot turned inward as much as possible, foot turned as much as possible outward.

e. Do the same exercise for the other beginning positions. Make as many reps as you can, then rest, repeat reps, rest and then do the third series of reps.

Please tell me about your experiences or your ideas for other exercises or variations.

9 - Fast limb movements

Do as many reps as you feel comfortable with. Then after some time repeat, relax, and repeat again.

To prevent injuries never overdo any of these exercises.

The purpose of this movement is to loosen muscles in many parts of your body. Here are shown just three examples, but you can think out many more positions to work on different parts of your body. The principle is always the same: Put an arm or leg or foot or hand or any part of your body in a certain position and make fast movements back and forth over a small distance. Do this as quickly as possible. This is only possible when the muscles needed to make the movement are entirely relaxed. Make movements in all possible directions: Back and forth, to the sides, up and down, make small circles.

a. Stretch out one arm (or two arms together) and make fast but small movements up and down, to the right and to the left, diagonally, and in small circles (fig 1)

b. Rest with your hands on a table and lift up one leg so your underleg comes horizontally. Make the movements as described above, out from your knee (fig 2)

c. Rest your elbow on a stool, or do the exercise sitting and resting your elbow on a table. Make fast movements with your underarm in all directions (fig 3)

Now think out new exercises, for your head, your entire upper body. Assume many different positions. For example, you can make leg movements out from your hip, out from your knees, or out from your ankles. As you get more practice, try to increase the speed.

You will notice that it is much easier to move limbs or body parts in one direction than in another one.

8 - More sit-up variations

Do as many reps as you feel comfortable with. Then after some time repeat, relax, and repeat again.

To prevent injuries never overdo any of these exercises.

a. Lie on your back with two feet resting on a chair (fig 1)

b. VARIATION 1: Come up with your hips as high as you can. Keep repeating this until you are tired (fig 2)

c. VARIATION 2: Starting from position 1 lift up only your shoulders and make reps (fig 3)

d. VARIATION 3: Starting from position 1 come up with your entire upper body as far as you can (fig 4)

e. VARIATION 4: Starting from position 1 turn your upper body to a side while lifting up your hips as high as you can. Go back to position 1 and repeat. Also practice to the other side.

Each of these variations gives practice to different muscles in your abdomen, back and upper legs.

7 - Sit-up variation

Do as many reps as you feel comfortable with. Then after some time repeat, relax, and repeat again.

To prevent injuries never overdo any of these exercises.

a. Lie on your back with one foot resting on a chair (fig 1)

b. Come up with your upper body to almost sitting position (fig 2)

c. Repeat as many times as you can and then change legs

d. This exercise strengthens muscles that are more at the inside and sides of your abdomen

e. If this exercise is too difficult for you in the beginning, put your leg on a stool instead of on a chair or use your arms to swing yourself up.

f. Advanced: Keep your arms in the back of your neck

6 - Ligaments of Knees & Ankles

Do as many reps as you feel comfortable with. Then after some time repeat, relax, and repeat again.

To prevent injuries never overdo any of these exercises.

Circle knee from fig 1 to 2 and from 2 to 1

a. This exercise is to strengthen and make more flexible the ligaments and joints of your knees and ankles. Put your feet about two shoulder widths apart to the sides. Now bring your weight on one of your legs and push the knee of that leg as far out as you can (fig. 1)

b. Make circles with your knees as wide as possible, always having your weight on the knee that you are circling. Fig. 2 shows the position when your knee is brought inward. Circle in two different directions.

c. VARIATION 1: Circle with both knees simultaneously, in the same direction or each knee in an opposite direction.

d. VARIATION 2: Bring your feet closer together and circle in both directions with the knees together.

e. VARIATION 3: Bring one of your feet one step to the front and cricle that knee with your weight on your front foot.

5 - Lean back on knees

Original Body Exercises are meant to train your body in many different
ways. Several of these exercises are not widely known and give practice to muscles
that you commonly don't use. Practice these and other exercises for
some time daily to increase the flexibility and strength of your body and for better
health and ability. These exercises are excellent preparation for dance and martial
arts.

Do as many reps as you feel comfortable with. Then after some time repeat,
relax, and repeat again.

To prevent injuries never overdo any of these exercises.

a. Sit on your knees with your arms stretched as high up as possible (fig 1)

b. Lean back (fig 2) as far as you can.

c. Come back to position 1.

4 - Balance on wooden ball

Do as many reps as you feel comfortable with. Then after some time repeat, relax, and repeat again.

To prevent injuries never overdo any of these exercises.

1. To do this exercise you need a wooden ball. You may be able to use a ball made of another material, but the weight of the wooden ball is what makes this exercise possible. It isn't easy to get a wooden ball. I made several myself of oakwood with different diameters using a lathe on a woodblock composed of several layers glued together.

2. First stage of the exercise is to stand on the wooden ball. The larger the ball is, the easier the exercise.

3. Advanced stages: Walk on the ball. Stand on one leg on the ball. Do rope-jumping on the ball. I myself managed walking on the ball but some people around me advanced to the rope-jumping.

4. If you don't have a ball, you can use other objects to stand and balance on like a small stool or poles in the ground.

5. Be careful with this exercise. When the ball starts rolling you may fall. So.... don't overestimate your ability! If you fear to fall, support yourself by holding yourself with your hands, for example standing in a door post.

6. This exercise is great fun once you master it! Children love it. Exercise each day for five or ten minutes and you will improve. For some people, especially older ones, it may take months to learn it though.

7. To prevent the ball from rolling too easily make sure the ball is on a floor that isn't smooth, not a wooden floor but a thick carpet, for example.

3 - One-arm side glide-up

Original Body Exercises are meant to train your body in many different
ways. Several of these exercises are not widely known and give practice to muscles
that you commonly don't use. Practice these and other exercises for
some time daily to increase the flexibility and strength of your body and for better
health and ability. These exercises are excellent preparation for dance and martial
arts.

Do as many reps as you feel comfortable with. Then after some time repeat,
relax, and repeat again.

To prevent injuries never overdo any of these exercises.

This exercise is good for training your triceps.

1. Sit on the floor on your side and lean on one arm (fig 1), your other arm
resting on your legs, which are stretched out.

2. Glide your hand out to the side, with stretched arm, while still keeping
control over your position (fig 2) and then all the way to position 3.

3. Push yourself up again to position 1. Let your hand glide back over the
floor, closer to your body and keep your arm stretched at all times.

4. Keep moving back and forth between positions 1, 2 and 3.

5. If you cannot push yourself up from position 3, move back and forth
between positions 1 and 2.

2 - Knee balance on stool

Do as many reps as you feel comfortable with. Then after some time repeat, relax, and repeat again.

Never overdo any of these exercises to prevent injuries.

- Rest with one knee on a stool of about 1 foot high. Stick out your other leg and try to bring it in a horizontal position behind your back.

- Stick out to the front the arm at the side of the balancing knee. Try to bring it in horizontal position.

- Stick out your other arm to the back, also in horizontal position.

- Do the same on the other knee

- You can make the exercise easier by resting with the balancing knee on the floor.

- This exercise isn't easy but very good for balance!

1 - Rise to heaven

Do as many reps as you feel convenient with. Then after some time repeat, relax, and repeat again.

Never overdo any of these exercises to prevent injuries.

Sit on your knees, your arms stretched up as high as possible (1)

Stand up with your arms stretched upward (2)

Stand up straight with your arms stretched high (3)

Come down again to position 2 and then position 1 and repeat

Sunday, June 21, 2009

14 - 256 variations of the bending upper-body

Wednesday, June 17, 2009

13 - Relaxing and stretching in unusual body positions

12 - Falling on your hands

11 - Stand-up variations with stool

10 - Leg-lift variations

9 - Fast limb movements

8 - More sit-up variations

7 - Sit-up variation

6 - Ligaments of Knees & Ankles

5 - Lean back on knees

4 - Balance on wooden ball

3 - One-arm side glide-up

2 - Knee balance on stool

1 - Rise to heaven

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Sunday, June 21, 2009

Do some extra reading

Wednesday, June 17, 2009

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