- How it is given
- Face Down
- What it is used for
- Each Point in Use
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From Face Down
BESIDE THE SPINE — बिसाइड द स्पाइन
Place your first finger and middle finger so that they lie on both sides of the spinal column. Then, pressing those fingers with a little pressure downward and inward into the back, rub from the neck down to the L5 bone, and — without lifting the hand — then from L5 upward to the C7 bone.
| Patient's position | Prone, 1½ pillows under the chest Prone |
|---|---|
| Where the hands are placed | The first finger and middle finger on both sides of the spinal column, pressed with a little pressure downward and inward into the back |
| Duration and repetitions | Rub from the neck down to the L5 bone, and, without lifting the hand, from L5 upward to the C7 bone; the number written on the card governs |
| What it is for | Not separately stated at the point. Elsewhere the aim is given as stimulating the 31 pairs of spinal nerves that lie on both sides of the backbone |
The two fingers straddle the column, spread just enough that the beads run between them — nothing rides the beads, which is the whole difference between this point and the one before it. The pressure has two components and both are written: downward into the back, and inward toward the midline; and the hand does not lift at the turn, so the return drags the tissue the opposite way over ground already loaded.
Note the upper end, and note that it differs. On the spine returns to T1; Beside the spine to C7, one bead higher. Both are given as written.
What runs along and beside the spine, and why the therapy works it so heavily
The column.
Twenty-four movable bones — seven in the neck, twelve in the chest, five in the low back — then the sacrum, five bones fused into one triangular plate, and the tail bone. What the thumb rides is the row of backward spurs; the blocks that carry the weight, the cushions and the turning joints lie deeper and in front.
The thirty-one pairs of nerves. Along the whole cord, nerves leave in pairs, one left and one right, through small openings between the bones: thirty-one pairs — eight in the neck, twelve in the chest, five in the low back, five at the sacrum, one at the tail bone. Each is formed where two roots join, one carrying sensation in, one carrying orders out. Everything you feel and everything you move travels one of those thirty-one routes.
And every one divides at once. Within a finger's breadth of leaving the bone each nerve splits. The larger branch turns forward, becoming the nerves of the chest wall, belly wall and limbs. The smaller branch turns backward — and that is what this article is about: it supplies the deep muscles that hold the spine upright, the small joints between the beads, and a strip of skin either side of the midline. Work the gutter beside the spine and those backward branches are under your finger. They also carry pain from the back's own joints and muscles, which is why tenderness beside the spine is so common and so easily reproduced.
The lanes of muscle. Beside the beads runs a long column each side — three ropes inside a strong fibrous sheet — and beneath them short deep muscles running slantwise from one bead to another: the spine's own steadying system, packed with the tiny sense organs that report how much a muscle is stretched. The most densely reported-on piece of muscle in the body.
And the honest boundary. On the front face of the column runs the great chain of the alarm system and the nerves reaching the organs of the belly — the real fact behind "the spine influences the organs", and in the same breath the reason no hand on a back reaches that chain. What can be said honestly is that steady, firm, repeated pressure into this strip reliably reduces how much pain a person feels, locally and at sites away from the hand. A real effect at a real site, needing no claim that a bone was moved.
Also explained in
- 3 ARROWS Face Down
f On the spine, Beside the spine and Round arrow are all three to be given, we call it "3 arrows" as a shortcut.
- Introduction Face Down
Read the arrow family off a card by its glyph, and give Back arrow, H arrow, On the spine, Beside the spine, Round arrow, 3 arrows and Organ clearance, each with its own tool, path, direction and count.
- The arrow family — six ways of working one strip of back Face Down
Both heads point up A ring-topped stem with a downward arrowhead · On the spine · A short stem, a small open ring at the top, an arrowhead below pointing down ↕ ° ↕ · Beside the spine · A double-headed vertical arrow, a
- ROUND ARROW — राउंड एरो Face Down
What lies beneath is as under Beside the spine; the force is aimed into the angle between the bead and the muscle beside it.
- What this article hands to the next Face Down
Beside the spine — two fingers straddling, downward and inward, neck → L5 → C7, hand not lifted.
- The Oxygen-Hormonal treatment Water and Salt
I — (2) \°/ Back Arrow (1) ↑o↑ H Arrow (3) Organ clearance (5) On the spine, Round Arrow, Beside the spine II — (1) Liv° (1) Mu° III — (2) Ch.
- Palpating the pair, and the first visit The Two Kingdoms
Kneeling on the patient's left, the therapist rests three finger pads in the soft hollow beside the spine — Mu°; the same hollow on the patient's right is Liv°.
- The back pain chart The Navel Speaks First
Left Right Table 4 — The back pain chart, label by label Label on the chart Where the arrow lands What lies at that level Cervical pain Nape, base of the neck, midline The seven neck bones and the long muscles either
- Generation five — the simplest treatment Clearing the Ash
They leave the spinal cord, run in bundles beside the spine, and gather in knots of nerve tissue lying in front of the vertebrae — which is why the great abdominal knot is named the solar plexus, for the way its fibres r
- The Oxygen formula Water and Salt
Only (6) ←→ (6) \°/ (3) ↑o↑ (20) On the spine · Beside the spine · Round Arrow + (6) \°/ (3) ↑o↑ (6) ←→ Every step of this one carries its own stated reason, and the reasons read like a single argument about breathing.
- Finding Mu° and Liv° by feel The Navel Speaks First
In the middle of that gap, a little out from the ridge of muscle running down beside the spine, the wall gives way under the finger; it is noticeably softer than everywhere around it.
- The master list — every treatment point, by the position the patient is placed in The Shorthand
Code Full name / Hindi Where it is taught in this wiki Adr Adrenal Face Down Swt Sweat Face Down Back Arrow Back Arrow, or Blood supply to lungs Face Down H arrow — Face Down On the spine — Face Down Beside the spine — Face Down Round arrow —
- Every symbol, and how to say it in words The Shorthand
(Figure 14.2) Table 10 — The written symbols and their names (first plate) Symbol (described) Code Full name A small circle flanked by inward-leaning strokes — \ ° / Back Arrow Back Arrow, or Blood supply to lungs Two
- (6) L3,4,5 — the plainest landmark in the wiki The Low Back
The sweep crosses the long upright muscle columns beside the spine, the deep square muscle running from the last rib to the pelvic crest, and the broad fibrous sheet that wraps them — the commonest place a patient with a