After the heart for keeping us alive, the Soas is arguably the most important muscle in the body. It's functions are for maintaining good upright posture, allowing full range of mobility between the upper and lower body and keeping us functioning correctly as a healthy physical individual. Also referred to as the hip flexor, it is important in a number of ways but it's key function is to keep us walking upright and when called for - helps flex the thigh and raise the knee forward for running.
Arguably, the evolution of Homo Sapiens owes much to the correct functioning of this muscle and it's very survival, dependent on the necessary quick reaction times required for action in averting danger. In evolutionary terms, it's not that long since we've come down from the trees to roam the plains and there are still very real dangers in our cities. So, this valuable life saving, primal region of our body is still hard-wired to our central nervous system as a first-stage mechanism for fight or flight. Due to it's necessity for being ready to move at all times, it's finely attuned to the environment and warning signals that are picked up from our senses, central nervous system, processed by the brain and sent out to this muscle even before our conscious minds are aware there is a potential threat upon us.
It's been shown through research, where our instinctive reaction times are alert and primed up to a staggering 10 seconds ahead of our conscious minds. Our senses react, the body systems and muscles prepare themselves while our mostly oblivious conscious minds pick up the messages through other signals - like the prickly feeling when our hairs stand on end, the gut feeling of unease or agitation as our blood supply switches away from the gut and cortisol is released from our adrenal gland into the blood stream or from the very fact that we've started running and unsure why that is we are doing it.
Stress Indicators
It appears the diagnosis and treatment for back pain has clearly been somewhere off the mark in many cases over the years. But through breakthrough research into chronic back pain by Dr Sarnos, there has been a lot of success with his treatment into undoing a lot of the problems associated with perpetual stress related symptoms. Key findings have indicted where a lot of stress related pain can be located around the lower back area. This has been shown through studies to be connected with the central nervous system and connected with repressed feelings of anger, anxiety and linked to sustained levels of stress, which in turn are linked and held in the Soas muscles and other related regions of the body - in particular, around the neck. The treatments for improving back problems are focused around directly treating the muscles with massage, pain and muscle relaxing drugs but also through evaluating environment and emotional health.
I believe yoga and meditation have a greater part to play in this rehabilitation therapy, but earlier acknowledgement of the potential stressors, understanding personality types and assessment of suitable environments for positive wellbeing should be considered as a preventative measure against all forms of stress related illness. If we consider that our environment, our moods, the people we surround ourselves with and work situations we put ourselves in are all the modern day equivalents of the Serengeti Plains - with dangers at every turn, either imagined or realised - then we can take preventative measures to stop the fight or flight response from being 'stuck on'.
Good muscle function should be a key factor in our continued quest for retaining peak levels of health. With more focus on the correct movement, agility, posture and balance of our muscles and less emphasis given to the size of say, a bicep, we could all have a better chance of staying pain-free.
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