In Nature, most birds learn to fly out of their nest within just a few weeks, some in as little as three weeks. They instinctively open their wings to fully flap the air as they dare to fly. It is natural and free to open your wings to fly, yet under daily stress the human nervous system will run an unconscious program of chronically pulling our wings back and in toward our sagging ribcage. This is the closed position for our wings when we want to be settled, to rest and self-nurture. The energetic memory of past emotional traumas are held tight in the tissue of the core of our wings, at the base of our neck between our shoulder blades. This area is like a V-hollow in which the inner somatic body shrinks and deflates at the top of the back of the ribcage…Any intuitive knowing of how to naturally open our heart and wings (ribcage and shoulder girdle) is normally covered up early in life these days. The dark side of the human mind is that it can be easily programmed to become addicted to comfort (the avoidance of discomfort). Our unconscious mind assimilates the dominant zombie social norms without questioning because the posture feels good. To sit still all day long in comfortable chairs (at work, in the car, at home, or at a restaurant) with a hollowness in our upper back ribcage and a narrowness in the shoulders is never considered or even consciously recognized since it feels safe and normal at a deeply primal part of our nervous system.

This V-hollow is reinforced by the worldwide standard model for proper posture for the shoulders:

• pulling the shoulders back
• flattening the shoulder blades on the back
• drawing the shoulders down away from the ears
• Focusing on broadening the front of the shoulders, while confidently lifting the chest​

One way to turn this V-hollow into a radiant mound and to open your wings for your heart to fly is the following Bowspring exercise: Flapping Wings

• In Earth pose with straight arms, turn Seed Hands down and point the knuckles toward the Earth.
• Turn the hollows of the elbows toward each other and towards the mid-line. Lift the outer elbows from the widening of the side ribs. Keep the Seeds Hands low as the navel.
• While maintaining a steady tonus in the Wings (from the hands into the shoulders),

Without bending the arms, and without pulling the arms back into the sockets, “flap your wings”. Rapidly pump or bounce the Seed Hands downward with a myofascial resistance that limits the flapping movement to just a couple of inches.

This flapping motion is made with a toned resistance in the arms. This rhythmic dynamic action helps create a more integrated fascial connection of the Wings into the ribcage on all sides. This increased fascial tonus of the Wings from flapping provides a stronger resistance, particularly in the V-hollow area of the upper back, against which the radiant heart can push out.

The Wings can be pulsed with the waves of the breath to generate more powerful integration and connection to the Heart. Also, when the Wings are pulsing or flapping with integration, then the ribcage can have its fullest expansion. On the contrary, when the hands or arms are disengaged and are in neutral default alignment, then the ribcage is limited in its capacity to expand. Furthermore, when there is a lack of conscious engagement in the myofascia of the Wings, then changes from the default alignment of the ribcage are unlikely.

The basic breath pulsation for the Wings is to exhale and extend from the center of the ribcage out through straight arms – wide and forward; then inhale and push out and down from the hands.

Wake up and feel the V-hollow in your upper back. Instead of staying in your comfort zone with your shoulders back and in, open your wings and shine your heart with inner freedom.