While many people might concede that the quality of one’s posture can accurately reflect and influence their psycho-emotional state, the health benefits of posture are not given significant importance in the public view. After a century of the standard model of alignment dominating medicine, physical therapy, and modern postural yoga, the long-term health benefits of straight, upright posture have not been convincing. Therefore, the idea that good posture is critical for our health has lost support and value by the general public. Despite the standard model’s emphasis on lengthening the spine through straightening and on abdominal exercises to build core strength, back pain and joint degeneration, including hip and knee replacements, have become even more common. With insufficient evidence supporting long-term benefits of the standard model, it is not surprising that in the last few years, alignment systems, particularly in the yoga world, have become less popular. The postmodern idea that everyone’s body shape and size are different so universal principles of alignment cannot be widely applied has become increasingly accepted.

The trend of 21st century yoga has been strongly toward emphasizing relativism and personal uniqueness, thus moving away from universality. In turn, new yoga styles focus on the individual’s subjective experience of alignment, instead of on systems which can be applied universally to a broad scope of the society. The result has been fad-oriented styles such as, ‘beer yoga’, ‘dog yoga’, or ‘I-Yoga styles’ that differentiate themselves by their founder’s individual eclectic interpretation of modern standard model alignment yoga. Individuality has become increasingly valued within the yoga world culture, causing alignment-based methodologies to become less popular as they are seen to threaten a student’s personal liberty and individuality to move and align as they wish.

Many postmodern yoga teachers don’t believe in universal forms, think all alignments are good, and maintain that all styles and methodologies are equally worthy and beneficial. These teachers judge the Bowspring method as dogmatic since we clearly state that some alignments are more effective, therapeutic, and healthier than others. For instance, we take the view that an anterior tip of the pelvis is more effective than a tucked pelvis for jumping or running. Furthermore, the Bowspring method is based on a systems approach to alignment with specific steps for optimal functionality, and it is our view that if any steps are skipped or replaced with arbitrary ones, then the method doesn’t have the same level of efficacy. The systems approach of the Bowspring is based on the idea that universal principles of alignment can be applied to anybody to help all individuals actually be more free through greater health. However, this highly defined alignment formula for dynamic posture and functional movement can be misunderstood by postmoderns as a rigid system which limits the freedoms and the expressed creativity of the individual. On the contrary, applications of the Bowspring method can be endlessly creative and the individual presentation of the method can be uniquely different for every certified Bowspring teacher. The alignment algorithm of the Bowspring can be universally applied to a tremendous diversity of physical exercises and daily movements, including swimming, running, jumping, golfing, bowling, mountain biking, prenatal yoga, sitting at a desk, driving, and walking. Additionally, the therapeutic applications of the Bowspring method to alleviate chronic pain and to improve the healing speed of a wide variety of injuries is innumerable, allowing infinite opportunities for the individual to creatively share and contribute their gifts within their family and with society. Although the Bowspring method has a set formula for its postural template, unique creative application of the Bowspring method by all practitioners is highly encouraged.

Another criticism against the Bowspring method is that it restricts the individual’s freedom to move in any alignment that they desire since the system doesn’t include a full range of spinal movement. This is true as far as the core of the practice doesn’t include tucking of the tail, rounding the lower back, pulling the glutes down, or shortening the belly with standard abdominal exercises, all of which are part of the mainstream alignment paradigm. Yes, the Bowspring template falls within a relatively narrow range of proportion, shape, and movement along the full spectrum of flexion and extension, which best promotes uniform myofascial tonus on both front and back sides of the body. We take the premise that our default C-curved posture, which may feel relaxing and may provide short-term benefits, is not a sustainable or healthy alignment for the long-run. Therefore, we practice a specific dynamic alignment in the Bowspring method to counter the typical static C-curve posture of our modern lifestyle and to help individuals become healthier with long-term happiness through the course of their lives. So, instead of limiting individual creative expression, the disciplined practice of the Bowspring for a few minutes per day brings greater freedom.If students want to spend some of their exercise or recreation time purposefully rounding their backs in forward bends, doing a Yin yoga practice, or engaging in rolling exercises, all of which can have short-term therapeutic benefits, we are supportive of their individual free choices outside of the Bowspring practice. However, we are advocating for students to practice and incorporate a universal, dynamically balanced alignment during exercise and daily movements for only a few minutes a day. We do not expect students to stop all other alignments until they determine which alignment is most beneficial to their long-term health and happiness. Our Bowspring practice focus begins by repeating simple exercises a few times a day, for only a few minutes. In time and with regular practice, the Bowspring alignment can become more of the normal default position for the healthy, powerful daily posture of standing, sitting and walking. Yet, at first, beginning students will probably unconsciously default toward a C-curve posture during most of their day, including in their modern postural yoga practice and during their other exercise regimes. This is to be expected, and there is no judgment toward the student for this normal alignment.

The Bowspring method completely supports the practice of the natural full range of motion of all joints and parts of the body. In fact, the Bowspring method may include initial warm-up exercises or ending positions in which the spine is curved in a forward bend toward a rounded C-shape to accommodate the beginning student’s deep postural patterning, and to psychologically support their desire to feel safe in their comfort zone. Although rounded, relaxed forward bends – Yin poses – are not included on the Bowspring syllabi of poses or exercises, the C-Curve is natural and appropriate for times of relaxation and comforting. So, if a student feels that they need to round their back for self-comfort or to relax their nervous system at any time in their Bowspring practice, then we support their free choice. Nevertheless, our primary alignment practice is on creating a specifically defined double-S curve on the back of the body with uniform tonus of the myofascia on all sides of the body. We focus exclusively on this precise dynamic alignment because it optimizes any functional movement and gives us tremendous health and therapeutic benefits, not because we think that passive forward bends are wrong or bad, or because we want to reduce the student’s liberty to move in all possible ways.

The Bowspring method’s focus on a universal alignment template is not intended to limit the individual’s creative self-expression but instead is used to help any individual know which way to align their unique body in order to give them a more harmonious alignment for higher health. The intention of the universal template is not to force everyone into the exact same cookie-cutter alignment, but instead to provide a postural map so students can move toward a balanced dynamic alignment for optimal functional movement. Even with full application of the universal template, everyone’s particular alignment will still be unique, so their individuality will continue to be maintained and honored. The difference is that they will be healthier and have greater ability to move with graceful power and agility!

One of the main reasons that we focus on practicing the dynamic alignment template of the Bowspring exclusively, instead of including C-curve postures in our curriculum like in mainstream yoga, is that our unconscious default C-Curve posture is so deeply programmed it takes full focus to do the opposite alignment in the Bowspring. We don’t focus on stretching in ways to round the back since that is already the general direction and posture that we do most of the time throughout our day, especially when we are sitting. Since the Bowspring is an alignment that is opposite to, it requires being fully present and kinesthetically awake in our body while practicing.

Even a 15-minute practice to create a wavy spinal alignment, with uniform tone on all sides of the body while including specific breathing techniques, takes a lot of mindfulness and effort in the beginning. Most beginners cannot avoid defaulting into an alignment in which they unconsciously draw their glutes and tailbone down, flatten their spine, or hyperextend one or more of the joints in their extremities every few minutes. It is not that the Bowspring method is against practicing rounded C-curve shapes of posture or that we are wanting to restrict the movements of individual students. Instead the method is designed so that any level of student with all of their unique body-mind attributes can learn how to better balance their postural alignment for long-term health and vitality through practice of the universal template. It takes such great concentration, vulnerability and emotional fortitude to practice the double-S wavy curvature along the back of our body. The alignment template is challenging enough for us to practice for a few consecutive minutes at a time without confusing the nervous system by including contradictory alignments.

In today’s postmodern world, alignment systems with precise principles and orderly formulas are judged as restrictive to the creative freedom of the individual. However, with the Bowspring method, the freedom of the individual is also honored, encouraged, and heightened through adhering to effective biomechanical principles with unlimited athletic, therapeutic, and dynamic applications. The Bowspring integrates and balances individual creativity with universal natural order into its holistic system of alignment for everyone. A systems approach is naturally holistic because it includes all sides – both polar aspects of the individual and the universal. Health derives from harmony in the dance of Yin and Yang, divine feminine and divine masculine, individual liberty and the intrinsic cooperation within the collective. All individual freedom without any societal boundary, or state authority without personal rights are both destructive in their one-sided imbalance. The Bowspring method integrates both the individual willpower to creatively self-express with the longing to flow in harmony with the deep beauty of Nature through embodying universal principles of alignment. By moving toward increasing harmony with the universal template, the individual gains in both power and self-realization. Instead of the individual having their creative freedom curtailed by practicing the specific universal curvy alignment on all sides of the body in the Bowspring, the individual can go to a higher level of capacity to move with springy power and of radiant health.