Tensegrity - the key to understanding the cause(s) of personally-generated joint and muscle pain and how to relieve it.

 

 

Our common practice in western medicine is to reduce the body into parts … and treat them … in isolation. This form of reductionism is often simplistic. The tensegrity structural design principle recognizes that stability and ease of movement … are determined by the way the entire system is configured.            Kelly Clancy

 

The term ‘tensegrity’ was coined by Buckminster Fuller in the 1960s as a word meaning ‘tensional integrity’.

Tensegrity (or in the case of the human body, ‘biotensegrity’) is a combination of the words ‘tension’ and ‘integrity’, that defines a structural principle in architecture. It's a principle that lends itself to illustrating how fascia, ligaments, tendons, muscles and other internal structures work together to make sure the skeleton stays in good alignment.

 A weakness, tightness or injury in one part of the body may cause the entire structure to shift, in an effort to restore tensegral balance. It explains why the cause of joint and muscle pain is most often not at the site of the pain. It explains why rubbing, crunching, heating and vibrating the spot where it hurts is frequently not the most effective and lasting treatment.

The biomechanical tensegrity model has been well outlined by Thomas Myers*. He explains what happens when the tensional integrity of the muscles, ligaments, tendons and fascia attached to the skeleton is disrupted. The skeleton loses its tensegrity. Sooner or later, pain will be experienced in one or more joints or muscles

The pain is the body's way of telling you your skeleton is out of alignment and that it's time you started doing the flexibility exercises that will get it back into alignment.

A pelvis in alignment stays in alignment unless acted upon by a force.

The pelvis is the largest bony complex in the human body. It’s the ‘foundation’ of what goes on both above it and below it.

The tensegrity of the pelvis depends on the equilibrium created by the muscles, tendons, ligaments and fascia that are attached to it and hold it in place.   Disrupt the tension and the pelvis moves out of alignment. When that happens the structural integrity of the skeleton is disturbed, which explains why the cause of the pain is rarely at the site of the pain – as illustrated by the red arrow pointing to the red spot in the second image opposite.   The tensegrity of the system depends on the balance of the soft-tissues of the fascia, ligaments, tendons and muscles.   If the tensegrity is balanced, the body stays in alignment.   Disruption of this tensegrity system is the source of joint degeneration, the symptom of which is joint and muscle pain.

 

The body is designed to take (as a system) the strain that occurs when moving and lifting. The body distributes the strain; it does not localize the strain and as a result, local injuries soon become global strain patterns.

 

If muscles attached to the pelvis shorten, the continuous lines of tension in the body are disrupted. If muscles attached to the pelvis shorten, the continuous lines of tension in the body are disrupted.

 

The whole structure is compromised. It’s ‘potluck’ which joint will be the first to experience pain.

 

Because of their proximity to the pelvis, the most frequent misaligned joints are lower back, hips and knees.

 

It's a fair estimate that 80% of joint and muscle pain is personally generated; that's the bad news. The good news is that if joint and muscle pain has been personally generated, there's a fair chance it can be personally ungenerated by a regular and systematic flexibility and strength training program. John Miller