Kim Vopni (00:01.277)
Hello Esther, thank you so much for joining me today. We were connected through a mutual acquaintance. I've known about your work for several years and just have never connected, but with the introduction that we had, it seemed like serendipity and here we are. I'm excited to learn more about you and your background, your method and all the things that you do passionately to help people who are experiencing pain in their bodies overcome that. So thank you for joining me. Can we start out by
you are, what brought you to the world of helping people in pain and helping people move their bodies better.
Esther Gokhale (00:39.214)
Well, as you know, we tend to develop our passions the hard way. I had really serious back problems. I was nine months pregnant with my first child and I had an L5S1 disc herniation.
Kim Vopni (00:44.337)
Yes.
Thank
Esther Gokhale (00:57.792)
Later, the radiographer looked at the x-ray and the MRI and said, whoa, that's the worst one I've seen all year. It was particularly badly herniated. And it expressed itself as sciatic pain shooting down my leg. It felt like an ice pick in my bum. And at first, there was some hope that maybe the parabi was sitting.
on a nerve and maybe it would resolve after delivering my baby but that's not what happened. It just got worse and worse and I went through all the conservative and the alternative methods that are out there for helping people with back pain which are, the research shows, not very effective and that was my experience. know, some things would help a little bit at the margins but not persist.
And I was just left with a horrible situation. know, being a first-time parent, you can't carry your own kid. I couldn't carry a cooking pot without feeling twinges down my leg. And the worst part, perhaps, was that I couldn't sleep. I didn't want to take pain meds because I was nursing my baby. And so I just...
Woke up every two hours with my back in extreme spasm and then had to kind of hobble around and walk around the block for a couple of times and then that would ease the spasms enough for me to be able to go back to sleep and repeat the cycle. So this is no way to live.
So you you try physical therapy and stretching and strengthening and then the alternative things chiropractic and acupuncture and me checking my head. You know second-guess yourself I was only 27 what's going on and yoga and all kinds of things and then finally surgery a laminectomy discectomy at L5S1 so they took away the extruded portion of the disc and I was given exercises which you can imagine I did.
Kim Vopni (02:45.81)
Mm-hmm.
Esther Gokhale (03:05.514)
religiously and the next year I had the same disc reherned and they're offering me another surgery so this is not looking good at all repeat back surgeries in your 20s destabilize any age destabilize the area then you're looking at fusion surgeries and the results are not as good and so I decided to cast an even wider net you know looking for something different
Kim Vopni (03:12.07)
Hmm.
Esther Gokhale (03:35.734)
And thanks to my upbringing in India, where my...
Dutch, Indophile mother would point things out around in people that she admired. So she admired all those fruit and vegetable vendors who were carrying enormous weights on their head. And these are not people with Popeye kind of muscles. These are pretty scrawny people and they do this all day and they don't have problems. And she would point that out. And she would point out the sweeper who could sit on her haunches and clean
entire house and no problems. in her generation people in Holland in a cold country don't sit on the floor very stiff usually and so she couldn't imagine sitting in on her haunches and stuff so she
pointed these things out, also folded me pretzel-like to make sure that I wouldn't suffer her fate. You know, totally well-meaning, but maybe it didn't quite fold me in opportune ways. But in any case, here I was in trouble remembering these things, and the things that resonated for me were things that point to how you're using your body, rather than...
Kim Vopni (04:29.873)
She also folded me pretzel-like to make sure that I wouldn't sound
Esther Gokhale (04:54.828)
you need another fix, need another adjustment, injection, whatever, something wrong with you, something missing. long story short, by studying some things out there that ask you to revisit the way you're doing everyday life with your body. So Feldenkrais and Alexander Technique and most of all Noel Perez aplomb.
and I got a lot of ideas and practices and slowly got considerably better. I never needed that second surgery.
And then I went about because I already had my own acupuncture practice. And most of the people who come to an acupuncture practice have some kind of ache or pain and very often it's back problems. So I had sort of my lab to experiment with, you know, what sort of things and in what sequence would help people. And so, and I was raising my child and then after I fixed my back problem, I dared to have
two more children. So I was raising a family and seeing my acupuncture patients on the side and kind of honing my method like what sequence, what metaphors, what exceptions and long story short it became a method that became extremely effective for me and then my students.
Initially my patience with word got out. was living on Stanford campus, so I seeing a lot of faculty, graduate students, undergraduates, and people in the community. And so little by little, I started to create a method, and it's grown from there. Whoa.
Kim Vopni (06:54.771)
It has grown significantly from there. So a few, if we could, you talked about Feldenkrais and Aplomb and Alexander, yes. So the Aplomb I've never heard of before, Alexander and Feldenkrais I have, but for those that aren't familiar with those practices, can you tell a little bit about what they are?
Esther Gokhale (07:04.014)
I'll accept it. Yes.
Esther Gokhale (07:15.464)
sure so feldenkrais has mostly to do with re-patterning your brain patterns because you're stuck in a kind of groove and you do things the same way and they're not necessarily serving you well so they do weird looking things you know like a repeat motion to re-pattern your brain
And Alexander technique started with Alexander who would lose his voice every time he went on stage. So it's very strong in the neck area, but it's instinctive. He sat in front of a mirror and noticed that he was doing little tensions that would then shut down his voice. And he trained himself out of that kinesthetically, but there isn't much verbiage around and there's not much intellectual.
what's happening and they don't so and then what I like to do is use every channel available like you see it you understand it and you feel it because if you only feel it that's a pretty slow way of learning and I think that's why Alexander techniques take students spend years in training two years minimum
to learn a new pattern and we teach our students in six lessons. That's the basic course, sometimes in a weekend and we get the kind of results that we've developed a reputation for.
The founder, Noelle Perez, is now dead. She was an early student of BKS Iyengar, from whom she learned a lot of useful things. He said to her, go walk behind the women in the Indian marketplace, and when your shadow looks like theirs, you will have learned something, which was actually an amazing guideline. And he developed, often out of his frustration with Western students. My mother was actually a student of his, so I know this firsthand.
Esther Gokhale (09:15.376)
and he would push and pull and he just shouted people, BKS, Iyengar is known to stand for bite, kick, shout. So he was really a guru who demanded unquestioning.
Kim Vopni (09:24.337)
Yeah.
Esther Gokhale (09:36.223)
following and Noel actually adopted that from him which is one reason you haven't heard about it because you know people don't like that kind of grand dame crossed with Indian guru harsh you know thinking that people have outsized egos and it's her duty to cut them down and I used to try to convince her that you know people actually have
Kim Vopni (09:49.107)
You
Esther Gokhale (10:00.702)
underdeveloped sense of self and need shoring up and so that kind of pedagogy is wasn't
part of that old school frame. But a lot of intuition and lot of techniques that came along. So anyway, I was lucky to have exposure to all these people and things they put together. And so what I did with my acupuncture patients, well first myself and my acupuncture patients and then my friends was slowly while I was raising three kids. So it's a very slow-cooked method.
And so, and then after 10 years of brewing this method in my head, I wrote my book, Eight Steps to a Pain-Free Back, and that spread it. Now I had a more international point, so it's been translated into 10 languages, and so now it's out there, and we have teachers all over the world who teach this method, and it's just shockingly effective, I have to say. Yeah.
Kim Vopni (11:01.063)
Mm-hmm.
Kim Vopni (11:07.955)
Mm hmm. Yeah, I love that story in the background and all really very different but all essentially rooted in movement and repatterning I guess is yeah. Yeah. Okay. What would you say would be when you say we can get stuck in ruts and they can maybe not be serving us. What are some of the common ruts that you see that contribute to well, let's start with back pain because that's the book that you wrote.
Esther Gokhale (11:20.942)
Totally.
Kim Vopni (11:37.767)
So what could be some of the grooves, the non-optimal grooves that people are in that could contribute?
Esther Gokhale (11:42.681)
So one of the common foundations for postural distortion is a tucked pelvis. So people are sometimes taught this, know, because they have a sway and because the person doesn't know how else to get rid of the sway, so they're taught tuck your pelvis.
And that's one way people get it, but people also get it through really badly designed furniture, beginning with infant furniture, know, baby car seats like this and umbrella strollers that tuck the pelvis. And so the human brain.
And these poor little kids is learning that this is what sitting means. And then we go to school and most kids these days are sitting in the C shape. So that tuck pelvis is at the root of a lot of problems. You know, in your field, pelvic floor issues because we're putting the wrong part of the pelvic floor.
Kim Vopni (12:35.549)
Mm-hmm.
Esther Gokhale (12:41.652)
under all our organs, pelvic organs, and especially when someone is pregnant or has twins, God forbid, with a tucked pelvis. It's a kind of an invitation for the insides to fall out. But in my field, it's like a badly positioned foundation for the rest of the building block stack. You know, the vertebrae that are the building blocks of your spinal stack don't get to stack effortlessly.
The only way to be upright is to tense all these erector spinae muscles in the back and then you don't get it right. It's too curvy, there's lots of pressure on various discs and so on. So this tucked pelvis is a big problem. It also puts the hip joint in an unnatural configuration and it just causes a cascade of health problems up the chain, down the chain.
common.
groove that people get stuck in and this was my groove is the correction for all of the slumping that happens from a tucked pelvis and that is the chest thrust out, the sit up straight, the arched back, the bending over backwards in effect, you know. And I think women are more subject to this than men because women more than men tend to be good little girls instead of bad little boys, you know, that's a
Kim Vopni (14:11.539)
You
Esther Gokhale (14:12.848)
a kind of trend in our modern culture. And it's also found its way into modeling culture and the sex industry, know, sticking out the tits and the ass. And even main, like...
Kim Vopni (14:25.491)
It's strange, you know, sticking out the tits and the ass.
Esther Gokhale (14:33.562)
mainstream culture things like women's gymnastics. Women's gymnastics has the chest stuck out and the hips thrust back. You remember Olga Korbut who won three gold medals in the 1976 Olympics.
Kim Vopni (14:42.248)
Thrust back.
Esther Gokhale (14:52.534)
And then within a year she'd had two back surgeries. And that's the part we don't hear about. You know? So I think women in men's gymnastics, they don't have to do this violent thrust of the chest after each routine that the women are all doing. So I think women do it more than men, but everybody gets the sit up straight, stand up straight message. And so that would be my number two rated.
bad postural habit and groove that we are stuck in in modern times. And then the other ones are kind of, let me see, which one would I rate number three? Maybe turned in legs, you know, women again, more subject to this.
Kim Vopni (15:24.573)
Mm-hmm.
Esther Gokhale (15:38.487)
because we're supposed to be dainty women and not, you know, and turn our knees in towards each other. And what that does is it makes it impossible for the pelvis to settle well because the legs are in the way. It makes it impossible to bend well because the legs are in the way. And so this turned in legs and that comes again from bad messaging like to be dainty and whatever. But also from poor seating again, infant.
Kim Vopni (16:04.941)
So from receiving an infant furniture.
Esther Gokhale (16:08.4)
furniture like the umbrella strollers, also adult furniture with mesh chairs, you know, that tend to turn the legs in. You know, that's just the nature of a cloth.
Kim Vopni (16:11.473)
adult furniture, nest chairs.
Esther Gokhale (16:21.75)
that you sit on, it's not gonna support you well. It's gonna roll your legs in and there comes a lot of bad habits and the things that are associated with these internally rotated legs are flat feet, bunions.
Kim Vopni (16:22.319)
sit down. It's not going to support you well. It's going to roll your legs in and out.
Esther Gokhale (16:39.234)
knock knees, any kind of knee problem including knee arthritis because the fit isn't right and it's also not right at the hips so arthritic hips can result. It's got a whole bunch of stuff and some of them obvious, some of them less obvious that go with. So there plenty more.
Kim Vopni (16:58.643)
Mm hmm. Yeah. When you if you think I mean tucked pelvis is something I talk about a lot and the sort of the optimal alignment diaphragm pelvic floor and also optimal loading through the joints. If you can cut so the points that you've just highlighted now, what is it about those grooves habits postures that creates pain or dysfunction in the system?
Esther Gokhale (17:26.862)
So when you've got a tucked pelvis, well, you know, we talked about the insides of you falling out, being invited to fall out. But also, if you relax, you're going to be slumping. And then it's the front part of every disc in your curve that is being squished, compressed. And discs have like 20 some layers of fibrous outer material, fibrous outer layers. And if you keep squishing them, they're supple.
to be shock absorbers, yeah? But if you keep using your shocks, then your shocks get worn down and those layers get eroded and then if you don't have enough layers to hold the contents, the shock absorbing middle in place, then it tends to...
press outwards and if you were hunching then it presses in the worst direction. Also if you round back bend and that habit often comes from slump sitting because the brain has gotten used to being convex, rounded. So we bend like that, it's so familiar. And when we are squishing with the whole weight of the upper body cantilevered out there in a bend and you're squishing the front and the contents are being pushed back.
you may be unlucky as I was and break through all of the fibrous outer layers and now you've got the inside out, know, herniated and pressing quite likely on some...
nerve root and that is agony. That is just horrible. you know, people think, let's bend it the other way and then maybe it'll go back in place. That's like hoping the toothpaste will go back into the tube, our little hole you made in the toothpaste. It's not going to go back that easily. And so that's one of the causes of pain is we've ruined our discs and the disc contents are pressing on nerves. Those are serious pains.
Kim Vopni (19:23.133)
Yeah.
Esther Gokhale (19:33.643)
Thanks.
Kim Vopni (19:34.023)
Yeah, yeah.
Esther Gokhale (19:36.077)
And the arching doesn't help either. You're not pushing things in the worst possible direction, but you're weakening those outer layers. So if you go back and forth between arching and then round back bending, you're weakening and you can get what they call staircase rents, you know, like between the fibers, it tears one place, then it tears another place. And if you keep doing that, then those tears communicate, you know, they become like staircases and then you
got the inside communicating with the outside bad bad situation. So yeah.
Kim Vopni (20:11.443)
Mm hmm. One thing that when when I was going through the notes that you had sent in about, you know, topics and discussion points, you you put in pelvis as the foundation, which which is something that, you know, when you when people think of, we need to improve our posture or we need to use that stand up straight or, you know, my mom, I remember she used to well intended, but she used to come and she
Esther Gokhale (20:37.698)
Thank you.
Kim Vopni (20:37.949)
dig or knuckle into my back and make me, you know, and what happens exactly is we thrust. And if I think of fitness, the fitness, competitive fitness, the poses that they get in there, I remember trying one one time, just I was like, I can't even get myself in this position. But that's the correction that we think is, we need to military thrust our chest forward. But really, we, think you and I are aligned on this. We kind of come to the pelvis and we say, let the pelvis,
Esther Gokhale (20:43.479)
Exactly.
Esther Gokhale (20:48.898)
Yes.
Esther Gokhale (20:58.579)
Exactly.
Totally.
Yes, so well, so the rest comes back. Well, so the sticking out the chest happens because it's the upper body we are most looking at, you know, that's the most visible. And so when people stick out their chest, nevermind what's happening below all kinds of damage, but it looks right. And so we settle for that, you know, and in the name of good posture, there's lots of mischief happening.
Kim Vopni (21:07.559)
dictate. Yeah, so why do you say that?
Esther Gokhale (21:34.655)
And the muscle men you mentioned, these sometimes will do the opposite. They'll kind of tuck their pelvis and thrust their upper body forward and to make their six pack bulge out. you know, six pack is the wrong abdominal muscle to focus on.
You know, if you must have a visible six pack, do it while in traction, you know, hanging from something. like in the gym, they have those bars that you can put your forearm on and then you can raise your, okay, that's a, at least you won't do damage and you can strengthen, but you don't want to constantly contract that muscle. And what most people totally neglect are the three deeper layers of abdominal muscles, the internal obliques, the external obliques, the transverse.
this abdominus that are the real structural.
abdominal muscles. So they hold your insides in place, they make you slender, and of course you need to also make sure your pelvic floor is engaged if it's weak. If it's not weak, it happens automatically that it will engage with these three deeper layers of abdominal muscle. And all together, I think of a party balloon, you know, that you want to squish slender and that's going to make you a little taller. The stuff has to go someplace.
Kim Vopni (22:58.759)
Mm-hmm.
Esther Gokhale (22:59.456)
And then that extra height gives protection to all those lumbar discs, especially those are the vulnerable ones, the bottom of the heap is the most vulnerable. For L five is the most frequently damaged disc. L five s one is the second most frequently damaged this that was mine.
Kim Vopni (23:08.039)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Esther Gokhale (23:20.49)
And so those get protected in any case by this contraction of the deeper abdominal as well as the deeper back muscles. So we call this the inner core set.
Kim Vopni (23:30.693)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Esther Gokhale (23:33.665)
And we're very precise about how to get people to engage that. And before we get them to engage that, we like them to loosen the super tight erector spinae muscles, the long back muscles that have, that they've been studiously tensing in the name of good posture to arch the back. So those need to be loosened first. So it becomes more practical to actually engage your muscles. You don't want to have those tight muscles fighting.
Kim Vopni (23:52.947)
You
Kim Vopni (24:00.84)
Mm-hmm.
Esther Gokhale (24:03.688)
your efforts. So we have a sequence in which we train people to first loosen all those tight muscles in the back, the long muscles, and then engage the correct muscles to keep the extra length. And now they're ready for some remodeling, getting their behinds behind. We teach them how to do that in walking. life exercises.
Kim Vopni (24:07.57)
to be great.
Esther Gokhale (24:28.79)
So it doesn't even take time to do it. Every step is a rep. It takes some time to learn that, but it's much easier than people think.
Kim Vopni (24:35.848)
Mm-hmm.
Kim Vopni (24:39.986)
What would you say would be when we think of coming to the pelvis first to sort of dictate maybe optimal posture, but as you say, it's a part of the process of releasing and the layers of releasing first so that we can then connect. what are some cues that you would say, how would somebody know this is now better posture because of the position of my pelvis? So you've said we don't want to be untucked. So then people will say, well, now
sorry we don't want to be tucked so maybe people think we should untuck. Yes. So where's how do we find that happy medium?
Esther Gokhale (25:14.594)
Yeah, so here's the problem. Usually when people have been tucking for years, that L5S1 joint gets stiff, maybe even a little rigid. And up higher, they've been swaying gloriously, and that place gives way too easily. So we first have to firm up the upper parts that give too easily before it becomes extremely efficient to get the behind behind is the way I like to talk about
it. You know, I quipped that it's called a behind for a reason. When people coined that phrase, they knew where this part goes. And so we're teaching people to use every step and glute reps, you know, so 5,000 a day, that'll do the job. Yeah. And but they first have to, you know, get their
upper part firmed up before those glute reps will be productive and not extra sway the back.
Kim Vopni (26:19.966)
So when you say firm up the upper body, what do you mean? Is it through a movement pattern?
Esther Gokhale (26:22.862)
for this computer.
inner corset, what I mentioned earlier. So we help people, you know, like learn to not sway. First of all, they have to learn to stop thrusting their chest out. And we have to loosen up those erector spinae muscles, but then hold it firm with those deep abdominal and deep back muscles. That'll keep it from just bending this way and that in response to what the arms or the legs are doing as part of reaching in a cupboard and people tend to sway and take a
Kim Vopni (26:27.252)
Mm-hmm.
Esther Gokhale (26:54.542)
step and people tend to sway which brings up another culprit which is the psoas you know if the psoas muscle
is tight then every step can extra arch the back. So we have to really not do that. know again another reason to firm up the upper lumbar area with what we call the inner corset before walking we'll do both jobs of getting the behind behind and sorting out the tight so as
Kim Vopni (27:28.082)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah, I'm...
Esther Gokhale (27:29.58)
And then we teach refinements in walking to make that even better. know, like these days people walk any which way, you know, it's almost like Monty Python ministry of silly walks.
Kim Vopni (27:41.801)
Yeah. With walking then what would you do from so we can also like we both are pretty pelvis centric in terms of we like to start there but I also put a lot of importance on the feet, the foot, the footwear. So when you say micro refinements from walking and you know the way that I think about walking is it
Esther Gokhale (27:51.566)
Yes.
Esther Gokhale (27:57.689)
So the video, yeah.
Esther Gokhale (28:03.234)
Yeah.
Kim Vopni (28:07.368)
when we especially have that tucked under pelvis, we're not using our glutes, we're using more hip flexion, the psoas, the hip flexors to kind of lift, so we're not pushing the ground away with our glutes as we should. So once we have the behind behind, we're using the glutes better, what would you say from a foot perspective could help optimize our micro refine?
Esther Gokhale (28:12.766)
What?
Esther Gokhale (28:18.872)
Yes.
Esther Gokhale (28:27.15)
The way I like to, to me that's the second tier, second tier of importance because even before we get to the feet there things in the legs that are super important. so after we've done the leg refinements, know, straightening the leg as it goes back and not overusing the quads too early in the step and making it hard for them to straighten the leg. For example, that that's a lot of info, but you know what I'm talking about.
Kim Vopni (28:53.94)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Esther Gokhale (28:56.944)
For the foot, I like to use animal likenesses. It's like ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny, was a principle I remember way back from my biology high school days. So we have similarities to other animals. So for example, a gecko is using suction pads to climb the wall.
and our feet.
You could, one could think of them like gecko suction pads kind of gripping the floor. So we're actually using those underfoot muscles actively. You know, it's a very complex structure. The foot, 22 bones, four layers of muscles, they're not made to just sit there. And the way we use our feet, might as well be prostheses. We're not using them. So how to use them. So I like animal images, gripping the ground, pulling the ground.
Kim Vopni (29:45.31)
Mm-hmm.
Esther Gokhale (29:57.345)
towards you and pushing it behind you. I like a dog digging a hole because there's a flick that wants to happen which also takes a lot of foot strength but also creates a lot of foot strength if we do it right. We don't want the foot to just willy-nilly bend backwards.
Kim Vopni (29:59.914)
Mm-hmm.
Kim Vopni (30:05.3)
Mm-hmm.
Esther Gokhale (30:18.158)
at any point so we don't lift the heel early that destroys the foot so there are a number of things and I like using animals I like using images like a horse you know a horse has its at some point has its forefoot just hanging limply
And that relaxation is important so that in the next cycle we're ready with strength in those same muscles. So it gets pretty detailed. And there are number of ways to invite extra participation from the feet.
Kim Vopni (30:47.796)
It's great.
Kim Vopni (30:53.374)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Kim Vopni (31:01.394)
Mm-hmm.
Esther Gokhale (31:02.88)
and make it even possible by leaving the heel down on the ground extra long because the moment the heel comes up, I mean the foot muscles usually are already weak but if now you have the heel up and you have the whole body's weight bending that foot backwards, it's not going to happen. Not much is going to happen.
Kim Vopni (31:14.302)
Mm-hmm.
Kim Vopni (31:20.19)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
So I think about the backs of the legs, tight calf muscles, tight hamstring muscles, very, very common. it's always chicken and the egg. it the tightness that created the posterior tilt in the pelvis? Is it the posterior pelvis that caused the adaptation in the backs of the legs? So we need to address that. And then one of the other things that you've highlighted is the
Esther Gokhale (31:41.635)
Thank
Kim Vopni (31:51.049)
you know, lengthening and stacking, I guess, and stacking through the joints. And I always go then to bone health and osteoporosis, which a lot of people in my community are struggling with. And again, now we can go chicken and the egg. it because you stopped moving because of your pelvic floor dysfunction that we stopped loading the bones? Or is it the non-optimal posture that we weren't loading through the joints that also then contributed to the pelvic floor dysfunction? So we can go so many different ways.
Esther Gokhale (31:54.061)
Yes.
Esther Gokhale (32:03.805)
Thank you.
Esther Gokhale (32:17.294)
So in that case, I have a vote for the non-optimal stacking, allowing the calcium to leach from the bones. And it's not that the bones are weak and therefore we've got this poor posture. I think it's much more clearly the first way. And that good stacking also prevents osteoarthritis because otherwise you have the wrong parts of the bones stressed.
Kim Vopni (32:27.124)
Mm-hmm.
Esther Gokhale (32:46.002)
and causing calcium deposition at the edges of the vertebrae, for example, that's not cool. Because if it's forming in the wrong direction, you've got a bone spur pressing into a nerve root.
It's not cool. opening up the edges of the vertebrae and realigning, restoring weight on the bodies of the vertebrae, very, very important. So I think there it's, nevermind how the cycle started, restoring normal posture can do wonders for both osteoarthritis and osteoporosis. we're on the same page there, yeah.
Kim Vopni (33:30.74)
When you say, yeah, with the terminology normal or natural posture, if you were to describe that to somebody, how would you say, especially somebody who has escaped that optimal posture, how would you say this is what we're working towards? This is what I would consider optimal or normal or natural posture.
Esther Gokhale (33:37.197)
Yes.
Esther Gokhale (33:41.431)
Yes.
Esther Gokhale (33:48.234)
Absolutely.
Esther Gokhale (33:54.511)
I coined a phrase J spine to describe the shape of the spine. Now it's not a loopy J. It's a modern stylized calligraphy kind of J where the hook of the J is the buttocks the behind behind and then up above. Well, the G is very flat and the back the lumbar spine is in fact
supposed to be quite flat. And then there's a little curve up higher in the thoracic spine, but much less than one sees in modern anatomy books. If you go back in time, you look at anatomy books from a century ago, you find more of a J spine. So it's not that we're making this up and we're going back in time. We're also going to non-industrial people today. It's harder and harder to find these people, but they still exist.
people who have not been acculturated by with modern ads and furniture and clothing design and what have you and they're still living a traditional lifestyle and style in villages in Africa and rural.
Kim Vopni (34:50.43)
Mm-hmm.
Esther Gokhale (35:05.856)
India and places like that and you can find these people with the J spine. So we point to those populations and we point to little kids who also have their behinds behind and the rest of their back relatively straight. So that's my most important descriptor of healthy posture is the spine will be like a modern calligraphy J with a little bit of extra curve here in the thoracic area but not
Kim Vopni (35:17.256)
Mm-hmm.
Kim Vopni (35:24.082)
Mm-hmm.
Kim Vopni (35:33.832)
Mm-hmm.
Esther Gokhale (35:34.979)
really in the cervical area, not in the lumbar area, low back and neck, pretty straight. And then the other parts, like there's a stacking of the bones of the spine over the legs.
Kim Vopni (35:38.868)
Mm-hmm.
Kim Vopni (35:49.32)
Mm-hmm.
Esther Gokhale (35:50.315)
And where the body meets the legs has a very inviting environment. You know, this is where all the blood vessels and the nerves that flow to and from the legs cross the femoral artery, the femoral nerve, the femoral vein, the lymph, they all cross via the groin. And so this tucking of the pelvis and or parking the hips forward, that's a common postural distortion.
I could have listed that one up there. Because that happens when our certain muscles are a bit weak. And then we find ourselves kind of resting against the counter as we're cutting vegetables. That's a pretty good clue that the relevant postural muscles for standing are a bit weak. And then I invite people to do chair pose from yoga to strengthen those very...
Kim Vopni (36:31.956)
Mm-hmm.
Esther Gokhale (36:49.164)
muscles that combination of muscle so that standing becomes easy peasy burdensome so that's also and we want a bit of softness at the knees we want as i was describing softness at the groin so all the flow can happen well there and so i call that a ready stance you know it's like not parked and
Kim Vopni (36:49.97)
Mm-hmm.
Kim Vopni (36:53.896)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Esther Gokhale (37:15.514)
So the shoulders back is another description. know, the chest very available for breathing. There's this notion in modern times that you have to belly breathe and that chest breathing is somehow bad for you. And that makes no sense to me.
So I encourage people to use their lungs in the direction of expanding their chest. That's what gives a nice expanded chest, which then has more lung capacity, breathing capacity. And now your little pendant is going to rest very nicely on your chest and not hang dangle in the air because the chest is kind of concave. So
Kim Vopni (37:51.786)
you
Mm-hmm.
Esther Gokhale (37:59.903)
That's normal. Shoulders back allows good circulation to and from the arms. Good breathing allows the weight of the arms to not weigh against you, know, pulling the upper body forward, but rather keep everything nice and open and be in in line with your spine.
Kim Vopni (38:18.067)
Mm-hmm.
Mm hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Esther Gokhale (38:22.068)
So that's a lot of description neck, tall, regal, the general appearance. The look is one of confidence, strength, at the same time, relaxation. that mix of strength. Yeah.
Kim Vopni (38:32.286)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Yep, Confidence and grace kind of. Yeah, yeah. What are some of the, like if you were to describe a couple of exercises or movements that you would give to somebody, let's start with the upper body. So you talked about that's a place we want to get the upper body kind of ready. You talked about the corset. What would be a couple of either one or two exercises or movements you would have somebody do to do that?
Esther Gokhale (39:06.55)
So in our approach, the exercise exercises are the least important part of it because,
Kim Vopni (39:13.445)
Yeah, yeah. But it's what everybody wants, right? And that's the hard part. Yeah. Yes.
Esther Gokhale (39:18.176)
It's what everybody immediately thinks of. It's like, what exercise can you give me? And you're asking me to tie up dedicated time, which you probably have precious little off. And here I'm giving you a way of sneaking that into your everyday life movements. It's not even contrived. I'm just teaching you how to do everyday life more naturally, more skillfully better so that you get these strengthening and stretching things happening in the background.
Kim Vopni (39:23.624)
Yes.
Kim Vopni (39:36.361)
Yep.
Esther Gokhale (39:48.033)
So that's where the gold is. you know, okay, but that said there are exercises to get people going to get the mind connected to certain muscles to reach threshold strength so that it can more easily find itself those actions skillful everyday life exercises can find themselves Just in the course of the day so I would say a shoulder roll is an exercise because it's contrived and we take the shoulder
Kim Vopni (39:48.156)
Naturally, yeah.
Kim Vopni (40:16.553)
Mm-hmm.
Esther Gokhale (40:17.936)
little forward, we do a big rainbow arc, we take it back, back, back, we let it settle. And then there are refined ways of doing that, but this is a pretty good first pass at repositioning the shoulder soft tissue back a bit. We're ratcheting the soft tissue back. So we're taking the shoulder forward, we're ratcheting it back, back, back.
Kim Vopni (40:26.036)
Mm-hmm.
Kim Vopni (40:33.31)
Mm-hmm.
Esther Gokhale (40:40.086)
and then we relax and that exercise done you know if one has forward shoulders done every 20 minutes and every 30 60 minutes will give the person practice and a smoother trajectory you know it's not something that needs to be done phonetically again and again and again you do it once and lo and behold it you're stuck in a better place a more posterior place now your lungs are able to breathe better circulation
Kim Vopni (40:41.449)
Mm-hmm.
Kim Vopni (40:51.413)
.
Kim Vopni (41:03.797)
Mm-hmm.
Esther Gokhale (41:10.04)
to and from the arms better all of that. So that's a kind of mini exercise very easy takes two seconds and helpful. But I mentioned chair pose if someone is weak and all these standing muscles then I would I like chair pose from yoga to strengthen exactly the combo of muscles you need to stand well. And then we have
Kim Vopni (41:15.059)
Mm-hmm.
Kim Vopni (41:19.401)
Mm-hmm.
Kim Vopni (41:22.836)
Mm-hmm.
Kim Vopni (41:30.121)
That's me.
Kim Vopni (41:34.857)
Mm-hmm.
Esther Gokhale (41:39.267)
We have exercises in the back of my book. have all kinds of floor exercises to strengthen what we call the rib anchor muscles. So those are mainly the internal obliques.
Kim Vopni (41:49.385)
Mm-hmm.
Esther Gokhale (41:53.877)
And they're the ones that tend to be weak because we've been contracting our back to stand up straight. We've let our ribs flare and now those muscles haven't been doing their job of keeping the rib cage anchored in the front flesh with the abdomen. And so that often needs a bit of toning. so lying on the back and
Kim Vopni (42:09.619)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Esther Gokhale (42:18.988)
doing all kinds of variations of leg movements and arm movements that tend to sway the back and then not letting that sway happen. So we prep people to first engage those internal obliques, well first the deeper abdominal muscles so there's all the intestines and stuff are held in place and then pressing the back of the rib cage against the ground and then challenging that, whether it's cycling in the air or
overtime tougher exercises like leg lifts and what have you, writing the alphabet with the outstretched legs that is pretty advanced but in the beginning mini just one legged little cycling motions that somewhat challenge the rib cage, make the back arch and then you don't let that happen.
Kim Vopni (42:53.737)
Mm-hmm.
Kim Vopni (42:58.037)
challenging. Yep.
Kim Vopni (43:09.269)
I think an important point is the brain involvement here and the understanding first of all why it's happened, why you're doing this, the repatterning part. I get asked multiple times a day, sometimes on social media, sometimes within my membership, what's the best exercise for this? What are the top three exercises I could be doing for X?
My answer is always the same, that I could say, and there isn't, first of all, there isn't a magic exercise, but I could say, go do these three exercises, and you may do them religiously, but when you aren't really internalizing the reason why, and not just going through the motions, because I said do 12 repetitions.
Esther Gokhale (43:55.564)
Yeah.
Esther Gokhale (44:01.729)
you.
Kim Vopni (44:02.227)
the why behind it and the repatterning that's necessary is missed. so I always, you need to go through, there's a method to the method. There's a method to the madness, right? And so you have to go through those steps and you have to understand and then we build and layer upon and what the body will naturally adapt based on those new inputs, which I feel is aligning very much with what you're saying.
Esther Gokhale (44:06.659)
Yeah.
Esther Gokhale (44:11.073)
Yeah.
Esther Gokhale (44:20.75)
Yes. Totally. Very much so. And the other input that I like to make this learning more robust and deeper and stickier is visual cues. So in my work, I use a lot of images. In my book, we have more than 1200 images.
Yeah. So this is taken from the field village Africans bending and sitting and walking and different, you know, freeze framed in different moments to illustrate different things. And, you know, we have a huge frontal cortex, the visual cortex.
Yeah, and I like to put that to good use. We also have lots of gray matter, like, you know, put that to good use. So it's, you know, you had asked me earlier about Alexander Technique. I have a lot of respect for Alexander Technique, but they only use kinesthetic learning. The teacher puts their hands on you and guides you through these movements, and then you go home. It feels very nice. You go home and you have no idea what happened.
Kim Vopni (45:30.708)
Yes.
Esther Gokhale (45:31.278)
And you come back and repeat and they do this for years. you know, my teaching in the US and people are busy and impatient. And so I've learned. Thank you. You know, the public and the president.
Kim Vopni (45:48.999)
Yeah? For all the bodies, yes?
Esther Gokhale (45:52.291)
to do to be efficient to provide as much and layered and woven learning. So it's, it looks right. It feels right. It makes sense. That makes for a really rich weave and very efficient learning. You know, people are astounded at the changes they make even in one lesson.
Kim Vopni (46:04.789)
Mm-hmm.
Esther Gokhale (46:17.396)
and you know six lessons or we teach online and it's eighteen tiny lessons like thirteen minutes each only and they learn one thing and then they go practice and they're ready for the next layer that's actually a very nice way to learn it's behavioral change done in little drip drip drip ways
Kim Vopni (46:23.253)
Mm-hmm.
Kim Vopni (46:28.361)
Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah.
Kim Vopni (46:36.435)
Yeah, the integration is really, important. I want to wrap up with a question that I don't get all that often, but I do sometimes. of course, people in my community are always biased to the pelvis and the pelvic floor. But a lot of people will say, what's the best position to sleep in? And my answer is usually, however you
best sleep because sleep is important. So I don't want you to be stressed out thinking you're in a bad position that's going to then ruin your sleep. is there like what would you say from a sleep perspective?
Esther Gokhale (47:11.63)
What I say is for the first five minutes of the night try this particular position and what's most important for that five minutes is to get them in a J spine whether they're lying on their back or their side or three-quarter turn or even on the belly though that's harder to
Kim Vopni (47:33.429)
Mm-hmm.
Esther Gokhale (47:34.051)
provide all the props for to make it work work. then you're building familiarity and don't discipline yourself for more than five minutes and create negative associations. Just think of it as a sleeping meditation postural meditation. And they try that out. And then they roll over and do whatever they need to do to sleep. Sleep is the priority. So I'm with you on that. But I like to seed this other way of
of First five minutes is all the discipline I ask. And then lo and behold, one of those nights the brain says, wait a minute, this is way better than what we usually get. Let's just stay here and fall asleep here. And next thing they know, it's morning and they've been in the same position all night. And I get this.
Kim Vopni (48:15.807)
Mm-hmm.
Esther Gokhale (48:24.82)
after the first lesson people come to me and they're shocked they've never been able to sleep on their back in their lives and they woke up in the morning they were still in that same position and so what I suggest is that yeah well if you give the body a really comfortable position don't insist on it
Kim Vopni (48:32.895)
Mm-hmm.
Esther Gokhale (48:42.37)
but you're giving it a chance to get used to it and maybe it'll like it and stay there and then you can get all the benefits because what we teach in sleeping is traction and reshaping and all of our usual J-spine little measures and so it's all the discs are benefiting and so on. So it's deeply healing.
Kim Vopni (48:43.955)
Mm-hmm.
Kim Vopni (48:57.353)
Mm-hmm.
Kim Vopni (49:04.531)
Yeah, I love that. So you've spoken about your book and I'd love to be able to direct people to where they can learn more. So potentially take courses with you, see your book. So you're holding up for those that aren't are just listening. Go over to the YouTube so you can see it. Eight Steps to a Pain Free Back is the title of your book. Where can people find that? Where can they potentially come and learn with you or take a course?
Esther Gokhale (49:21.934)
That's it.
Esther Gokhale (49:27.476)
Yeah, so they can find that on our website and wherever books are sold, in Amazon and so on. On our website, we invite people to a free workshop where they can really see images and me demonstrating techniques and then they learn something, first baby step to improving their posture and then they can go from there.
Kim Vopni (49:53.598)
And that's it's go clay method. Yes, not go. I was saying I think go kale. was how I was pronouncing it. But yeah.
Esther Gokhale (49:55.47)
Spell funny, it's not funny.
Yeah. Yeah, it's a very famous Indian educator. I can't mess with that spelling. just how it's spelled. G-O-K-H-A-L-E. It's pronounced Go Clay. It's like, yeah, Yeah. Goclaymethod.com.
Kim Vopni (50:08.823)
interesting.
Kim Vopni (50:14.879)
gokale-method.com. Is it the go kale or just go kale-method.com? Go clay, sorry. Is it goclay-method.com or the go clay method? Got it, perfect. Amazing. Okay, we'll have all the links in the show notes. We are very aligned, pun intended. I'm so glad that we shared this conversation and thank you for sharing your wisdom.
Esther Gokhale (50:32.607)
I know.
Same here. It was just a pleasure. Thank you, Kim.
