Superpower or Kryptonite?

Spinal Extension: The Poison is in the Dose

“Chest up, shoulders back!” You’ve heard it time and time again. It’s the ideal, perfect posture we all have seared into our minds. When I was in high school, I was often complimented on my prim and proper air. At home, I even had the words “Perfect Posture” set as the banner on my Dell desktop computer, the idea of maintaining it was so pervasive for me.

Superman, Wonder Woman—really, think of any hero, and they all exude a billowed-out chest that implies superhuman strength. It’s the power pose that’s said to build confidence when held for two minutes. It helps us become an invincible version of ourselves, like Beyoncé’s alter ego Sasha Fierce, which helped her tune out the noise and get onstage with confidence when she felt she couldn’t hack it herself.

An entire art form is built off this principle. Picture the ballerina: her chest is up, shoulders back, tummy pulled in. Floating on her toes in a constant state of inhalation, it's as if she’s standing on the precipice of a cliff, ready to take flight. I was told, when training in theatre, to “play to the balcony!” Eyes glimmering, I lifted my chest and projected my voice and body to the back of the house.

When we hit this pose, there’s no doubt it makes us stronger, and as a society, we value that. We look pretty, proud, handsome, strong, confident, successful—regal, even. This is all valuable, and it absolutely has its time and place.

But let’s be clear: it’s not relaxed.

From a nervous system perspective, this posture put us into an activated, sympathetic, “fight or flight” response. It’s the response you need when you’re running from a predator, or trying to push a stuck car uphill. It’s an incredible adaptation available to us all in the blink of an eye, turning us into heroes.

At the gym, calling upon this strength is fantastic. In a deadlift or a squat, when you’re trying to stand up against 100% to 200% of your body weight, you absolutely must lift your chest and fight for your life to stand up. You are defying gravity, moving massive weight away from the floor. As a dancer, I spent hours working on making my jumps higher and more grande. My power pose is exactly what helps me set personal records—single-leg squatting 105 pounds, deadlifting 335 pounds, and saying, “Wow! I just did that!!”

Extension is your superpower. But too much of it is your kryptonite.

When you live there day in and day out, it causes issues. Your nervous system never resets. Your lower back muscles become hyper-contracted and constantly shortened. You find yourself holding your breath, limiting your access to a deeper, more relaxed way of moving.

What you need to do is learn to reset your posture out of "confidence" and into a state of humility, taking the pressure off your lower back. You need to engage the under-utilized muscles that the “MY-BACK-CAN-DO-EVERYTHING-FOR-ME” posture squelches.

You do this by learning how to get out of a “Donald Duck back” (anterior pelvic tilt/hyper-lordosis) and into an intentionally rounded lower back. You learn how to activate your hamstrings—which, while they may feel “tight,” are very often just weak, whether or not you can touch your toes. And you learn how to use your core—not your six-pack, but the deep muscles that actually control your ribs and hips, your transverse abdominis and obliques.

And if you don’t look to set constant PRs at the gym? If you prefer the middle way, balancing life with yoga and Pilates, you still aren’t immune. I’ve been using extreme examples, but modern life itself puts us into a perpetual state of hyper-vigilance that mimics this superpower posture. Whether you are bracing against stress at a desk or over-correcting your alignment on a yoga mat, most likely, you are still trapped in extension.

When I work with people in pain, we peel back these layers of chronic tension, compensation, and look at where they are over-working. We train your body to find its brakes, learning how to exhale, drop the ribcage, and find a true, neutral resting state. It isn't about giving up your strength; it’s about mastering it.

Once we establish that baseline, we slowly integrate bodyweight exercises that teach you how to keep your ribs and pelvis connected. This teaches you how to move with only the necessary tension in your legs, finally allowing your lower back to get a break from doing all the heavy lifting.

Make no mistake: these bodyweight exercises aren’t easy. They ask a very specific, targeted group of muscles to work while keeping all-too-often unnecessary "helpers" out of the picture. My students are often shaking like a leaf when learning how to do a lunge (or split squat) correctly for the first time.

But once you master that? Then we get you back into lifting heavy, running, or dancing, while continuing to hammer that point home: you can be strong without being stressed. We layer the strength back on top of a resilient, adaptable foundation.

Ultimately, you will be able to do what you love—whether that's crushing a 300-pound deadlift or just living pain-free—equipped with the tools that help you come back home. Because a true superhero isn't always flying; sometimes, they need to know how to land.