lunes, 22 de junio de 2015

La Sociedad de la NIEBLA - Sociedad Angelica - Julio Verne

 La verdadera no pretende la transmutación individual sino hacerla extensiva a toda la humanidad, y en este sentido se han detectado sociedades encargadas de sondear en un sector de la población la reacción que supondría la ejecución de un determinado acto, que en principio es simulado y resultará aplicado en la realidad si el sondeo es favorable a determinados intereses.

De la misma manera, se han pretendido y se pretenden cambios sociales encaminados hacia determinados ideales o como reacción en contra de las circunstancias actuales.

Todo ello supone una transmutación, ya que se pretende cambiar la y la ideología de millones de personas para que se produzca un cambio social controlado y en determinado sentido.

Annie Besant fue notable como activista política para que la India se emancipase del Imperio Británico antes de que aceptase el cargo de presidenta de la Sociedad Teosófica, influyendo profundamente en seres que como Gandhi, han dejado una cuña de valores espirituales inmersos en un clima de odio y de materialismo, lo que provoca contradicciones que se manifiestan en la destrucción o en el deseo de destruir, retrasando la expresión objetiva de aquella energía espiritual y cohesionadora.

Dentro de estas iniciativas, colectivos como la Sociedad Teosófica o la Golden Dawn, surgieron en el siglo XIX como resultado de los grupos de pensadores, místicos y políticos que se encontraban desencantados ante dos siglos de racionalismo, época descrita por el poeta irlandés William Butler Yeats como: “la rebelión del alma contra el intelecto”.

Pues tanto Escocia como Irlanda, fueron alentadas por personajes como Yeats para llevar a cabo sus aspiraciones independentistas y tratando de encontrar en sus raíces celtas todo aquello que justificase sus motivos para emanciparse.
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En Gran Bretaña, la Golden Dawn influenciaba a autores de novelas como el mencionado Bram Stoker o Bernard Shaw, mientras que en Francia se producía una potente corriente dentro de la que se encuentran personajes como Alejandro Dumas, George Sand, Delacroix, Poussin, Gerard de Nerval o el mismo Jules Verne, y esta corriente la provoca la Sociedad de la Niebla.
Esta sociedad se fundó en el siglo XVI por un impresor afincado en Lyon y llamado Griphe para la que eligió el nombre de “Néphès”, una antigua sociedad griega cuyo nombre significa “niebla” y constituye el símbolo sobre el que se representa la acción de Dios en el mundo, tal como se contiene en el libro Eclesiastés, 24-4: “Yo levanté mi tienda en las alturas y mi trono era una columna de nube”.

Y esta acción de Dios en el mundo la pretenden realizar a través de iniciativas como las de estas sociedades provocando cambios sociales desde las mentes de los hombres.

La Sociedad de la Niebla toma su ideología de la francmasonería y, al menos en sus principios, pretende el conocimiento de Dios a través de la naturaleza y de sus leyes reproduciendo la filosofía natural aristotélica, ideología compartida asimismo por los gnósticos y rosacruces, resultando que la mayor inspiración de la Sociedad de la Niebla la encuentra en Los Iluminados de Baviera, sociedad creada por Adam Weishaupt en el siglo XVIII y que, según George Sand, reclutaba a todos los instigadores que: “dirigen todas las cosas, deciden la guerra o la paz, castigan a quienes consideran perversos y hacen temblar a los reyes en sus tronos”.

Curiosamente, los Iluminados de Baviera defienden los ideales de Libertad, Igualdad y Fraternidad, habiendo influido decisivamente en el advenimiento de la Revolución francesa en 1.789.

La Sociedad de la Niebla rehabilitó un texto atribuido a un dominico en Italia, Francesco Colonna, siendo el nombre del libro “El sueño de Polifilo”, con contenidos que han influido a Miguel de Cervantes, Dante y Goethe, y han inspirado jardines como los de Versailles en Francia, los de Bomarzo en Italia o los de Aranjuez en España, todos ellos llenos de símbolos descritos en El sueño de Polifilo.

Alejandro Dumas, padre, publicó en 1.839 su novela “El Capitán Panfilo”, símbolo de Polifilo, pues “pan” significa todo o “poli” y la terminación “filo” coincide con el original, además conocidas son sus aficiones sobre temas esotéricos y las amistades con personajes que han tratado estos temas como Papus o Eliphas Levi, siendo él quien presentó a Julio Verne, entonces un joven, al editor Pierre Jules Hetzel.

Dumas fue notable como masón y libertario apoyando proyectos unificadores como el de Garibaldi en Italia, en cambio su amigo Hetzel se dejó notar como activista político, aunque ambos han colaborado estrechamente en los mismos proyectos.



Dumas y Hetzel son decisivos en la Sociedad de la Niebla, pues mientras Dumas buscaba y captaba nuevos valores literarios a través de los cuales se podría propagar la ideología de la Niebla, Hetzel les editaba sus obras, se las distribuía y promocionaba como nadie.

Uno de los personajes de Verne en su novela “La vuelta al mundo en 80 dias”, Philéas Fogg, esconde un nuevo Polifilo en su trama, pues etimológicamente puede descomponerse en “eas” que en griego significa todo y es el equivalente de Poli, y Fogg en inglés significa niebla. Pero hay más, ya que Philéas Fogg pertenece al selecto club llamado “Reform Club”, otra vez queda patente el deseo de reformar o transmutar, cuyas iniciales coinciden con las de la sociedad Rosa-Cruz además de dotarle de una de las características de la alquimia: la inmortalidad, pues lo describe como “un byron impasible que parece haber vivido miles de años sin envejecer”.

La Sociedad de la Niebla estableció una especie de complot para que se transformase el cristianismo mediante los rituales inspirados en los misterios de la sangre y que estaba financiado por la casa de los Habsburgo, pretendiendo secretamente realizar los ideales anárquicos de la Niebla mediante una profunda transformación social en todos los ámbitos: “desacreditar a todas las casas reales europeas para establecer una única dinastía reinante e institucionalizar la figura de un Gran Monarca en Europa, objetivo perseguido asimismo por otros grupos como el Priorato de Sión”.
Aquí tenemos el Gran Priorato de España, cuyo objetivo es cambiar el mundo a partir de la educación.



¿Qué hacían en estas reuniones? Poco se sabe de sus cónclaves, salvo que aprovechaban para hablar de política y literatura. Sus principales sesiones consistían en leer pasajes de El sueño de Polifilo, algo que parece absurdo a priori, salvo que existiera algún secreto que desconocemos


Toda sociedad secreta que se precie tiene que ser eso, secreta y lo más discreta posible. La Sociedad de la Niebla casi consigue esos dos objetivos.

Hasta hace muy pocos años, su existencia había quedado muy bien camuflada. Se trataba de una sociedad artística-literaria-mística-masó— nica, muy influida por las doctrinas rosacruces y en la que estaban «todos los que tenían que estar».

Haciendo un símil cinematográfico, era una especie de Club de los poetas muertos en la que se reunían novelistas, poetas, pintores, políticos y artistas en general para estudiar un libro raro:

Hypnerotomachia Poliphili, también conocido como El sueño de Polifilo, una obra impresa por Aldo Manucio en Venecia, en el año 1499.


Sobre su posible autor, Francesco Colonna, y su contenido, todo son especulaciones. Está escrito en latín vulgar, con mezcla de griego, lombardo, y voces hebreas y caldeas. Y para complicarlo más, el autor utilizó palabras inventadas y un lenguaje arcaizante que ha sacado de quicio a sus críticos y traductores.
En el mismo se describen los amores eróticos y alegóricos entre Polifilo y una tal Polia. Se sabe tan poco de su profundo significado que desde el siglo XVI se ha visto rodeado de un aura esotérica. De hecho, estamos ante uno de los libros más curiosos y enigmáticos del Renacimiento, una obra tan fascinante que ha cautivado a grandes intelectuales de todas las épocas y, en concreto, a varios escritores franceses del siglo XIX.

Según las investigaciones de Michel Lamy —reflejadas en su obra Jules Verne, initíé et initiateur (1984)—, Julio Verne pertenecía a esta sociedad secreta, llamada Sociedad Angélica (también recibía el nombre de la Niebla, término que designa para los francmasones el Principio Universal o caos originario del que surge el Principio de la Verdad), que tenía como breviario o texto básico el Hypnerotomachia Poliphili
 http://www.vgesa.com/imagenes/15Poliphili/15%20Hypnerotomachia%20Poliphili-Columna-Manuzio-Incunables%20Libros%20Antiguos-libro%20facsimil-Vicent%20Garcia%20Editores-0%20abierto.png
Lamy comenta que esta sociedad fue fundada en el siglo XVI por el impresor lionés Sébastien Gryphe, inspirándose en otra sociedad griega llamada Nephes (que significa 'alma' en hebreo y 'niebla' en griego), que tenía como símbolo al grifo, animal mitológico,https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f8/Griffin.png y a la que pertenecían lumbreras literarias como Rabelais o el pintor Poussin. 
 https://pulsoelectromagnetico.files.wordpress.com/2011/01/poussin-arcadia.jpg
Sobre Rabelais existen suficientes evidencias que indican su pertenencia a una extraña Sociedad Agla, que empleaba como emblema una «cifra de cuatro» como la que se cree que utilizaban los antiguos cátaros para reconocerse entre sí. 
 
En cualquier caso, Lamy cree que «Agla» no es sino otra forma más de definir a La Niebla.
Tras un largo letargo, la sociedad fue reactivada en el siglo XIX y a ella se incorporaron, además de Julio Verne, Alejandro Dumas, Gérard de Nerval, Gastón Lerroux, Maurice Leblanc, Maurice Barres y George Sand, así como el pintor Delacroix, en cuyos cuadros algunos críticos han querido ver rastros de El sueño de Polifilo.https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a7/Eug%C3%A8ne_Delacroix_-_La_libert%C3%A9_guidant_le_peuple.jpg
 Desde Rabelais, pasando por Cervantes hasta Julio Verne, se ha creído que en esta obra se ocultan códigos secretos y mensajes cifrados. La Sociedad de la Niebla tenía como objetivo analizar los pasajes oscuros o fijarse en sus numerosos jeroglíficos para detectar enigmas. Toda una sociedad secreta que gira en torno a un libro secreto donde tan importante es el texto como los dibujos.
De hecho, algunos de sus extraños grabados se han reproducido en pinturas o se han copiado en esculturas, ex libris o fachadas de edificios. En España, por ejemplo, se pueden ver varios esculpidos en las paredes del claustro de la Universidad de Salamanca. Incluso los diseñadores de parques y jardines románticos se han inspirado en sus diseños y a tal efecto se citan los jardines de Versalles, en Francia, el de Bomarzo en Italia o el de Aranjuez en España.

Hablaré de un libro que, desde que se publicó en Venecia en 1499, tiene un halo de misterio sobre su verdadero significado y su autor. Es la historia bastante excéntrica y recargada, de los amores oníricos y un tanto oscuros de un clérigo. Se trata del Hypnerotomachia Poliphili o El sueño de Polífilo cuyo autor, aún discutido, se cree que fue el monje dominico Francesco Colonna.

El “Sueño” es un poema alegórico de estirpe medieval con clara vocación enciclopédica, porque contiene conocimientos arqueológicos, arquitectónicos, litúrgicos, epigráficos, gemológicos y hasta culinarios. Pero, durantes siglos, son muchos los autores que han buceado en su verdadero significado y se han apuntado toda clases de teorías sin que aún ninguna sea la definitiva. Está claro, par un lector experto, que contiene muchas claves alquímicas, pero como digo, su verdadero significado, aún no ha sido revelado. No es extraño que, una misteriosa sociedad secreta a la que pertenecieron muchos escritores y artistas, tuvieran esta obra como libro de cabecera. Me refiero a la Sociedad de la Niebla.

El libro en realidad son dos escritos con distintas técnicas pero, según los expertos, proceden de la misma mano. Aunque parece que se unieron de una forma un tanto tosca. El primero nos cuenta el viaje onírico en primera persona de Polífilo, un viaje de carácter amoroso por regiones y construcciones alegóricas. Esto último podría explicar que, una de las primeras ediciones al castellano del libro, fuera hecha por el Colegio de Arquitectos de Valencia. En el segundo libro toma la palabra la amada Polia que se introduce en el mismo sueño.

Como dije, su autoría aún está en discusión. Poco se sabe de su autor y son varias las identidades que se barajan. Para unos Colonna era un fraile veneciano y para otros un noble romano. Aunque el original no apareció firmado, se llegó al nombre de Colonna de una forma harto curiosa. En una edición francesa del siglo XVI, el encargado de la traducción se dio cuenta que, uniendo las iniciales de los títulos de los capítulos, se podía leer: Poliam Frater Franciscus Columna Peramavit, y se relacionó este apellido con una famosa familia de la época. Ya en el siglo XX, hay autores que citan a un tal Felice Feliciano como autor del “Sueño” y aprecian en el acróstico solamente que: “Francesco amó a Polia”, pero no dice que escribiera el libro. Otras teorías hablan que el autor pudo ser León Battista Alberti, que fue poeta, arquitecto, lingüista, criptógrafo, arqueólogo… en fin, todas las materias que aparecen el en “Sueño”.

Lo que sí sabemos es quién lo financió, pero no con qué motivo. Fue el Duque Leonardo Grassi. No sabemos nada del autor de los grabados, y por lo que está obra adquirió fama. En cambio, el nombre del impresor sí que lo sabemos, y también se descubrió de una forma curiosa. Resulta que en una fe de erratas que sólo tenían algunas ediciones, se pudo leer “Aldo el Viejo, impresor”.

Sobre la lengua en que estaba escrito el original, también creó no pocos problemas a sus primeros lectores y traductores. En el texto se mezclaban el latín vulgar, el griego, el lombardo y hasta voces hebreas y caldeas. Pero para complicarlo más, su autor o autores, utilizaron palabras inventadas y un lenguaje pomposo y arcaizante que sacaba de quicio a sus críticos y traductores. Fue esta clara intención de enmascara el lenguaje, lo que le dio fama de libro esotérico, para iniciados. Es posible que la primera redacción se escribiera en italiano o latín, pero luego se encriptó con una mezcla de lenguas.


Son muchos autores que han citado o se han inspirado en el “Sueño”. Desde Rabelais hasta Cervantes. Alejandro Dumas escribió El capitán Pánfilo, de “pan”, que como “Poli”, significa “todo”, y “Filo”, que es “hijo”. Nerval se inspiró en el “Sueño” para su obra titulada Angelique. Rabelais utiliza algunos trucos del “Sueño” para esconder sus amores en Gargantúa. Rabelais era posiblemente Rosa-Cruz y Dumas, sin ninguna duda, perteneció a la Sociedad de la Niebla. Pero también tenemos rastros en las novelas de Julio Verne como El castillo de los Cárpatos o en el Viaje al centro de la Tierra, donde se habla de la fundación de una sociedad secreta formada por literatos. Hay autores que ven en el personaje de La vuelta al mundo en ochenta días, una referencia a lo que estamos hablando. En Phiélas Fogg estaría la clave. “Phiélas” puede descomponerse en “eas”, que en griego significa “todo”, que es equivalente a “Poli”. Lo del “Fogg” es más evidente, pues significa “niebla” en inglés.

Pero no hay que ir muy lejos para encontrar como este libro inspiró a pintores como Delacroix o Poussin. Basta con pasear por el Claustro de la Universidad de Salamanca, para ver en sus paredes grabados de este libro. Es más, hay zonas de los jardines de Aranjuez y de Versalles, que están sacados de las ilustraciones del “Sueño”.

Quizás, el “Sueño” sea el primer Manifiesto Hermético del Renacimiento. Un manual en clave donde se expresa una doctrina que se quería salvaguardar de las persecuciones. Una doctrina basada en la Vieja Religión, la de las corrientes neopaganas que practicaban en la Academia de los Príncipes y en las sociedades secretas de la época. Quizás ese amor a Polia sea el simbolismo de un amor a esos conocimientos heréticos y secretos. Pero todo, de momento, queda en un quizás, por lo menos por mí parte.

Nota: Los libros aquí referenciados no deben tomarse como una recomendación de lectura. Entre los libros “extraños” que tengo en mí biblioteca (en realidad el suelo y unas nórdicas estanterías) hay verdaderos peñazos que no recomendaría ni a mí peor enemigo. Algunos, ni siquiera después de los años, he podido entenderlos, como uno que les comentaré en unos días.

Sueño de Polífilo


Polífilo se arrodilla ante la Reina Eleuterylida.
Hypnerotomachia Poliphili (del griego hypnos, ‘sueño’, eros, ‘amor’ y mache, ‘lucha’), o el Sueño de Polífilo (discurso del) en castellano, es una obra de Francesco Colonna (1467). La edición original apareció en Venecia en 1499, en la imprenta de Aldo Manucio, con importantes xilografías, obra del Maestro del Sueño de Polífilo. Constituye una verdadera obra maestra del arte del libro, y obtuvo un gran éxito en el siglo XVI y en el siglo XVII, siendo traducido rápidamente a diversas lenguas.

Índice

Contenido

Se trata de «uno de los libros más curiosos y enigmáticos salidos de unas prensas», «oculta una rara hermosura y un apasionado anhelo de perfección, sabiduría y belleza absolutas, bajo el signo del Amor», «desde el mismo siglo XVI se ha visto rodeado de un aura de esoterismo enfermizo», «está, todavía hoy, envuelto en misterios». «En realidad, es un injerto de poema alegórico de estirpe medieval y enciclopedia humanística de vocación totalizadora, ya que contiene una ingente amalgama de conocimientos arqueológicos, epigráficos, arquitectónicos, litúrgicos, gemológicos y hasta culinarios».1

Repercusión literaria

Además de aparecer citado en obras literarias (por ejemplo, en el siglo XVI en Gargantúa y Pantagruel, de François Rabelais, y en el XX en El Club Dumas, de Arturo Pérez-Reverte), sus elementos crípticos e iconográficos han sido objeto central de la exitosa novela de misterio de Ian Caldwell y Dustin Thomason The Rule of Four (El enigma del cuatro) ambientada en la Universidad de Princeton.
Polyphilo: or The Dark Forest Revisited - An Erotic Epiphany of Architecture es una recreación moderna de la historia de Polyphilo por Alberto Pérez-Gómez, un eminente historiador de la arquitectura. El prólogo es una excelente introducción a la Hypnerotomachia.



Julio Verne dijo de sí mismo: «Me siento el más desconocido de los hombres». Y es que todo en su vida fue un verdadero misterio...
  Alejandro Dumas padre tuvo famosos amigos ocultistas como Papus, Eliphas Lévi o el quiromántico D'Arpentigny, que fue quien le presentó a Verne. Tan prometedor le pareció este joven que Dumas se convirtió en su padre espiritual y le inició en los ritos de la Sociedad de la Niebla. Allí conoció a su futuro editor Pierre Jules Hetzel. Dumas y Hetzel fueron tal vez dos de los miembros más activos de esa sociedad.
El primero captaba jóvenes valores literarios y había escrito su novela, El capitán Pánfilo (1839), como un guiño al grupo al que pertenecía, donde su protagonista va manteniendo conversaciones con la elite de París. Recordemos que Pan, al igual que el término Poli, significa 'todo' y Filo, 'hijo'. Hetzel, por su parte, publicaba los libros de sus miembros divulgando soterradamente sus ideas, promocionándolas a través de su Magazine d'Education et Récréation, dirigido por un notable masón llamado Jean Macé.
Verne, amigo de criptogramas, escribe en 1871 La vuelta al mundo en 80 días, cuyo protagonista es Phileas Fogg, extraño nombre para un caballero inglés que adquiere su auténtico significado cuando sabemos su pertenencia a este grupo secreto: 
Fogg es 'niebla' en inglés y Phileas es el equivalente etimológico de Poliphilo (además Phileas puede descomponerse en «eas» que en griego es 'todo' y equivale a Poli). 
Otros dicen que Phileas viene del latín filius (hijo), lo que daría 'hijo de la niebla'. Los partidarios de esta teoría, como Michel Lamy, tienden a vincular la creación del nombre con las iniciales del Reform Club al cual pertenecía el inmutable y flemático inglés. Ve en RC (las iniciales del nombre del club) una alusión a la palabra Rosacruz, grupo ocultista cuya filosofía imitaba la Sociedad de la Niebla. 
En 1903, en una de las entrevistas que le hiciese Robert Sherard, el autor francés, al hablar de este particular, Verne expresó: «Le concedo cierta importancia a los nombres (...) Cuando encontré el apellido Fogg me sentí complacido y orgulloso. Y era muy popular. Fue considerado un hallazgo real. Pero fue especialmente el nombre, Phileas, el que le dio tal valor a la creación. Sí, los nombres tienen gran importancia. Siga como ejemplo los padrinazgos de Balzac».
Hubo otros miembros que destacaron por su labor literaria y por divulgar sutilmente la existencia de la Sociedad de la Niebla. Gérard de Nerval se inspiró en los mensajes cifrados de El sueño para componer algunos de sus relatos, como el titulado «Angelique», que forma parte de su obra Las hijas del fuego (1854). George Sand, seudónimo que encubrió a la controvertida Aurore Dupin, se dejará influenciar por la Sociedad Angélica utilizando, para algunos de sus personajes fundamentales, nombres como Ange en su novela Spiridion y Angele en Consuelo.
Maurice Barrés, otro de los escritores de la Niebla, además de político y amigo del místico Stanislas de Guaita, es el autor de la novela La colina inspirada (1913). Hay quien ha creído ver una referencia a Rennes-le-Cháteau, al ser una obra en la que se insinúa la existencia de un gran complot para transformar el cristianismo gracias al apoyo financiero de la casa real de los Habsburgo, con el secreto propósito de instaurar la figura de un gran monarca en Europa. 
La Niebla estaba relacionada con otra sociedad secreta de la época, la Golden Dawn, fundada en Inglaterra en 1887 y que contaba con una logia en París. Entre sus miembros estaban el premio Nobel William B. Yeats y Bram Stoker, cuyo Drácula muestra las ideas e influencias de esta sociedad.
En España existe una edición traducida y comentada de Hypnerotomachia Poliphili, por la historiadora Pilar Pedraza, donde se intenta esclarecer su importancia. En la introducción explica: «En realidad, es un poema alegórico... que contiene una ingente amalgama de conocimientos arqueológicos, epigráficos, arquitectónicos, litúrgicos, gemológicos y hasta culinarios». No es de extrañar que encandilara a expertos e investigadores de todos los tiempos, incluidos los intelectuales franceses decimonónicos. Y su influjo continúa. 
En nuestros días el Hypnerotomachia Poliphili se ha convertido en el argumento de un best setter
Me refiero a El enigma del cuatro (2004), de Ian Caldwell y Dustin Thomason, en el que sus protagonistas, Paul Harris y Tom Sullivan, a punto de graduarse en la Universidad de Princeton, intentan resolver un crimen sabiendo que en las ilustraciones de esa obra se encuentran mensajes y claves ocultas que hay que descifrar, algo que les llega a obsesionar. Los autores mezclan ficción con datos reales, como el hecho curioso de que si se unen las iniciales de los títulos de sus treinta y ocho capítulos, se puede leer: 
«Poliam frater Eranciscus Columna peramavit», es decir, el nombre de su autor, Francesco Colonna, al parecer un fraile dominico veneciano.
Hoy sigue siendo un enigma tanto El sueño de Polifilo como La Niebla, cuyos miembros lo tenían como libro de cabecera. No se puede entender la una (la sociedad) sin la otra (la obra). Ya han pasado más de quinientos años y seguimos casi como al principio. Quizá una de las claves nos la dé una frase que aparece en uno de sus jeroglíficos: «Apresúrate siempre despacio».
Haremos caso a esta máxima para que la sociedad que inspiró no se pierda en la «neblina» del tiempo...
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by Philip Coppens
from PhilipCoppens Website
There was a “movement” named AGLA, about which we know very little. As a secret society, it maintained its nature very well. On first appearance, it seems they were an underground movement that was not very active. However, this is a dubious statement to make: as they were little known, bluntly suggesting they were not very active is dangerous, owing to the fact that we do not know anything about them, which means we know nothing about their activities or frequency thereof either. 

Robert Ambelain defines AGLA as an autonomous society and firmly closed. He suggests that rather than a subgroup, they were in fact the group behind a more visible organization, like for example, the organization led by another priest, Nicholas Montfaucon de Villars, author of “Count de Gabelis”, subtitled “The Extravagant Mysteries of the Cabalists, expounded in Five pleasant Discourses on the Secret Societies.” 
The book which appeared in 1670, was a treatise on the occult and elemental sex magic, assuring its ban in France, even though it sold out several editions in the first few months. Nevertheless, it had no known author, until Montfaucon’s name was advanced. He was a well-known figure, a “Libertin”, an intellectual whose ideas were deemed dangerous both for the church and the king. In March 1673, De Villars was murdered by a rifle bullet, near Lyons. His murder was never solved, but René Nelli believes that Montfaucon de Villars had been assassinated, possibly because in his book, he had revealed “too much”.
Villars wrote on the topic of,
“the great name of AGLA, which operates all these wonders, at the same time as it is called upon by the ignoramuses and the sinners, and who would do many more miracles in a Kabbalistic fashion”.
What could this secret be that had to be protected at all cost, even with the life of this priest? This question remained unanswered, but raises another, almost identical one: what could be the secret that had to be protected at all cost, even with the life of the priest Antonin Gélis? No answer has ever been provided for his murder either. 

That murder occurred on the evening of 31st October, 1897, in his presbytery. Newspaper accounts relate how Gélis was found lying in a pool of blood, his arms placed on his belly, but his legs in an awkward position, with one leg firmly underneath the body. He had suffered 14 blows to the head, fracturing his skull and even making the brain visible.
There were further minor injuries on the rest of his body. Gélis had locked up the night before and it was known he never let anyone in at night, unless he knew the person visiting. With no signs of a break-in, it is clear that Gélis let his murderer in – and was thus familiar with him. The murderer killed the priest, but did not steal anything of value. 

Although cabinets had been gone through and some documents had been stolen, nothing of value, including 500 Francs, had been taken. Newspaper reports spoke of a “masked intruder” who had also broken into the presbytery many years before and had got away with certain papers. He was never found and now history was repeating itself and no-one was ever charged with the murder.

One organization known as AGLA was not esoteric at all. That AGLA was, from its inception, only intended to attract invited members from the publishing industry: booksellers, printers, etc. The presence of a Rabelais, Nicholas Flamel, Sebastien Greif, Montfaucon de Villars would therefore not seem odd – neither would the booksellers of Lyons, who bought Saunière’s books. According to Robert Ambelain, AGLA also attracted the makers of the first sets of Tarot cards.

There is AGLA, but there is also A.G.L.A. – written with all capital letters punctuated by a point. In this interpretation, “AGLA” would not be one word, but the abbreviation of four words. It is clear that this approach would be a clever “trick” – a smokescreen. For all intents and purposes, any observer would read AGLA or A.G.L.A. as an incorrect rendering of Agla – a society which had no esoteric connections whatsoever. Even if someone felt that A.G.L.A. could not be an error, but meant something else, there was no way for that person to know what each letter stood for – unless he had powerful computers at his disposal, or, more likely, came across someone who “knew”.

So what might A.G.L.A. stand for? One proposed reading is Attâh, Gibbor, Leholâm, Adonâi:
“Thou art strong for ever, O Lord”.
Actually, many people in Germany thought it stood for “Almachtiger Gott Losch Aus!

It is said to contain all the letters of the Kaballah. Tradition has it that the Divine Power resides within this simple set of four letters, containing at the same time absolute knowledge, the science of Solomon and the Light of Abraham. In other readings, it is the Secret or Hidden Name of God, so cherished by the Kaballists, but also other esoteric traditions, including the Freemasons. The question arises, therefore, as to whether Saunière’s remotely guided steps were to direct him into that direction?

The A.A. is a genuine organization – the very organization that was identified as the one to which Henri Boudet, the priest of Rennes-les-Bains, and Felix-Arsène Billard, the bishop of Carcassonne, belonged. However, trying to find information on the A.A. is next to impossible. We note that a document was found, which listed Boudet and two bishops of Carcassonne as members of this organization. This information was given to us by Gérard Moraux de Waldan.

It seems that several movements, at least four to our knowledge, claimed to be a part of this organization. However, although it was certainly present in more than 39 areas of France, only the Toulouse area seems to have had retained documents on the subject.

The general presentation of these little known groups shows a structure established on secrecy, accompanied by an undeniable spiritual improvement. At the time of the French Revolution, these secret societies opposed a clergy managed by a civil Constitution. One also finds their virulent action against the Napoleonic Regime during the plundering of the Vatican archives, the general confusion in Rome and the arrest of the pope.

According to Jean-Claude Meyer, in the Ecclesiastical Bulletin of Literature,
“The study of the AA of Toulouse, founded into the 17th century, forms part of the understanding of the more general movement of spiritual and apostolic reform of the clergy of France at that time. Beyond rules which appear out of date today, the history of this AA reveals the spirit of a sacerdotal fraternity lived by the fellow-members: thus is explained its exceptional longevity, one which will see the positive effects during the decade of the Revolution.”
There is also the work of Count Bégouin who, in 1913, presented one of rare works on the subject in the form of a work entitled:
  • UNE SOCIETE SECRETE
    EMULE DE LA COMPAGNIE DU SAINT-SACREMENT
    L’AA DE TOULOUSE
    AUX XVIIe et XVIIIe SIECLES
    D’APRES DES DOCUMENTS INEDITS

     
  • A SECRET SOCIETY
    EMULATING THE COMPANY OF THE SACRED SACRAMENT
    THE AA OF TOULOUSE
    FROM THE XXVII and XVIII CENTURY
    ACCORDING TO UNPUBLISHED MANUSCRIPTS
On the bottom of the title page is the address of the “editors”, set in two columns:
• on the left: “PARIS, Auguste Picard, rue Bonaparte 81”
• on the right-hand side: “TOULOUSE, Edouard Privat, rue des Arts, 14”.
At the bottom of the last page of text (page 131), is the identity of the printer:
“Toulouse, Imp. Douladoure - Privat, rue St Rome, 30–678.”
Count Bégouin himself admits that there are difficulties when he tries to base his argument on previously unpublished documents, which are, of course, essential for his work. These documents were extremely difficult to find, although apparently some were said to exist in the region of Lyons and Vienna, at the beginning of this century.

The starting point of Bégouin’s quest is the Parliamentary Decree of 13th December, 1660, marking the dissolution of the “Compagnie de St-Sacrement”. It also stated that it was now forbidden “to all people to make any assemblies, neither brotherhoods, congregations or communities” anywhere in France “without the express permission of the King”.

During the 17th century, the Compagnie de St Sacrement was a genuine movement which seems to have gone against the French King. It actually involved his mother, Anne of Austria, who seems to have plotted on the side of the conspirators, a group of people including Nicolas Pavillon, Vincent de Paul and, it seems, the Fouquet family. The statutes of the Compagnie stated that its sole goal was the “maintenance of the secret”. But the French king came down hard on the organization, and on any future attempt to reorganize it.
However, it seems that the AA’s original role was to perpetuate the Compagnie, to maintain “the secret” – and to make sure that this time, the powers that were, could not stop them.

Curiously, one of the first documents to use the term A and AA, was published by Mr. Lieutaud, a librarian in Marseilles. It was in the reproduction of a report of 1775, on the AA of that city, written by its president, with the complete order of what was known as a “Société”. The title does not match up with the contents. It is curious that in a total of 16 pages, there is no reference to details of printing or the publisher. It is known as “A and AA, Preamble of a Future Encyclopaedia of Provence”.
It is difficult to understand the relationship between the AA and an encyclopaedia of Provence, however glorious its scenery is perceived to be. The same can be said of another booklet, again without any references, entitled “French history by a Carthusian monk”. Two further works on the same topics would follow.

At this stage, two points demand our attention. First is the question as to how a librarian can publish books which lack all references; it is the very opposite of what his job description entails. Furthermore, as Bégouin himself stated, the titles are “odd and disconcerting”. Any normal search in a library would fail to come up with these booklets, except for someone who knew what he was looking for.

But even stranger collections would be published:
“A secret society of ecclesiastics in the seventeenth and eighteenth century - AA Cléricale - its history, its statutes, its mysteries”, with the epigraph: ‘Secretum prodere noli.’ To Mysteriopolis, with Jean de l’Arcanne, librarian of the Company, rue des trois cavernes, at Sigalion, in the back of the shop. MDCCCXCIII - with permission.”
On the back of the page, it reads:
“100 copies printed – none will be sold.”
The reference is so enigmatic that you might suspect you had become a character in a detective novel! The “with permission” reference is just one in a long series of incredible details. Is it a hoax? A joke? Have these documents been falsified, as has been the case in some instances in the mystery of Rennes-le-Château? However, the booklet does exist and the reader will find that there is an accompanying document at the end of the collection.

Our librarian Lieutaud never betrayed his sources, except to state:
“By ways that were both multiple and unexpected, the original parts that were used to compose this work fell into my hands. We are not authorized to say it, and thanks to God, though we never belonged to any AA, we know to maintain its secrecy.”
There is little else, except some throwaway sentences:
“Knowing how jealously the last owners took care of these invaluable papers, keeping them contained and hidden, allows me suppose that, as for the Company of the Blessed Sacrament, we are far from knowing all the places where these files lie.”
On page 20, it explains that in Toulouse, it had access to the files of the AA, which had more than 1,300 names of ecclesiastics from the Toulouse region who were members.

This was not the only book of its kind. There was another such document printed in Lyons, at Baptiste de Ville, rue Mercière, in 1689. The book is extremely rare and unknown to bibliographers, just like yet another book, dated to 1654, which is intended “for a restricted number of initiates, those that belonged to the small group of elected officials comprising the AA”.

The reason for the choice of AA or A.A. as the title is never explained in the documents. It is argued that it comes from the expression “Associatio Alicorum”. 

Others say it comes from taking the two A’s from AssociAtion, and to present them in a similar way to those that appear in certain alchemical writings such as AAA, for the term “AmAlgAmer”, i.e. removing the consonants to keep only the vowels. 

If that were the case, such coding is contrary to Egyptian or Kabbalistic writings, where normally, the vowels are removed and the consonants kept, e.g. YHWH rather than Yahweh – which would be AE if the “vowel-retention cipher” had been used.

Bégouin himself believed that the AA should for “Amis” and “Assemblies”, Assembled Friends, thus summarizing the spirit of this company. Another assumption advanced by Lietaud is that AA stood for “Association Angelica” – the organization which, according to some, was related to “AGLA”.

One of the few letters sent by the AA does have the heading: J. M. J. A. C., which are the initials of: Jesus, Maria, Joseph, Angeli Custodes, i.e. Custodian Angels. This is an intriguing analysis. It seems to identify the AA somehow as being “Guardian Angels” of a “secret” that was at the heart of the Compagnie du Saint-Sacrement, and its successor, the AA. Perhaps the AA is the Association of Angels?

The rule of the “secret” was absolute and without exemption. Admittedly, for certain researchers within this framework, the “secret” was simply that of the “good deeds performed under religious initiative”. But what is secret about “doing good”? If “good things” had to be kept secret, there are normally very good reasons for it – and the “good deeds” would not be of the everyday variety that you might do on weekends or weekday mornings in the church, those normally practiced by elderly men and women, who are “doing good” for the community.

Instead, the AA says:
“It is thus essential to maintain our secrecy. Reveal it to no-one, neither to the most intimate friends, nor to the dearest parents, not even to the most trustworthy confessor. Why would one speak with the confessor about it? In a project of this nature, that the only natural lights come from the Father of Light, a similar confidence was never necessary; it would always be imprudent and often contrary to the existence or the propagation of our AA.
Outside of the assemblies, the fellow-members will behave together as though no secret bond linked them. No sign, no word to make anyone suspect. In their letters, if they happen to mention the AA, it should only be in the shortest and most general terms possible. The AA will never be named, either in the letters, or in ordinary conversations. Those who have some papers relating to our Association on their premises, will preserve them with care and under key.”
Surely this is not “just” so that no-one would know when the next cake stall is on – or what profit margin there was on the second hand books sale? These rules are similar to those of other secret societies, or societies, which require initiation. It could be that of a Masonic lodge, as they could still be found at the beginning of the 20th century. 

But whereas the secrecy of a Masonic lodge these days is a matter of form, it seems clear that the AA is serious. The secrecy instilled in their members is more along the lines of an intelligence agency rather than a brotherhood of mutually interested individuals. But the question is whether the AA is a secret society, or a discreet society. In the documents of the AA, the rules relating to the secret start from page 71 onwards.
There is mention of a password, how to envisage the self-destruction of the cell, to destroy all traces of its existence, to pass from action to silence if there is the slightest doubt. You can wonder whether terrorist organizations practice such a level of secrecy. This type of moral convention is of such an inconceivable rigor that the only framework in which this document could come about is that of a fanatical sect… or of a movement that was elected to safeguard a frightening secret.

It is difficult to believe that within the Church, there would be a company, made up of monks, that could impose such injunctions to protect themselves if their only goal was prayers, benevolence or charity. After all, “doing good” has always been out in the open; “doing bad” is normally done in secret.

There is another intriguing aspect to the AA. Under certain conditions, it allowed the admission of women from exclusively female congregations. Furthermore, laymen could, under very strict conditions, be accepted too. According to the type of members, they were distributed over several “congregations”. 
For the Seminarists, the AA rule envisaged a type of ante-room, called “Small Company”. In this, the future priests were allowed to meet, without ever knowing the “active members” of the brotherhood. As in all other brotherhoods, there were several levels, or grades, in the hierarchy. No doubt, the lower echelons had no idea what the higher ranks were up to – as is the case in any hierarchical organization, whether a business organization or a secret society.

Even so, at this stage it is still possible to consider that we are talking about a congregation, though of a very exceptional severity, reserved for a kind of religious elite… yet without being able to accept or acknowledge that it could be something else – something more obscure – secret.

Yet, that this is the case, is argued by the document itself:
“At the same time, behind this congregation or visible company, there was another occult one. It was the true AA, whose existence was a mystery and the name of the members an even greater mystery still. There were several political characters among them. The meetings were secret and certain members, in particular Prince de Polignac, only went to them in disguise. For on being allowed into this association, it was necessary to swear to absolute secrecy, to promise a blind obedience with passwords which no-one else knew.”
Prince Jules de Polignac (1780 - March 29, 1847) was a French statesman, who played a conspicuous part in the clerical and ultra-royalist reaction after the Revolution. 

If he attended such meetings, then it is clear that they were important – and controversial. If we place Saunière in the same environment, then we find a solid reason why he felt he could never divulge the origins of his income – not to his bishop, or to anyone else. He had sworn himself to it – to protect “the secret”. Although it might seem bizarre that a small village priest should become a member of such a notorious organization, he was a priest – somehow predisposed towards joining the AA – and a discovery in his church might have propelled him to the forefront of their attention – and their cash flow.

It is clear that if Boudet and Billard were members of this organization – and the evidence suggests they were – then they too would be part of this secret brotherhood. It would seem that de Beauséjour was not…

The AA is the best candidate for the framework in which Saunière and his closest allies operated; membership of the AA could explain the extreme level of secrecy that Saunière adhered to – at the same time being instructed on how to maintain that secrecy so that his “double life” would never be known…

jueves, 11 de junio de 2015

algas



Javier Ruiz (Sambal) buscando nuevos ingredientes en la Mar









La vida de Javier Ruiz ha circulado siempre en torno a la mar, su pueblo natal (Noja) vive de frente a la mar y todo gira en torno a ella en la vida cotidiana de pueblo.



Preparando parte del proximo post me acerque a Sambal y al final temine quedando con Javier al dia siguiente en su particular peregrinaje gastronomico en la busca de nuevas experiencias y utilidades gastronomicas en este caso relacionados con algas, erizos y pepinos de mar o espardeñas.

La mar siempre es femenina, por lo menos en Cantabria, nuestra comunidad es femenina, sociedad matriarcal, dominada por la mar y la montaña, deidad principal la luna y de marcada religiosidad Mariana, asi que nadie se sorprenda a la hora de referirme al medio marino en su estado natural "femenino" la.

Javier Ruiz siempre buscado nuevas experiencias culinarias ultimamente se esta centrando en la identificacion y recoleccion de algas del cercano litoral para su aplicacion en el mundo de la gastronomia, tambien esta investigando la utilidades del pepino de mar, espardeña en Cataluña. Y por ultimo incorporando los erizos en su busqueda de nuevas experiencias.
El pepino de mar

Es una especie de equinodermo de la clase Holothuroidea (pepinos de mar). Mide, como máximo, 30 cm y su cuerpo es blando, aplanado y rugoso, de color marrón-rojizo con manchas blancas.



La carne, blanca, de esta especie de pepino de mar es apreciadísima para recetas de alta cocina, por su sabor y su escasez en el mercado, ya que se pesca en pequeñas cantidades.

La caracteriza el hecho de que algunos ejemplares alberguen en su interior un parásito parecido a un gusano (aunque se trata de un pez, Carapus acus) y que se alimenta de sus órganos sexuales. Cuando la espardeña se siente incómoda por la presencia de estos parásitos, se desprende de sus propias vísceras, las cuales posteriormente regenera.



Durante casi todo el siglo XX las espardeñas eran, si no unas desconocidas, sí un plato que sólo apreciaban los hombres del mar, especialmente en Cataluña, Valencia y Baleares, que las cocinaban principalmente como acompañamiento a los arroces típicos marineros. En Ibiza las llaman morena bamba, en Cataluña espardenya, en Cádiz, carajo de mar, en Cantabria pepino de mar.
Los Erizos

Los equinoideos (Echinoidea), comúnmente conocidos como erizos de mar, son una clase del filo Equinodermos. Son de forma globosa o discoidal, carecen de brazos y tienen un esqueleto interno, cubierto sólo por la epidermis, constituido por numerosas placas calcáreas unidas entre sí rígidamente formando un caparazón, en las que se articulan las púas móviles. Viven en todos los fondos marinos, hasta los 2500 metros de profundidad. Han sido muy abundantes en diversas épocas geológicas desde su aparición en el Silúrico. Comprenden unas 950 especies vivientes.



Los erizos de mar tienen una larga historia gastronómica. Los griegos ya los conocían y los consumían abundantemente de aperitivo, como documenta el mismísimo Aristóteles. También figuraban en la alimentación de los romanos, que los comían sazonados con vinagre, perejil y menta.

Las zonas de mayor difusión del consumo de los erizos históricamente son el Mediterráneo, la Patagonia y las zonas tropicales. En España los comían tradicionalmente los pescadores de Andalucía, Asturias, Cantabria o Cataluña.



Los erizos de mar se se abren cortando un trozo del caparazón con unas tijeras fuertes por el lado de la boca. Para cortarlos, sujetadlos con un paño, ya que pinchan bastante.

A continuación escurrid el agua y sacad con una cucharita las cinco partes anaranjadas situadas en forma radial. Esa parte son lo único que se come aunque el líquido también se puede aprovechar.
Algas

Las algas son quizás las grandes desconocidas del mar para la mayoría de la gente, ya que pasan desapercibidas en un mar en el que especialmente los peces y en general todos los animales son los que más llaman la atención.



Generalmente, entre la mayoría de las personas, las algas gozan de bastante mala fama, su tacto resulta desagradable y pocos aceptan tocarlas. Cuando el mar las arranca y las deposita en la playa, forman enormes montones malolientes de materia en descomposición; se enganchan y enredan a los aparejos de los pescadores; se adhieren rápidamente a los cascos de las embarcaciones, obligando a invertir en costosos tratamientos para eliminarlas; si caminamos sobre una zona recubierta de algas en marea baja, tenemos que ser muy cuidadosos, pues son muy resbaladizas. Ya en tiempos de los romanos, el poeta Virgilio resumió el sentir general hacia las algas con la siguiente frase: “Nada es más despreciable que las algas”.



Pudimos encontrar diferentes tipos de algas, el codium, ogonori, kombu, alga parasita, lechuga de mar etc.



El Ogonori (Gracilaria spp.) es un tipo de alga comestible del género de algas rojas (Rhodophyta) habitualmente utilizada para producir el agar agar que utilizamos en la cocina como gelificante natural, aunque también se elabora con otras variedades de algas rojas, como las Gelidium o las Chondrus.

El alga ogonori se cultiva abundantemente en Asia, además de en otros continentes, siendo de gran importancia para el desarrollo económico. Es muy consumida y demandada para producción de alimentos en Japón, el Caribe y Latinoamérica, y también para hacer pienso para ciertos peces y mariscos.

Se puede incluir cruda en algunos platos, como en las ensaladas, como guarnición o complemento de platos como pescados, arroces, etc. También se puede incluir en rellenos o farsas, siendo un sustituto recurrido en las dietas vegetarianas de las proteínas de origen animal, pues además de ser un alimento muy nutritivo, como bien sabemos las algas rojas son espesantes. Por ello también son utilizadas en la elaboración de sopas, caldos, salsas, etc.





El alga Kombu es originaria de Japón y constituye una de las más utilizadas. Pertenece al grupo de las “algas pardas” y entre sus riquezas destaca su alto contenido en yodo que puede influir en el correcto funcionamiento de las glándulas tiroides.

El alga kombu se puede conseguir en tiendas japonesas u orientales y sólo debemos remojarlas para después cocinarlas e incorporarlas a nuestros platos.

En la dieta del deportista, las algas pueden resultar una gran alternativa para reponer las pérdidas de minerales y agua tras la ejercitación física. Por ello, un plato de cereales enriquecido con alga kombu puede convertirse en un buen bocado para después del entrenamiento.



Ulva lactuca, así se llama realmente el alga marina comestible conocida comúnmente como lechuga de mar por tener largas hojas de color verde, muy parecidas a las hojas de lechuga. Su crecimiento se produce en las zonas intermareales, creciendo en los peñascos y descubriéndose durante la marea baja. Esta presente que casi todos los mares del mundo.

Es rica en proteínas, hidratos de carbono, fibra, sodio, calcio, yodo, hierro (50 veces más que las espinacas) y magnesio. Se comercializa sobre todo deshidratada, aunque también se puede encontrar en conserva.







Al final pasamos una mañana de lo mas gratificante en el sector intermareal de la costa de Noja, identificando diferentes tipos de algas, algunas de ellas las probamos y resultaron para mi sorpresa de gran sabor y perfectamente comestibles, con un acentuado sabor a mar, cercano al sabor del percebe, una buena experiencia acompañado de Javier.

miércoles, 10 de junio de 2015

Antiguas tribus nunca tienen dolor de espalda

El motivo por el que algunas tribus jamás tienen dolor de espalda

Esther Gokhale, L.Ac. discusses her book "8 Steps to a Pain-Free Back

¿Te duele la espalda? Puede que se te haya olvidado colocarte en una postura saludable y de ahí venga tu tormento. Eso es lo que piensa Esther Gokhale, una gurú postural, que asegura haber encontrado la solución a todos los dolores en esta sensible parte del cuerpo.

Según esta bioquímica licenciada en la universidad de Princeton y que también ha estudiado en la escuela de medicina de Stanford, en algunas tribus en la India jamás ha existido el dolor de espalda. Y no porque no hayan cargado peso, ni mucho menos. Trabajan, llevan de un lado a otro pesados bardos y transportan a sus hijos sin dolor, todo gracias a una postura ‘perfecta’ que reparte el lastre por toda su anatomía.

La propia Gokhale ha probado el éxito de esta posición. En los años 90, sufrió una hernia discal. El dolor era tan insoportable que apenas podía dormir dos horas por la noche, según explica en su página web.   Aunque pasó por el quirófano, no encontró sosiego. Ni tampoco en las terapias alternativas. Así que decidió recorrer el mundo en busca de alivio.
http://media.mercola.com/ImageServer/Public/2013/August/stretch-sitting.jpg
Y lo encontró tras visitar Sudamérica, Asia y África. En los tres continentes descubrió tribus que no conocían lo que era el dolor de espalda. En esos lugares remotos, Gokhale fotografió a mujeres cargando gran cantidad de peso o que se tiraban horas sentadas en el suelo. Analizando las imágenes, encontró que el secreto podía estar en la columna vertebral.
 
Columna en forma de 'J'
“La columna de los norteamericanos suele tener forma de ’S’”, explica Gokhale en una entrevista concedida a la radio NPR, “cuando están de pie se forma una curva en la parte de arriba, otra en la parte media y otra en la final. En las personas que jamás han tenido dolor de espalda no se ve esa forma, sino una ‘J’”.

Columna en forma de 'S' (Izquierda) y columna en forma de 'J' (derecha)Columna en forma de 'S' (Izquierda) y columna en forma de 'J' (derecha)


Después de este hallazgo, Gokhale se ha dedicado a estudiar la figura humana en el arte, y ha descubierto que en las estatuas del Renacimiento o en los dibujos de Leonardo Da Vinci no se ve la espalda en ’S’, sino la ‘J’. Ella atribuye este cambio a que nos hemos olvidado de caminar y cargar con peso.

¿Pero cómo podemos recuperar esa forma saludable? Gokhale ha escrito varios libros sobre el tema, explicando ejercicios y posturas más saludables para sentarse o cargar con peso. Sus publicaciones han tendio tanto éxito que empresas como Google o Facebook  le han pedido consejo para que sus trabajadores no padezcan dolores posturales.

La clave para acabar con el dolor de espalda
Pero no hace falta ver ningún libro de Gokhale para poder salvar nuestra dolorida parte de atrás. El  doctor Praveen Mummaneni, un neurocirujano del centro especializado en columna vertebral de la Universidad de California en San Francisco (Estados Unidos) da validez a los hallazgos de Gokhale, ya que reconoce la forma de ’S’ y la forma de ‘J’, pero da un diagnóstico completamente diferente.

“En la actualidad, los occidentales pesan mucho más que los miembros de las tribus de África o la India. Y también pesan más que sus antepasados. Eso podría explicar el cambio de forma de la espalda: ahora la columna tiene que soportar más peso”, razona Mummaneni. “Incluso los occidentales que son más delgados tienen una ’S’ mucho menos pronunciada que los que tienen sobrepeso”.

Para el médico, la solución pasa por “perder peso y fortalecer los músculos de la espalda, los de las piernas y sobre todo, los abdominales. Así se repartirá mejor el peso y el dolor desaparecerá”.

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Primal posture: Ubong tribesmen in Borneo (right) display the perfect J-shaped spines. A woman in Burkina Faso (left) holds her baby so that his spine stays straight. The center image shows the S-shaped spine drawn in a modern anatomy book (Fig. I) and the J-shaped spine (Fig. II) drawn in the 1897 anatomy book Traite d'Anatomie Humaine. (Courtesy of Esther Gokhale and Ian Mackenzie/Nomads of the Dawn)
Primal posture: Ubong tribesmen in Borneo (right) display the perfect J-shaped spines. A woman in Burkina Faso (left) holds her baby so that his spine stays straight. The center image shows the S-shaped spine drawn in a modern anatomy book (Fig. I) and the J-shaped spine (Fig. II) drawn in the 1897 anatomy book Traite d'Anatomie Humaine. (Courtesy of Esther Gokhale and Ian Mackenzie/Nomads of the Dawn)

Back pain is a tricky beast. Most Americans will at some point have a problem with their backs. And for an unlucky third, treatments won't work, and the problem will become chronic.
Believe it or not, there are a few cultures in the world where back pain hardly exists. One indigenous tribe in central India reported essentially none. And the discs in their backs showed little signs of degeneration as people aged.



An acupuncturist in Palo Alto, Calif., thinks she has figured out why. She has traveled around the world studying cultures with low rates of back pain — how they stand, sit and walk. Now she's sharing their secrets with back pain sufferers across the U.S.

About two decades ago, Esther Gokhale started to struggle with her own back after she had her first child. "I had excruciating pain. I couldn't sleep at night," she says. "I was walking around the block every two hours. I was just crippled."

Gokhale had a herniated disc. Eventually she had surgery to fix it. But a year later, it happened again. "They wanted to do another back surgery. You don't want to make a habit out of back surgery," she says.


Many ancient statues, such as this one from Greece, display a J-shaped spine. The statue's back is nearly flat until the bottom, where it curves so the buttocks are behind the spine.
Many ancient statues, such as this one from Greece, display a J-shaped spine. The statue's back is nearly flat until the bottom, where it curves so the buttocks are behind the spine.

This time around, Gokhale wanted to find a permanent fix for her back. And she wasn't convinced Western medicine could do that. So Gokhale started to think outside the box. She had an idea: "Go to populations where they don't have these huge problems and see what they're doing."

Over the next decade, Gokhale went to cultures around the world that live far away from modern life. She went to the mountains in Ecuador, tiny fishing towns in Portugal and remote villages of West Africa.

"I went to villages where every kid under age 4 was crying because they were frightened to see somebody with white skin — they'd never seen a white person before," she says.

Gokhale took photos and videos of people who walked with water buckets on their heads, collected firewood or sat on the ground weaving, for hours.
"I have a picture in my book of these two women who spend seven to nine hours everyday, bent over, gathering water chestnuts," Gokhale says. "They're quite old. But the truth is they don't have a back pain."


Healthy spines in the Western world: The J-shaped spine is often seen in photographs from the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Healthy spines in the Western world: The J-shaped spine is often seen in photographs from the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

She tried to figure out what all these different people had in common. The first thing that popped out was the shape of their spines. "They have this regal posture, and it's very compelling."
And it's quite different than American spines.
If you look at an American's spine from the side, or profile, it's shaped like the letter S. It curves at the top and then back again at the bottom.
But Gokhale didn't see those two big curves in people who don't have back pain. "That S shape is actually not natural," she says. "It's a J-shaped spine that you want."

In fact, if you look at drawings from Leonardo da Vinci — or a Gray's Anatomy book from 1901 — the spine isn't shaped like a sharp, curvy S. It's much flatter, all the way down the back. Then at the bottom, it curves to stick the buttocks out. So the spine looks more like the letter J.
"The J-shaped spine is what you see in Greek statues. It's what you see in young children. It's good design," Gokhale says.
So Gokhale worked to get her spine into the J shape. And gradually her back pain went away.

Then Gokhale realized she could help others. She developed a set of exercises, wrote a book and set up a studio in downtown Palo Alto.
Now her list of clients is impressive. She's helped YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki and Matt Drudge of the Drudge Report. She has given classes at Google, Facebook and companies across the country. In Silicon Valley, she's known as the "posture guru."

Each year, doctors in the Bay Area refer hundreds of patients to Gokhale. One of them is Dr. Neeta Jain, an internist at the Palo Alto Medical Foundation. She puts Gokhale's method in the same category as Pilates and yoga for back pain. And it doesn't bother her that the method hasn't been tested in a clinical trial.
"If people are finding things that are helpful, and it's not causing any harm, then why do we have to wait for a trial?" Jain asked.
But there's still a big question looming here: Is Gokhale right? Have people in Western cultures somehow forgotten the right way to stand?

Scientists don't know yet, says Dr. Praveen Mummaneni, a neurosurgeon at the University of California, San Francisco's Spine Center. Nobody has done a study on traditional cultures to see why some have lower rates of back pain, he says. Nobody has even documented the shape of their spines.
"I'd like to go and take X-rays of indigenous populations and compare it to people in the Western world," Mummaneni says. "I think that would be helpful."



But there's a whole bunch of reasons why Americans' postures — and the shape of their spines — may be different than those of indigenous populations, he says. For starters, Americans tend to be much heavier.

"If you have a lot of fat built up in the belly, that could pull your weight forward," Mummaneni says. "That could curve the spine. And people who are thinner probably have less curvature" — and thus a spine shaped more like J than than an S.

Americans are also much less active than people in traditional cultures, Mummaneni says. "I think the sedentary lifestyle promotes a lack of muscle tone and a lack of postural stability because the muscles get weak."
Everyone knows that weak abdominal muscles can cause back pain. In fact, Mummaneni says, stronger muscles might be the secret to Gokhale's success.

In other words, it's not that the J-shaped spine is the ideal one — or the healthiest. It's what goes into making the J-shaped spine that matters: "You have to use muscle strength to get your spine to look like a J shape," he says.
So Gokhale has somehow figured out a way to teach people to build up their core muscles without them even knowing it. "Yes, I think that's correct," Mummaneni says. "You're not going to be able to go from the S- to the J-shaped spine without having good core muscle strength. And I think that's key here."
So indigenous people around the world don't have a magic bullet for stopping back pain. They've just got beefy abdominal muscles, and their lifestyle helps to keep them that way, even as they age. 

Copyright NPR. View this article on npr.org.

Transcript

ARI SHAPIRO, HOST:
Today in Your Health - back pain. Most Americans have a problem with it at some point. For a third of people in this country, treatments won't work. The problem becomes chronic. There are a few places on Earth where back pain hardly exists. These tend to be cultures that are far removed from modern life. One woman at the epicenter of modern life in Palo Alto, Calif., thinks she has figured out why these traditional societies have such healthy backs. NPR's Michaeleen Doucleff reports.

MICHAELEEN DOUCLEFF, BYLINE: After she had her first baby, Esther Gokhale couldn't even bend down to pick up her child.

ESTHER GOKHALE: I had excruciating pain. I could not sleep at night. I was walking around the block every two hours. And I was just crippled.

DOUCLEFF: Gokhale had a herniated disc. Eventually she had surgery to fix it. But a year later, it happened again.

GOKHALE: And they wanted to do another surgery. And, you know, you don't want to make a habit out of back surgery.

DOUCLEFF: Gokhale is a smart woman. She has a degree in biochemistry from Harvard, and she's a licensed acupuncturist. This time around, she wanted to think outside the box, and here's what she came up with.

GOKHALE: Go to populations where they don't have these huge problems and see what they're doing.

DOUCLEFF: Gokhale went online and searched through medical studies, and she found something intriguing - several studies of traditional populations reporting very low rates of back pain. We're talking about people who live far away from modern life. Now, most of us would've stopped there - at doing research on the web - but not Gokhale. She went to the mountains in Ecuador, to tiny fishing towns in Portugal and to the remote deserts of West Africa.

GOKHALE: Like, I went to villages where every kid under 4 was, you know, like, crying, frightened to see someone with white skin. They'd never seen a white person before.

DOUCLEFF: Gokhale took photos of people who walked with water buckets on their heads, collected firewood or sat on the ground weaving for hours.

GOKHALE: I have a picture in my book of these two women who spend seven to nine hours every day, bent over, gathering water chestnuts. And they're not spring chickens; they're quite old. But the truth is that they don't have back problems.

DOUCLEFF: She tried to figure out what all these different people had in common, and the first thing that popped out was the shape of their spines.

GOKHALE: They have this regal posture, and it's a very compelling.

DOUCLEFF: And quite different than American spines. Here's an experiment. Take a friend and have them stand up and turn to their left so you're looking at them in profile. If they have what we think of as good posture, then their spine is shaped like an S. It curves at the top and then back again at the bottom. This is what's drawn in medical books. But Gokhale didn't see those two big curves in people who don't have back pain.




GOKHALE: That S-shaped spine is actually not natural. It's a J-shaped spine that you want.

DOUCLEFF: In fact, if you look at drawings from da Vinci - or a "Gray's Anatomy" book from 1901 - the spine isn't shaped like a curvy S. It's much flatter almost all the way down the back. And then at the bottom, it curves to stick the butt out, so it looks more like a J. It seemed to her that this J shape was key to a pain-free back, so she developed a set of exercises to get her spine into the J shape. And gradually, her back pain went away. Then Gokhale realized she could help others. She wrote a book, set up a studio in downtown Palo Alto.
 http://annebobroffhajal.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/05/i8_149_DaVinci_Anatomy1.jpg

UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN: And so without further ado, welcome Esther from all of us here in Silicon Valley.


DOUCLEFF: The day I caught up with her, she was giving a workshop at one of the biggest law firms in the world - Jones Day in Palo Alto. About 50 workers dressed in khakis and pencil skirts came to learn how they could sit at their computers for hours without hurting their backs. Gokhale brings a volunteer to the front to demonstrate the most common problem - the way we hold our shoulders.


GOKHALE: Now, if we look at you from the front view, we can see that the portion of her hand that faces forward is mostly her knuckles and not so much the thumb.

DOUCLEFF: Americans tend to scrunch their shoulders forward so our arms are turned in. That's not how people in indigenous cultures carry their arms.

GOKHALE: And we're going to show you a very simple way of addressing this.
DOUCLEFF: Gokhale gently takes the woman's shoulders, pulls them up, pushes them back and lets them drop, like a shoulder roll. And then the woman's arms dangle by her side.

GOKHALE: This is the way all your ancestors parked their shoulders. This is a natural architecture for our species. So it behooves us all to explore this.

DOUCLEFF: Her list of clients is impressive. She's helped YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki, Matt Drudge of the Drudge Report, and she's given classes at Google, Facebook.

In Silicon Valley, she's known as the posture guru. Doctors in the Valley refer hundreds of patients to her, and they put her method in the same category as Pilates and yoga for back pain. But there's still a big question - is she right? Have people in Western society somehow forgotten the right way to stand? Praveen Mummaneni knows spines intimately. He operates on them three times a week and co-directs the Spine Center at the University of California in San Francisco. Mummaneni says scientists don't know yet why some traditional cultures have fewer problems with back pain. Nobody's done a systematic study or even documented the shape of their spines.
PRAVEEN MUMMANENI: I'd like to go and take X-rays of indigenous populations and compare it to the Western world. I think that would be very helpful.
DOUCLEFF: But Mummaneni says there's a whole bunch of reasons why postures of Americans and the shape of their spines may be different than indigenous populations. For starters, Americans tend to be much heavier.
MUMMANENI: If you have a lot of fat built up in your belly, it can tend to pull your low back forward.
DOUCLEFF: And that would curve the spine?
MUMMANENI: That could curve the spine. And people who are fairly thin probably have less curvature.
DOUCLEFF: And, thus, a spine shaped more like a J than an S. Mummaneni also points out that Americans are much less active than people in traditional cultures.
Do you think that that sedentary lifestyle could have an effect on the spine shape?
MUMMANENI: I think the sedentary lifestyle promotes a lack of muscle tone and a lack of postural stability because the muscles get weak.
DOUCLEFF: Everyone knows that weak abdominal muscles can cause back pain. And, in fact, Mummaneni says that might be the secret to Gokhale's success. It's not that the J shape is the ideal one or the healthiest. It's what goes into making the J shape that matters.
MUMMANENI: And you have to use muscle strength to get it to look like the J-shaped spine.
DOUCLEFF: So Gokhale has somehow figured out a way to teach people to build up their core muscles without them even knowing it.
MUMMANENI: Yes, I think that's correct. You're not going to be able to go from the S to the J without having good core muscle strength, and I think that's a key here.


DOUCLEFF: In other words, indigenous people around the world don't have a magic bullet for stopping back pain. They've just got beefy abdominal muscles, and their lifestyle helps to keep them that way even as they age. Michaeleen Doucleff, NPR News.
SHAPIRO: At NPR's "Goats and Soda" blog, you can find Esther Gokhale's five tips for better posture and less back pain. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.


How to adopt the right sitting posture for productivity

October 25, 2013

Summary: In this post I explain how to have the right sitting posture for maximizing long-term productivity and health (hint: it's not the advice you've always been given)

In workflow design, we care about the holistic experience of our work. How we care for and use our bodies is, for that reason, one of the most fundamental drivers of productivity.

Now you probably think I'm going to tell you to "have good posture" like everyone from your parents to your doctors has told you since you were a child.

But have you ever wondered what exactly "good posture" means?


After years of experimenting with every trendy solution short of surgery (fancy office chairs, standing desks, ball chairs, massage, yoga, ergonomics) to fix the discomfort I felt sitting for long periods of time, I've discovered a new posture technique that I believe treats the core problem instead of the symptoms: the Gokhale Method (pronounced Go-clay).

Esther Gokhale is known as "The Posture Guru of Silicon Valley," and her book 8 Steps to a Pain-Free Back has shot to the #1 spot in the category on Amazon, despite basically contradicting everything we've ever been told about posture ( I have no financial or other interest in her business).

The Gokhale Method is simple, easy, requiring minimal time investment, and no special equipment. Its aim is to teach you to sit, stand, and move like our ancestors did, before modern furniture and the fashion industry conspired to mold us into more "modern" positions.

She points to research in traditional societies and indigenous cultures showing that back pain is almost unknown, even among manual laborers and long-term sitters.

In this post I will summarize the first, and most important, technique of the Gokhale Method: stretchsitting.

If you are skeptical, which you should be, spend 20 minutes learning this technique and try it for a week, and you will become a believer.

Here is the video version of this lesson as well: End Back Pain: Stretchsitting


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Summary of Technique #1: Stretchsitting

Defining good posture

First, we need to define what good posture actually looks like. 
  • The pelvis is tipped forward (or anteverted). An easy way to see this is to imagine a belt line and notice that it angles downward toward the front.
  • There is an even groove along the vertical midline of the back. The groove is not especially deep in any place (for example, the low back), nor are the vertebrae prominent in any location (for example, the upper back).
  • The shoulders are positioned behind the torso, so that the arms align with the back of the torso. The arms are externally rotated so that the thumbs face forward.
  • The front contour of the torso is dome-like and smooth. The lower border of the rib cage does not protrude from, but rather is flush with, the abdominal contour. The chest is full with a raised sternum as a result of the chest expanding with every breath.
  • There is a soft angle at the groin between the front of the torso and the legs that lets the femoral arteries, veins, and nerves function normally.
  • The chin, and an imaginary line joining the middle of the ear and the tip of the nose, angle downward as a result of a relaxed and elongated cervical spine.
  • The buttock muscles are well developed because they are positioned correctly.
  • The muscles throughout the body have good tone (not bunched up with long taut tendons attached to bone).
  • The main weight-bearing bones in the body are vertically aligned over the heels.
  • The feet point 10-15 degrees outwards and the arches of the foot are muscular and pronounced.

Key Principles

So how can we create this posture? There are 6 key underlying principles at work:
1. Anteverted pelvis
This is the foundation for everything else, but is the opposite of what most people think of as "good posture." Parents and doctors will tell you to have a "neutral" pelvic position that is slightly or very "tucked."
This retroverted pelvic position leads you into one of two common, yet damaging postures:
  • you sit upright, but your low back muscles are tense, or
  • you relax, but your upper body slumps forward
The ideal position is to have the top of your pelvis tilting forward (anteversion). This allows your vertebrae to be naturally stacked without muscle strain, and aligns your weight over your strongest bones (which, by the way, need a certain level of stress to remain healthy).
 2. A gently curved, elongated spine
The ideal shape of the spine is a gentle, elongated curve, not an exaggerated “S” curve. 
We're always told "chin up and chest out," which creates a spine that curves forward in the low back, backward in the upper back, and forward again in the neck. Most modern furniture and clothing reflects and reinforces this exaggerated curve.
3. Every bone in its natural place
The human skeleton is the product of millions of years of fine-tuned evolution. Each bone has a natural place relative to its neighbors. Adjacent bones are designed to fit together in a certain way.
Our weight-bearing bones need stress to remain strong, but when they're misaligned, even moderate stress results in damage and pain.
4. Using muscles more than joints
Most people use their joints too much, and their muscles not enough. Muscles get weak from underuse, and joints get damaged. Not good.
This method teaches you how to walk and bend correctly, using your muscles to take the burden off your joints.
5. Muscles fully relaxed when not working
When something is wrong with our musculo-skeletal system, we're often directed to some sort of physical strengthening exercise, like in physical therapy. But actually muscle relaxation is just as important as strength.
For muscles to be healthy, they need to relax. Misalignment often becomes habit and people get locked into positions that wear their muscles unnecessarily.
6. Breathing as a therapeutic exercise
Besides, you know, keeping you alive, breathing has another purpose: to exercise the key tissues of the chest and spinal area, keeping them well-circulated and healthy.
The natural elastic movement of breathing provides a massage-like action that promotes circulation. How cool is that?
When you stack your vertebrae correctly, the muscles around your spine will relax, facilitating this elastic action.

Summary of Technique #1: Stretchsitting

The goal of stretchsitting is to lengthen your spine against the back of a chair. This decompresses your discs (preventing damage) and stretches your back muscles (helping them adjust to longer baseline lengths).

Equipment

You will need a basic chair, such as a secretarial chair or padded folding chair. It should have:
  • a firm seat
  • a low, straight backrest that, if adjustable, can be locked into position
  • an outcropping at the mid-back level to which you can "hitch" your spine. 
outcropping.png
Look at this picture of Ubong tribesman as you read this description of good posture:

The pelvis is tipped forward (or anteverted). An easy way to see this is to imagine a belt line and notice that it angles downward toward the front.
There is an even groove along the vertical midline of the back. The groove is not especially deep in any place (for example, the low back), nor are the vertebrae prominent in any location (for example, the upper back).
The shoulders are positioned behind the torso, so that the arms align with the back of the torso. The arms are externally rotated so that the thumbs face forward.
The front contour of the torso is dome-like and smooth. The lower border of the rib cage does not protrude from, but rather is flush with, the abdominal contour. The chest is full with a raised sternum as a result of the chest expanding with every breath.
There is a soft angle at the groin between the front of the torso and the legs that lets the femoral arteries, veins, and nerves function normally.
The chin, and an imaginary line joining the middle of the ear and the tip of the nose, angle downward as a result of a relaxed and elongated cervical spine.
The buttock muscles are well developed because they are positioned correctly.
The muscles throughout the body have good tone (not bunched up with long taut tendons attached to bone).
The main weight-bearing bones in the body are vertically aligned over the heels.
The feet point 10-15 degrees outwards and the arches of the foot are muscular and pronounced.

Key Principles

So how can we create this posture? There are 6 key underlying principles at work:
1. Anteverted pelvis
This is the foundation for everything else, but is the opposite of what most people think of as "good posture." Parents and doctors will tell you to have a "neutral" pelvic position that is slightly or very "tucked."
This retroverted pelvic position leads you into one of two common, yet damaging postures:
  • you sit upright, but your low back muscles are tense, or
  • you relax, but your upper body slumps forward
The ideal position is to have the top of your pelvis tilting forward (anteversion). This allows your vertebrae to be naturally stacked without muscle strain, and aligns your weight over your strongest bones (which, by the way, need a certain level of stress to remain healthy).
If your chair lacks an outcropping, you can make one from a folded towel or flannel sheet placed just below the shoulder blades. This outcropping:
  • Offers a place to hitch your mid-back (discussed later)
  • Gives your buttocks space to settle behind you in the chair
  • Provides enough clearance to let you perform a shoulder roll (discussed later) 

Steps

Step 1: Sit down, placing your buttocks well back in the chair

 If the chair has a gap between the seat and the back, be careful not to place your buttocks too far back. If you do, your back will sway in later steps.

Step 2: Place your feet about hip-width apart and relax your legs

Step 3: Lengthen your spine

Bend at the waist and curve forward slightly to lengthen your low back. This eliminates any sway you may have, and prevents your introducing one in the next step.

Step 4: Further lengthen your spine

Leave your buttocks anchored to the chair. With both hands, hold on to some part of the chair (armrests, backrest, or seat) and push with your arms. Relax the muscles of your torso, allowing the rib cage to separate as much as possible from the pelvis.
Don't do this:
 Be sure you are not engaging your leg muscles in this step. If you find they are tense, stretch your legs forward, fold them under your chair, or use any relaxed position.

Step 5: Attach your mid-back to the backrest or cushion

Keeping your arms engaged to maintain the extra length in your spine, "hitch" your back to the backrest of the chair. Think of pinning a point in your mid-back as high as possible on the backrest. For most people, this will be about an inch higher than normal.
It may help to imagine that you are hanging from the point of contact with the chair like a picture frame hangs from a wall.

Step 6: Release the tension in your arms

Feel the chair take the weight as you release your arms.

Step 7: Straighten your upper back

Now your lower back is in traction. Be sure not to arch back over the chair nor to press so hard against the backrest as to cause discomfort.

Step 8: Perform a shoulder roll with each shoulder

As with all these new movements, the shoulder roll may feel exaggerated and awkward at first, something you wouldn't be comfortable doing in public. With practice and time, the movement becomes subtle, and you can easily incorporate it into seating yourself at a company meeting, in a restaurant, or on your sofa.
Screen Shot 2013-10-25 at 9.02.31 AM.png
Screen Shot 2013-10-25 at 9.02.38 AM.png
Screen Shot 2013-10-25 at 9.02.43 AM.png
Screen Shot 2013-10-25 at 9.02.48 AM.png
Screen Shot 2013-10-25 at 9.02.56 AM.png
Screen Shot 2013-10-25 at 9.03.01 AM.png
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When doing a shoulder roll, imagine the shoulder's soft tissue ratcheting back one notch on a cogged wheel. Unless the pectoral muscles are very tight (lucky you), the shoulders tend to remain in this position without any sustained muscular effort.
Screen Shot 2013-10-25 at 9.04.29 AM.png
Don't do this: 
After performing a shoulder roll, you may notice that your reach is shorter. This is because your arms now originate further back than before. This is a healthy home base position that you don't want to compromise during normal activities. The solution is to adjust your distance from your task. For example, when working at a computer, you may need to move the keyboard closer. When driving a car, you may need to move your car seat closer to the steering wheel (but keep a safe distance from the airbag).

Step 9: Lengthen the back of your neck

Though you have lengthened your back, your neck may still be compressed. There are many ways to lengthen the neck. If your neck is injury-prone, choose Option A or a very gentle version of Option B. If you are looking to make fast progress, use Option E occasionally. Otherwise, choose according to what is comfortable for you. The goal is a neutral neck position with the jaw gliding back and up and the chin angled down.
Option A. Imagine a helium balloon inside your head. Consciously release any tension in your neck muscles that works against the balloon's upward thrust.
Option B. Grab a clump of hair at the base of your skull and gently pull it back and up.
Option C. Position your fingertips in the two side indentations at the base of your skull (the occipital grooves) and move your skull up and away from your body.
Option D. Grasp the base of your skull with both hands and gently pull upward while lowering your shoulders.
Option E. Place (or imagine) a light object on the crown of your head. Push up against it.

Step 10: While continuing to stretch sit, fix the toes and ball of one foot on the floor while lifting the heel

Lift foot just high enough so that the heel clears the floor.
Screen Shot 2013-10-25 at 9.10.11 AM.png
Screen Shot 2013-10-25 at 9.10.26 AM.png

Step 11: Twist and pivot the heel inward before planting it firmly on the floor.

Your goal is to create a "kidney- bean" shape with your foot.
Screen Shot 2013-10-25 at 9.11.03 AM.png

Step 12: Repeat this action with the other foot

Notice that your knees point in the same direction as your toes.

Step 13: Relax your whole body

Let the chair do all the work. Try to locate any tension in your body and release it. Reposition your legs as you wish.
If you find that you settle back to your habitual position after awhile, you will need to reset your position periodically. Simply repeat the steps of this lesson.
I sincerely hope you will at least give this posture method a try. Also check out the book for lots of other techniques and lessons. Report back with your results in the comments!