Looking up with chin down

January 14, 2010 - 2:56pm | 3 posts

Susan

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10/26/2009 - 11:11am

Looking up with chin down

Dear Esther: My question is what to do when looking up in general day to day life. In your book you make reference both to keeping the eyes perpendicular to the body and moving the eyes rather than shifting the head. I'm short and I have to look up a lot to make eye contact with people, or to read so called "eye level"

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January 18, 2010 - 5:15am | 1 post

Esther Gokhale

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09/10/2008 - 8:36pm

Hi Susan, The eyes can do a lot, but not everything...There is a natural way to look up with the head that kids use, that people would use to look up at the sky or the Sistine Chapel and that you may want to use if you are not very tall. It involves pivoting the skull on the atlas and not craning the neck. Try paying attention to the length and stability of your neck as you gently rotate your head to look upwards to find this action. I don't have a set guideline on how much your eyes do and when your head begins to take over the job of looking up. I would be very still and experiment with what seems to have some internal logic. you want to find something harmonious and co-ordinated, not cerebral and stilted. And use your clenching and grinding as a feedback mechanism for your particular case. Good luck and do keep us posted. This is not material that has been researched as far as I know, so it's valuable to get your feedback.

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January 20, 2010 - 2:50pm | 1 post

Susan

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10/26/2009 - 11:11am

Dear Esther: Thanks for the reply, yes there seems to be nothing on the connection between bruxism and eye position or even bruxism and head positioning generally. This weekend found me standing guard over a group of excellent head pivoters in the form of a little kids sports group; they all moved their eyes prior to pivoting their heads and they didn't keep their eyes up or their heads back for too long. I also noticed that they blinked after adjusting their eyes and again after adjusting head positions I've been trying to do what they do and I can pivot when I let my head follow my eyes. It's impossible for me to pivot unless my eyes go first. The blinking seems to be relaxing in some way. That said, my body is still fighting to look down to look up though, as I focus my consciousness on keeping my chin forward, I've actually started unconsciously standing on one foot and rotating my whole torso backwards, just so I can look down to look up. ("and at what?" I ask myself, "the ceiling?") The positive side of this is that I can't grind my teeth because my chin is relaxed and bending backwards on one foot is so awkward that I catch myself almost immediately. Thanks again. Susan