sense in that as there is in much of the so-called Christian
resignation to be found in the world to-day. To be sure there are
inherited illnesses and pains, physical and mental, but the laws are
so made that the compensation of clear-sightedness and power for use
gained by working our way rightly out of all inheritances and
suffering brought by others, fully equalizes any apparent loss.
In writing there is much unnecessary nervous fatigue. The same
cramped attitude of the lungs that accompanies sewing can be
counteracted in the same way, although in neither case should a
cramped attitude be allowed at all Still the relief of a long breath
is always helpful and even necessary where one must sit in one
position for any length of time. Almost any even moderately nervous
man or woman will hold a pen as if some unseen force were trying to
pull it away, and will write with firmly set jaw, contracted throat,
and a powerful tension in the muscles of the tongue, or whatever
happens to be the most officious part of this especial individual
community. To swing the pendulum to another extreme seems not to
enter people's minds when trying to find a happy medium. Writer's
paralysis, or even the ache that comes from holding the hand so long
in a more or less cramped attitude, is easily obviated by stopping
once in an hour or half hour, stretching the fingers wide and
letting the muscles slowly relax of their own accord. Repeat this
half-a-dozen times, and after each exercise try to hold the pen or
pencil with natural lightness; it will not take many days to change
the habit of tension to one of ease, although if you are a steady
writer the stretching exercise will always be necessary, but much
less often than at first.
In lifting a heavyweight, as in nursing the sick, the relief is
immediate from all straining in the back, by pressing hard with the
feet on the floor and _thinking_ the power of lifting in the legs.
There is true economy of nervous force here, and a sensitive spine
is freed from a burden of strain which might undoubtedly be the
origin of nervous prostration. I have made nurses practise lifting,
while impressing the fact forcibly upon them by repetition before
they lift, and during the process of raising a body and lowering it,
that they must use entirely the muscles of the legs. When once their
minds have full comprehension of the new way, the surprise with
which they discover the comparative ease of lifting is very
pleasant. The whole secret in this and all similar efforts is to use
muscular instead of nervous force. Direct with the directing power;
work with the working power.
VII.
THE DIRECTION OF THE BODY IN LOCOMOTION
LIFTING brings us to the use of the entire body, which is considered
simply in the most common of all its movements,--that of walking.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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