Saving Strength 



1315 



and heavy body must be energized and invigorated. The very effort made 

 in thus taking oneself in hand and holding the body bravely erect, affects 

 the mental state wholesomely. Courage begins to replace despondency. 

 When everything seems topsy-turvy and your feelings are correspondingly 

 crisscross, instead of clouding the day with irritability, or grieving some 

 one by an angry word or unkind tone, try a simple physical culture remedy : 

 stand perfectly still for a full minute; breathe full and deep; let go the 

 tension in the muscles, loosen the hard-set jaw, smooth out the forehead 

 frown; let go physically, and the mental let-go will follow. 



Every one admires a woman who is reposeful. — A well-poised woman has 

 greater efficiency and a greater power over others than does one with less 

 poise. 



HOW TO USE THE BODY 



The backbone: its great importance in the correct use of the body. — Few 

 appreciate how much health, strength, and endurance, how much ease in 

 work and youthfulness of figure, depend on the backbone. 

 When that wonderful twenty-four- jointed column of bones is 

 in its natural position it forms a double curve (Fig. 3). That 

 double-curved line is the line of greatest strength and flexi- 

 bility. It is also the line of beauty. On the maintenance of 

 the double curve in the spine, the attitude of the body as a 

 whole and the correct positions of all the vital organs primarily 

 depend. Although the double-curved line is the right line for 

 the backbone always to keep when the body is simply erect — 

 either in a standing or sitting posture — deviations from that 

 line are continually occurring during the manifold movements 

 of the body. 



The adjustability of the spine to the movement desired is of 

 great service in the use of our bodily machine, but we must^be 

 sure to bring the spine back to its natural pose — the double curve 

 — after every act that causes it to bend or twist ; the failure to 

 do so is one of the chief causes of the aging of the body, of un- 

 due fatigue from work, and of the ills that flesh is not " heir to." 



Injurious and healthful ways of using the body. — A tall, thin woman is 

 represented in Fig. 4 in what is a very common standing position — the 

 back bowed outward in a single curve, the chest and abdominal muscles 

 collapsed. The same general bad use of the body is seen in a sitting posi- 

 tion, Fig. 6 (a). Such positions compress the ribs and disastrously inter- 

 fere with the three indispensable vital functions of life — respiration, cir- 

 culation, and digestion. The chest is cramped and sunken, making full, 

 invigorating breathing impossible; the circulation is impeded by pressure 

 on the veins and arteries, caused by the sagging of the heavy upper trunk; 



Fig. 3 



