What is TONE?

We often hear of the importance of tone…usually referring to muscular tone. “Wow! He/She is buff! So toned!” Yes, that is important AND tone refers to so much more beyond our muscles. I would like to start with a basic experiential as I feel it will offer a deeper awareness of tone. For this experiential you will need a sponge (ideally a sea sponge from a craft store… but an artificial/kitchen sponge can also work) and a tub/sink of warm water:

Experiencing Tone(~15 minutes)

• Encounter a dry sponge: Look at the texture and contours of your dry sponge, Pick it up and feel its crisp dry edges; give it a squeeze, is it malleable? Sniff it…what does it smell like? Run your finger along the dry sponge and listen to its texture.
• Now soak your sponge in warm water until it is fully or over-saturated! Again experience your soaked sponge from as many of your 6 senses as possible (touch, movement, smell, vision, hearing…)
• Lastly, squeeze your sponge until it is wet-damp but not dripping and not overly dry. Take in the sensorial experience of this latest version of your sponge….what do you notice? How do each of these compare w the others? What do you like? What do you dislike?

‘Tone’ refers to the ‘readiness of the body to respond’. This refers not only to the muscular system but also our nervous system, immune system, blood flow, connective tissue flow, glandular and hormonal support, organs, integrity of our skin, and so much more. While a sea sponge is much more basic than we are, the above experiential provides examples of high tone (dry sponge), low tone (over saturated such that it cannot take in more), modulated tone (able to take in and/or release). Our bodies are experts at recruiting the tone it needs in each of our systems to maintain our homeostasis. It is often we ourselves who get in the way, either thru our ‘stories’, or bad habits, or long term patterns that no longer serve us.

Let’s look a few over-simplified examples, that might help you gain more awareness about whole body tone: (a) Often times when we are nervous (high tone in sympathetic nervous system) this carries into a high tone in our myofascial (muscle and connective tissue) system. We can end up performing tasks, such as a dance phrase or a new task at work with excess tone….this can leave us feeling tense and very fatigued. Depending on the situation, this may even lead to a stomach ache (high tone in our GI tract). This may snowball into a poor sleep because we cannot find the balance of our parasympathetic nervous system to enable us to rest.

(b) Say you have had the flu for a few days, and after resting in bed and not eating so much, you feel weak and lethargic (low tone in muscles, low tone in central nervous system). Your body has been active in fighting the virus (high tone in immune system). Then your friend comes over to cheer you up with your favourite game (maybe Dutch Blitz, or take you for nine holes on the golf course.) This feels like a great way to recuperate, except that your friend wins every single time and it feels unreal. Well, give yourself grace: your mind did not have acuity and speed, your muscles felt floppy, and you spent most of the time coughing to clear your lungs.

(c) what other examples can you come up with? Take the time to look at different body systems and try to discern what is the quality of tone in those systems…. It’s incredibly enlightening.

What does this have to do with movement? With life? I often recommend that movers ‘meet the task/resistance with no more and no less than is required’. Take note of your own tendencies…do you tend to excess tone? Does this lead to tension in your muscles? Can you, for example, explore a plank with a bit less tone in your legs and shoulders while still maintaining good form? Can you engage in a dance class from a place of releasing/relaxing your body weight into the earth so that your expressivity is more apparent? Can you bring up your tone when you have to place a bag of sea soil into your vehicle? Can you lower your voice and soften your presence when meeting your grandchild who just fell off their bike? Tone is a dance of modulating your body systems with the situation you find yourself in. Explore modulating your tone!