The forgotten joint!

Catrin Abrahamsson-Beynon
Dec 28, 2025
4 min read

And why we loose the spinal mobility as adults and how to reverse it!

Our ankles provide the foundational contact with the ground. When our ankle joints are weak, stiff, or unstable, everything above adapts poorly.

Ankles are often forgotten until they get injured! (as are feet - read about them in an earlier blog). Our ankles are often the cause of other pains higher up in the body, but they rarely get "blamed". Why are our ankles overlooked?

Probably because these joints are small, often hidden under clothes, and not at all flashy.

We tend to train what we can see: chest, arms, quads, glutes. Ankles don’t grow visibly, so they’re ignored unless they hurt.
Shoes "do the work for them": footwear of today stabilizes, cushions, and restricts the ankle. But this is bad help over time because the ankles lose strength and mobility.
Strength routines emphasize hips, knees and shoulders. We just assume that the ankles are strong and healthy, so we do not even train them.
Pain from weak ankles often appears somewhere else first in the form of: Knee pain, Achilles issues, Plantar fasciitis, hip and low back pain, and wrong alignment, which often spreads upwards in the body to shoulder and neck pain.
Hip or low-back compensation

Strong and flexible ankles and feet help your whole body, as they are the foundation. And you cannot build anything durable on a cracked foundation!

So, how to fix this?

Become aware of your ankles, and give them good training to improve their flexibility and mobility. Here is a good inspiration, your whole body will thank you!

The spine is a wave-transmitting structure that moves in harmony with an awakened breath.

And what about the spinal, flowing movement?

My yoga teacher, Ty Landrum, is the person who made me wake up to the spinal wave movement, synchronized with the breath. So, if you are interested, explore more of his teachings here.

Our spine is intended to be movable like a flowing wave! The way our spine is built makes this possible:

It is built with alternating curves (sacral → lumbar → thoracic → cervical).

It is built in segments, with many small joints and elastic discs in between them.

It is supported by deep fascial layers (dura, longitudinal ligaments, myofascial meridians).

This makes the spine function by moving back and forth along its axis; it's not a stack of blocks.

Fundamentals of a wave movement:

Starts centrally
Moves sequentially
Transfers force with minimal local effort

Our first spinal wave takes place when we are born! It awakens our nervous system and makes us ready for life outside our mother.

What our nervous system learns at birth

Movement begins in the central axis (which is our spine), not in the limbs.
Breath and movement are inseparable.
Pressure precedes release (breathing in - taking in prana - builds pressure - expands us from the inside - breathing out - releasing, relaxing us - apana).
Force travels through the whole body and the nervous system and requires whole body coordination, not an engagement of isolated parts/muscles.

This is a pre-conscious patterning.

Our breath is the primary wave driver, so without the breath, no prana and no spinal wave. So even if you practice yoga, but you do not sync your movements with your breath, the spinal wave will not happen. This is true for every type of exercise! — Our breath is the **primary wave driver**, so without the breath, no prana and no spinal wave. So even if you practice yoga, but you do not sync your movements with your breath, the spinal wave will not happen. This is true for every type of exercise!

Why do we lose this pattern as adults?

The modern fitness movement and our lives in general reverse this logic:

Limb-driven motions, meaning our limbs act as the major drivers
Segmental isolation, we isolate movements to a specific part
Bracing instead of an overall pulsing, wavelike movement
We hold our breath, or our breath is not synced with our movements
We use too much force, as we think this gives us control

Our spine is no longer a waveguide; it is treated like a weight-bearing central column.

The results of this type of training and living are neither effective nor healthy.

Our prana does not circulate in the body
We can develop joint pain
Exercising and movements can feel very effortful; we force ourselves to exercise!

How to restore the wave transmission through the spine

Yoga - the sun salutations are a whole practice in themselves
Chi Gong and Tai Chi
Feldenkrais and craniosacral therapies
The goal with yoga and other breath-based practices is not flexibility or strength but restored axial wave mechanics, which lead to both flexibility and strength!