I don't like the term "Corrective Exercise."
I don't like it because the term often implies that something gets corrected because the exercise corrects it. But there's no such thing as something being corrected because of an exercise.
To fully understand what I just said, you need to bring things back to first principles. Let’s start with the term “exercise.”
What exactly is an "exercise"?
Fundamentally, an exercise is just a movement or position you put your body in. Beyond that, it’s nothing in itself. It doesn’t have inherent physical properties or effects—those come from how it’s used. The word “exercise” is just a label we use to describe a certain action someone goes through in pursuit of a goal.
Now that this is said, the second question we can ask is, “What makes an exercise ‘corrective’ ”?
What makes an exercise corrective, and another not corrective?
To help us answer this question, it can help to look at some exercises that are not generally considered as being “corrective.” Take throwing a ball or dribbling a basketball, for instance. Both are exercises, but aren’t generally considered as being “corrective” exercises. They could be, but for most people, they’re not. Why?
Why aren’t they corrective in most cases?
They aren’t corrective, because most people performing these actions don’t do it with the intent of correcting anything. Instead, they do them to perform a task; to reach an external objective (eg, making the basketball bounce or the ball go somewhere). However, they are still movements and positions you put your body through. So, what exactly sets them apart from a corrective exercise?
The difference lies in what you’re putting your attention on. What's going on inside your body and what you're feeling.
THIS is the part that makes a corrective exercise corrective. Not the exercise in itself.
Therefore, the corrective exercise should only be seen as a "context" that facilitates our awareness of a variable we otherwise would have missed—not something that does something for us.
You correct a problem “through” an exercise. Not “because” of the exercise.
The nuance is very subtle, but it makes a huge difference in how you approach things.
Still, too many people do corrective exercises thinking that the exercise will “give” them something or make something happen for them. But it doesn’t work that way.
It’s YOU that makes things happen. Not the exercise.
This means that almost any exercise could become a corrective exercise if you know what to put your attention on—even those that aren’t normally considered as being “corrective”. (There definitely is a limit to how much this is true, because some exercises are more damaging then anything, but considering an exercise doesn’t negatively affects you, it could become a corrective one.)
Now, there's one last question we need to ask ousrlesves if we want to make those reflections useful and relavant. It’s probably the most important of all:
On what should we put our attention?
Or differently said, if we are to do “corrective exercises,” what exactly should we aim to correct?
This question is a crucial one because the answer determines if a “corrective exercise” truly ends up being corrective or not.
Since the exercise doesn’t really do anything and you are the one responsible for making the changes happen, focusing on the wrong things during an exercise that should be a corrective one can make it uncorrective. Said in more simple language: you can still fuck yourself up while performing an exercise that should be “corrective” if you focus on the wrong things when performing it.
So, the question of what we should focus on and what a problem is isn’t trivial. It has massive implications.
In fact, I think that this question is at the root of why this whole industry is a mess. If we agreed on the answer, everyone would work towards the same goal. But we don’t agree on what a problem is.
And to make it worse, most people don’t even think about this question, and they do movements they’ve been told will “correct the way they move”, but they don’t even know what they’re aiming for.
Yes, some people talk about the importance of “being aware” of what’s going on in our body, but more often than not, they don't specify what we should be aware of, which makes the whole idea a bit abstract… and often pointless.
So with all this said, I have my own theories and ideas of what we should focus on… but this text is now long enough as it is. If you read carefully, this should be enough to make you think a bit about why you’re doing things.
If you want to hear more about the subject of what a problem is and how to address it, consider attending one of our upcoming workshops.
The one I'll be hosting next week is sold out, but we will be hosting more very soon. These workshops sell pretty fast (2-3 hours last time), so if you don’t want to miss a beat, you can join our mailing list here!