The Lateral Line

An Important Stabilizer in your Body

As you can see, it begins (or ends) behind the ear and comes down to the shoulder in an ‘A’ frame when viewed side on. From there it is going to zig zag like shoelaces down the side of the ribs (but reaching around the front and back as it goes) and then joins to the hip. From here it is focused into two main streams, one from the front of the hip and one from the back, and it descends now down via the Iliotibial Band (ITB) to join below the knee. Here it then becomes one strand and flows down the side of the calf, eventually terminating underneath the foot in the plantar fascia.

This is an ancient line of connectivity. Way back – billions of years – when your mother’s mother’s mother’s mother was a fish, we were primarily mobilising side to side and being able to get away from danger and toward food etc using this Lateral Line. These last 7 million years it has been relegated to the support role of stabilising us as we move primarily straight ahead with various rotations thrown in. But don’t discount it, the Lateral Line is ignored at your peril.

So how does this Lateral Line affect me? Well, have you ever had a sore side-of-thigh/ ITB? Maybe now you can see that you don’t just have to foam roll the hell out of that ITB every day. Perhaps learning to spread the load out evenly over the entire line will help. Have you been to one of my Body Care classes and learnt how to massage the Sternocleidomastoid (the neck massage that we do)? So now you can see exactly what else in the body might be getting benefit from that simple neck massage.

Have you seen how the elderly shorten their stride length, and start bobbing side to side as they walk? They can be almost instantly helped to walk more smoothly again simply by upregulating this Line.

Once again, as always, if any of this sounds interesting, come and see me anytime in class and I can potentially help you unlock the secrets and benefits of the Lateral Line.