Skip to main content

Pandiculation

In this episode - Pandiculation . . .

Have you ever noticed when your cat wakes up from a nap how they arch their back and enjoy an entire body stretch, yawning with legs extended, paws, claws, and toes spread wide? Now fully awake, they're ready to take on the day.

What about you? When you wake up in the morning, do you sit halfway up, contract your arms to your body, then raise them high above your head while yawning? Then, relax your arms, pause for a second, and jump out of bed refreshed? That’s pandiculation.

Little did I realize this is natural to our body functioning - simply put, pandiculation is the act of yawning and stretching. Wait, there’s more.

Pandiculation is the involuntary stretching of the soft tissues, which occurs in most animal species and is associated with transitions between cyclic biological behaviors, especially the sleep-wake rhythm (Walusinski, 2006).

Pandiculation comes from the Latin root pandiculari, 'to stretch oneself,' which is the act of contracting and stretching all body muscles.

According to an article on https://www.yogauonline.com, Pandiculation is as essential to our health and wellbeing as nutrition and exercise! It is necessary for the optimal functioning of our neuromuscular system. Without this yawning-and-stretching activity, our muscles and fascia become increasingly tight, leading to physical imbalances such as poor posture, limited range of motion, pain in our joints, and other core imbalances.

How does pandiculation work?

Pandiculation is the nervous system’s natural way of waking up the sensory-motor system and preparing for movement. Humans and all vertebrate animals tend to stretch automatically when we wake up or have been inactive for a while. Pandiculation sends biofeedback to our nervous system regarding the level of contraction in our muscles, thereby helping to prevent the buildup of chronic muscular tension.

Pandiculation contracts and releases muscles, so the alpha-gamma feedback loop is naturally reset. This resetting reduces muscular tension and restores conscious, voluntary control over the muscles. Preventing the buildup of tension in our muscles is critical to maintaining healthy posture and movement throughout our lives.

In a pandicular response, the body contracts even more and then relax the whole body from head to toe. “This ensures a reset of the alpha-gamma feedback loop – a biofeedback loop in our nervous system between the spinal cord and the muscles – that regulates the level of tension in our muscles."

Unfortunately, our alpha-gamma loops can be compromised due to structural imbalances caused by habitual patterns and trauma. Typically, our muscle strength is determined by the central nervous system and the information sent to the brain from our proprioceptors (sensory receptors on nerve endings). When our alpha-gamma loop is working correctly (alpha neurons to muscles and gamma neurons to muscle fibers in muscle spindles), we can contract muscles when we need to, and they will automatically relax when they are not receiving "contraction" messages.

However, due to the previously mentioned structural imbalances caused by habitual patterns and trauma, muscles and fascia that are 'stuck' cannot send or receive the proper proprioceptive messages, causing them to remain contracted and unable to relax.

Benefits of voluntarily pandiculating our muscles.

Even though pandiculation is considered an involuntary response of our nervous system, we can beneficially affect our overall health and wellbeing with Yoga by stretching.

Voluntary pandiculation forms part of the clinical somatic education developed by Thomas Hanna. Slowly, consciously, and in sync with our breath, we can begin to restore our alpha-gamma loop function with the consistent practice of muscular contraction and release - stretching, and yawning.

In conclusion, if someone asks, “Are you tired?”

Nope, just yawning and stretching to relieve muscle tension, practicing Yoga to improve overall body function.

I'm Patrick Ball; thanks for listening. See you in the next episode.

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Most Popular of All Time

We Need Awe More Than Ever

In this episode, Why We Need Awe More Than Ever Yesterday morning, I slipped into the cool stillness of my backyard before dawn. The air was crisp, the silence deep—broken only by the faint rustling of leaves and the familiar calls of birds waking early. Then I looked up. A thin crescent moon hung low in the east, with Venus just above it like a shining jewel. The sky was clear and full of stars, and for a moment, I felt something I hadn’t in a long time: Awe! For thousands of years, the heavens have carried on their steady dance, untouched by human noise. No ruler, no election, no breaking news has ever changed their rhythm. And yet here I was, tempted to reach for my phone—to trade the eternal for the urgent. Instead, I stayed. I watched the moonrise, the sky slowly lighten, and the world around me stir. Ducks passed overhead in a loose V, hummingbirds zipped past to visit their feeder, pausing mid-air as if curious about me sitting so still. Little by little, the static in my mind f...
2 comments
Read more

The Birth of a Cubs Legend

In this episode, The 162-Game Exhale — and the Birth of a Cubs Legend There’s a hush in the baseball world on Game 162 — a collective breath drawn in and slowly released. Scoreboards stop flipping. Dugouts empty. For six months, the game has been our steady heartbeat, pulsing from the cherry blossoms of Tokyo in March to the crisp, playoff-charged winds of late September. And now, as the regular season exhales, baseball fans everywhere pause to absorb the story we’ve just lived. For me, that story has been deeply personal. This season unfolded in the rhythms of my daily life. It was the summer soundtrack echoing beneath the constant turmoil of politics and sensational headlines. It was a handful of carefully chosen ballpark pilgrimages stitched together with countless nights in front of MLB.TV. And at the center of it all, for a lifelong Cubs fan like me, it revolved around one name — a young center fielder who turned hope into history: Pete Crow-Armstrong. The 2025 season didn’t begin...
Post a Comment
Read more

The Silent Grid–Part Two

In this episode, The Silent Grid – Part Two Sirens split the night as Greenwood went dark. Marvin knew instantly—the blackout wasn’t an accident. It was a warning. In this quiet town, where life once unfolded at a predictable pace, a sleek, intuitive smartphone—a so-called gift from the future —has arrived. But it’s no tool for connection. It’s a silent force, erasing individuality and turning neighbors into something less than human. Marvin Gellborn, a man who values independence, sees the truth. His device isn’t helping; it’s testing him, watching him, and quietly embedding itself into the life of Greenwood. Welcome back to On the Fly . In this week’s episode of The Silent Grid , GridBot tightens its grip. After a hopeful community gathering, Marvin and his robot companion, Norman, notice a troubling absence—the very generation they hoped to reach has vanished into the neon glow of The Signal Box , a youth tech hub pulsing with digital obsession. When Greenwood’s lights vanish, Marvi...
Post a Comment
Read more

The Pessimism Aversion Trap

In this episode, The Pessimism Aversion Trap Picture this: a room full of bright minds nodding in agreement as a bold new strategy is unveiled. The slides are polished, the vision is grand, and the future, we're told, has never looked brighter. Everyone beams—because who wants to be the one to say, "Um… this might not work"? Heaven forbid someone spoil the mood with a dose of reality. Better to smile, add a buzzword or two, and march confidently toward disaster. That's how the Pessimism Aversion Trap works. Even now, I can still hear the sound—a high-pitched shriek and a digital hum, followed by the slow, rhythmic clatter of data pouring from a 5¼-inch floppy disk. It was the late 1980s, and my makeshift home office (our living room) was dominated by what felt like a marvel of modern engineering: a used Tandy 1000 PC with not one, but two floppy drives. To top it off, we purchased a 'blisteringly fast' 300-baud modem—which, for the uninitiated, could downloa...
1 comment
Read more