Tone, Tension, and the Sweet Spot
Let’s talk about tone and tension. Do something that you do almost every day. For me, that’s emptying the dishwasher. Usually by the time I’m emptying the dishwasher in the morning, I’m also making breakfast. I’m also getting lunches ready for the family. There’s a lot going on. As I’m reaching for the glasses, there’s a tension in my jaw.
It’s true… I don’t want my mouth to hang open and drool over the clean dishes. I really don’t. I want to have enough tone in my jaw muscles to keep from drooling on the dishes. Right? That makes sense.
But gritting my teeth? If you saw me gritting my teeth, straining as I emptied the dishwasher, you’d be like, “That glass isn’t that heavy, Rick. Just pick it up.”
We can all feel that, can’t we? There is an appropriate amount of tone (muscle activation) for an action.
With energy energy awareness we begin to realize that there’s a sweet spot. There’s a zone. You could grab a delicate glass with too much tone and crush it in your hands, but that’s not usually what happens. Most of us are not the Hulk, where our basic muscle strength exceeds the norm so much that we’re busy smashing things when we hold too much tension.
Instead, what do we get when we hold too much tension? We get muscle aches. We get tightness in our shoulders. We get headaches. Might even crack our teeth from gritting them when we certainly didn’t need to.
The amount of tone to keep from drooling on the clean dishes—you can feel for it. And it’s almost certainly less tension than your jaw holds when you’re emptying the dishwasher.
And that’s my invitation. For thriving, one of the core skills is to have awareness of how much tone you’re using and to seek out the sweet spot.
Right now I’m holding my phone as I speak, and I notice that I can actually reduce the tone, the tension in my fingers. The phone starts feeling even more secure. It’s resting differently in my hand now. My forearm can relax. My whole shoulder can rest more easefully against my body.
As I walk and talk, by adjusting the tone and tension in how I’m holding my phone, my voice even changes! My jaw relaxes. My shoulders unwind. My gait changes, too.
You can take any part of your body as a portal. Bring awareness to it. “Oh, I’m holding a lot more tension than is useful here.”
Call it tone if you want. It’s a little more neutral description. Ask, “I wonder how much activation I need in order to hold this thing, do this thing, move this way?”
I am absolutely certain it’s less than your habitual.
In our culture, we celebrate the busy person. I don’t. Because I used to be one. I know what underlies that—the kind of psychological and even spiritual tension that drives a person rather than inspires and activates them.
We notice the hard worker who looks like, dang, they’re really smashing that! We less often recognize the efficiency of movement of the person who is using the sweet spot of energy that is more sustainable and allows for more joy.
When we’re using more tension to empty the dishwasher than is needed, we’re less likely to laugh. We don’t laugh with gritted teeth. We don’t glide across the floor. We don’t turn it into a dance. We don’t even feel the music in our bones if we’re more tense than needed.
Try it on. If you notice your body speaking up in some part of it, use that as the pathway. How much tone do I actually need for this? To be thriving. To be in it. And to be even more Present.
Useful Concepts for Thriving in This Story
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Awareness
Awareness widens our focus to include what we can see, feel, sense, and intuit inside and around us. -
Unwinding
Unwinding is the process of releasing held tensions so we feel lighter, freer, calmer, and present. -
Unrushed
Unrushed is moving at a natural rhythm, free from urgency, so energy can flow sustainably. -
Practical
Practical means putting insights into action in our physical and emotional world. -
Vitality
Vitality is the life energy that shows up as health, resilience, clarity, and dynamic connection.