My Own Sad Story:
Bicycle Racing and the Posture of Depression

At 15, a Passion for Bicycle Racing

At 15, I became deeply involved in bicycle racing. As I trained, I improved quickly, winning the Michigan State Championships on the velodrome two years in a row as a junior, at ages 16 and 17. I competed in the national championships twice and was ranked 9th in the nation—just one spot shy of joining the US Junior World Championship team. Once, I rode 215 miles in 24 hours. During college, my interests changed (I met the wonderful woman I would later marry), and I left racing behind. If I knew then what I know now, maybe I could have been faster. I was strong, fast, and unstoppable—at least, I thought so.

A Pattern Takes Root

The nervous system learns what it practices. The position on the bike mirrors the hunching tension pattern of depression. As I improved at holding that posture, unknowingly depression embedded itself in my body, taking hold.

The Descent into Depression

My childhood was happy and trauma-free. But during my racing years, I began to plunge into depression. It chased me, hunted me, and haunted me. My nervous system learned this pattern the depressing downward pull became my new normal.

Before racing, I was bold and courageous. But as time passed, worry, fear, and sadness took over. Depression affected my career and marriage. This tension stayed with me for 41 years until a day I realized that a movement I had been doing to try to reduce my pain,  seemed to turn off my depression. Testing it further, it became clear a certain type of movement, done a certain way,  stopped the emotional plunge.

Learn how to release these hidden tension patterns of depression.

Discovering a Solution

One of my early teachers claimed “[Somatics] has nothing to do with emotion.” But tension and emotion are inseparable. Your background tension habits define your signature emotions. The nervous system is teachable with the right lesson.

With my 3 years of Somatics training, my back pain improved, but the hip and sciatic pain persisted. Depression remained, revealing the traditional method’s limitations.  Starting with “Elbows to the Sky,” which cleared my depression. I then developed my own set of movements, “The Four Leaf Clover,”“The Two-Axis Rocking Chair,” and “The Dowager Hump Destroyer”  to effectively banish depression from my repertoire. These movements directly address the tension patterns of depression. I was able to change the deep habit. I taught my system out of the tension habit.

Breaking Free: Releasing the Posture of Depression

The tension of bicycle racing became my depression. It ran in me without my consent, driving my life and nearly taking it. The places in my body that locked me into that position are still strong and tireless. I’ve learned how to pull out of the well worn groove of that high-idle of tension. At the first sign of depression I know what to to derail the vicious descent. My practice help me free myself from the posture of depression, and bicycle racing.

A New Sense of Self

It’s different now. I am no longer a depressed person. Somatics helped me change who I am.

You can do it. You can free yourself.

  -Eric Cooper

The ECSM ‘Stop Being Depressed’ YouTube Playlist: