I have had fairly chronic pain in two spots(my shoulder and lower back) in my body for a few years now. I notice that this is mostly(at least with the shoulder) caused by bad posture and stress/overactivity(the stress also causes the bad posture). What I mean by overactivity is exerting more force than is necessary to do things(usually things that require a very small amount of force, like playing guitar or writing) and causing myself very low level pain in the process. The pain is so slight that I hardly notice it while it's happening, it doesn't bother me until it has built up throughout the day(Maybe chronic is the wrong word, it really only bothers me in the evening, but even in the morning I can tell that I'm not as healthy as I could be).

When you do things this way it seems like the body stores stress in places like the shoulders and the feet.

Does anyone have advice for become more aware of unconscious tendancies like these, avoiding them and sort of reseting the way you do things? I think that the key may lie in becoming completely aware of my relationship to these activities and finding a new way of seeing them that holds more respect for the actual activity itself.

Does anyone know what I'm talking about, or am I making no sense? I posted this here because it seems like what I;m looking for is similar to the practice of kinhin in zen, also known as walking meditation. Where you do something gently with your attention completely on the activity itself. I;m also looking for different techniques and approachs.