Most people have at least heard of the term “body memory” or “tissue memory.? The Myofascial Release perspective believes that it is within the intricate matrix of the myofascial, or connective tissue that holds this memory and the myofascial tissue is literally the ?record keeper? of memory in the body/mind complex.
When trauma occurs, whether physical, mental, emotional or a combination of these, people respond with a flight/fight or freeze response. It is this unresolved freeze response that MFR therapists believe is what holds us back from fully and naturally healing from a traumatic event.
Kathy Monkman, BSN, LMT, who is a Myofascial Release therapist with over 20 years of experience, has had a very creative idea that I would like to share with you.
?I’m excited to share with you a project I’ve launched this week that you might want to affiliate with and/or help me promote.
Last year I had one of those “aha” moments related to returning service persons struggling with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and how I (we) could help them with Myofascial Release but really didn’t know how or where to begin. Life went on and this summer a pebble got kicked in me that started a momentum to get this project started and the ?In One Peace Project? was born.
The ?In One Peace Project? is created to offer once per month, 100% free clinics to returning service persons using John F. Barnes Myofascial Release to help them resolve issues with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and/or body/head injury. At my office the 3 of us MFR therapists are going to offer this service to this population each month for a full day of free sessions. As I say in the mission statement, ?we are here to serve those who are serving us.?
So, please take a look at my site, and friend me on Facebook and affiliate if you’re so inclined and help me get the word out! Thank you to John for giving me this opportunity to get this out there as well!?
If you are interested in helping those brave men and women who have risked their lives protecting us, please contact Kathy at: http://www.inonepeaceproject.org/.
Sincerely,
John
For more information about Myofascial Release, you can now access two separate excerpts from the Fireside Chat with John F. Barnes, PT DVD on ‘You Tube’! Just click on the following links:
Not only do Myofascial restrictions create pain, headaches, and the symptoms of Fibromyalgia, but they also seem to speed the aging process internally and externally.
In my Myofascial Release I seminar, I teach therapists the importance of doing self treatment, so they can treat themselves and so they can also teach their clients to treat themselves. As the therapists take my advanced Myofascial Release seminars, those that take my advice of doing regular self treatment state that they look and feel younger!
Over the years from habitual pain expressions, grimacing, and gravity the fascia tightens and deepens the lines and wrinkles in one?s face and neck. Of the many techniques that I teach is the ?fascial facial?. These techniques can provide a much more youthful appearance to your face and neck.
Obviously, the internal beauty of physiological health is also very important. The environment of every cell, the fascia?s ground substance, ideally should be fluid. Trauma and thwarted inflammatory responses tend to solidify the ground substance. This limits the amounts of oxygen, nutrition, biochemicals, hormones, information and energy that the 50 trillion cells receive. The pressure of the restricted fascial system is interfering with the delicate inner mechanisms of the cell. Recent research is showing that debris, waste products, and toxins that become trapped in the cell may be what can lead to the decline of the aging process.
I believe the solidification of the ground substance blocks cellular excretion and does not allow this and the toxins to reach the lymphatic system so they become trapped and cannot flush out to purify cells.
I believe that excessive pressure and dehydration of the fascia?s ground substance forces our molecules to tangle and stiffen with age. Cross links form, gluing the molecules together. Cross links stiffen our collagen and make our skin wrinkle. Chemists call this the advanced glycation end products, AGE.
The goal of Myofascial Release is to release the cross links and eliminate the pressure on our cells and their important environment.
Thanks,
John
For more information about Myofascial Release, you can now access two separate excerpts from the Fireside Chat with John F. Barnes, PT DVD on ‘You Tube’! Just click on the following links:
As mentioned in last month?s blog, Myofascial Release can be beneficial helping many Women?s Health issues, including fibrocystic breasts. Fibrocystic breast disease refers to benign (non-cancerous) changes in the tissues of the breast. Often times, fibrocystic changes occur during ovulation and before menstruation, due to changing hormone levels. The breast cells can start to retain fluid and develop into nodules or cysts. With Myofascial Release, the skilled therapist can help to release the restriction in these tight areas as well as addressing other restrictions in the body, on order to eliminate and prevent the cysts from occurring.
My new article titled, ?We are not Mindless Machines?, will be available in the print/newsstand version of Massage Magazine in July. This article discusses some new thoughts and theories about cancer and disease and I discuss how Myofascial Release can help many disease processes, while often times helping to avoid surgeries and/or unnecessary procedures.
You may also want to read my Therapeutic Insight Column titled, ?Breast Health? on the Massage Magazine website under the techniques section or at the following link: (http://www.massagemag.com/News/massage-news.php?id=9186).
Sincerely,
John F. Barnes, P.T., L.M.T., N.C.T.M.B.
For more information about Myofascial Release, you can now access two separate excerpts from the Fireside Chat with John F. Barnes, PT DVD on ‘You Tube’! Just click on the following links:
Myofascial Release techniques are successful in resolving many of women?s health problems such as: fibrocystic painful breasts, menstrual and pelvic pain, painful intercourse, and urinary frequency, urgency and incontinence.
You can now access my latest Therapeutic Insight Column titled, ?Breast Health? on the Massage Magazine website under the techniques section or at the following link: (http://www.massagemag.com/News/massage-news.php?id=9186).Also, be on the lookout next month for my new article titled, ?We are Not Mindless Machines,? which will be featured in the July issue of MASSAGE Magazine, and discusses the treatment of cancer with myofascial release.
Myofascial Release is safe, highly effective, and creates the possibility of avoiding medicine and surgery.
Thanks,
John
For more information about myofascial release, you can access two separate excerpts from the Fireside Chat with John F. Barnes, P.T. DVD on YouTube. Just click on the following links:
Myofascial and Myofascial Rebounding techniques are successful in resolving many of women?s health problems such as: fibrocystic painful breasts, menstrual and pelvic pain, painful intercourse, and urinary frequency, urgency and incontinence.
We’ve had many inquiries regarding how Myofascial Release differs from other forms of massage, bodywork, and energy work. To learn more about Myofascial Release it may be helpful to view this excerpt from my Fireside Chat DVD that we recently posted on ?You Tube?. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PWRuS9xAbMo<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PWRuS9xAbMo>).
The work of yours that I have heard about is perking me into a bit of a chat.
My only experience in a myofascial release class was not with you or your group but it was SO painful that I left it feeling unloved and certain that the work was not for me. You speak of things that do interest me, our intuition, water, emotion etc. What is your experience with the Trager Approach?
Virginia
Virginia,
The Trager Approach is excellent. Myofascial Release is the “”missing link” in this and other forms of therapy, massage, energy work, and it can significantly increase your effectiveness.
I have been teaching Myofascial Release seminars for well over 30 years. As you may have noticed, “Copy Cat” Myofascial Release courses are popping up and these courses do not teach the same principles or techniques that we do. They teach what we call the old form of Myofascial that is forceful, mechanical, and very painful and only produces temporary results. Many of the theories of these courses are based on information that has been obsolete for over 70 years!
My Myofascial Release principles were developed from my personal experience with pain. My theory of Myofascial Release is explained in detail in my monthly column titled, “Therapeutic Insight”. To learn more, you can click on the following link to read the first Therapeutic Insight column.
My approach to Myofascial Release is safe, gentle, and produces consistent results in reducing pain, headaches, and fibromyalgia symptoms. The goal of the Myofascial Release therapist is to return the individual to a pain free, active lifestyle.
As you know, the state of a current health care system is a hot topic among many people including politicians, health care workers and consumers. There has been a lot of speculation about what is going to happen to our health care system in the future. But what concept they are missing is that most therapists are taught obsolete techniques that only produce temporary results which drive up health care costs.
All of this consternation about the collapsing health-care system is to me no more than a reshuffling of the deck chairs on the Titanic. The Titanic is an inept health-care system based on principles that are more than 300 years old and were proven to be obsolete in 1923 by Max Planck, the founder of the Quantum Theory. Many of the principles taught in medical, dental and therapeutic schools have been proven to be wrong for more than 70 years and yet are still being taught. Medical theory has degraded into the biochemistry of disease, as if we were just mindless bags of chemicals. A massive amount of recent research supporting our experience with myofascial release has shown that fascial restrictions change the shape of the cell and the viscosity of its surrounding environment, the extra-cellular matrix.
Dear John,
Thanks to everyone out there sending me support with their prayers and love and light. It is greatly appreciated. I know I must have written you in the middle of the night and didn?t proof read my work prior to sending it out since my last name lost an ?a? in it. So just for the record it?s East, George Lee East, P.T. aka The Cayman Cat, Toast and Breeze. My email address is breeze_east@hotmail.com (that is an underscore between the breeze and east). I really do appreciate hearing from everyone and forgive me if it takes a while to get back with you right away, since I seem to be having a lot of low energy days lately and the pain meds make me feel totally out of it! I personally believe I am going to figure out how to lick this thing since I was just coming into my own as a therapist, energy worker and being able to reframe the consciousness behind the cause of my client?s problems when this happened to me. I would love to hear from the Old Mastery Group and anyone who is into alternative healing techniques, especially remote work. Anyway, The Cayman Cat Lives! I also can?t wait to come out to play again with all of John?s MFR family. I got way too much stuff on my plate to do before packing it up for good. Too much yet to be learned and too much fun yet to be had. So keep me in your prayers in a posititive light and if anyone needs a practice patient, pick me, pick me, pick me! Until then,
Lots of Love & Light,
George Lee East, P.T.
Breeze
The Cayman Cat
I just wanted to revisit the topic of scars and the concept of the treatment of scars. As you may remember, a couple months ago there was a blog titled, “Scars” which discussed the importance of assessing and treating scars, no matter how large or how small, once they are healed. You can access my “Scars” blog at the following link:
I have been dealing with the aftermath of my accident for 14 months now. I have scars from the initial facial surgery and neck fusion. Most recently I have new scars from revision facial surgery. I have a new scar in my naval where they withdrew fat to inject into my lips. Knowing what I know about the fascial web, I was still amaze at how a tiny incision in the naval could cause soreness all the way up to my ribs and down to the pubic bone. I could feel the fingers of tender fascia. I was also aware of the tiny restrictions created in my lip margins from the injections. As tiny as they are, they feel significant. All the scars have had an impact on my entire structure from head to toe and I believe my functional progress has been largely due to receiving MFR throughout the past 14 months. I have specifically requested scar releases as I believe as long as there is a tight scar it will pull any other work out of alignment. I hope the greater medical community will understand the importance of this work (especially scar releases) in achieving improved function.
I knew very little about ?scar tissue? before attending Intensives and Healing Seminars you offer.
The first week a therapist did a psoas release on my right side of my abdomen near my old appendectomy scar. I would experience pain on my left side ribs, lats, and rhomboid! The fascial connection was obvious.
Later, when being treated intra-orally with a therapist?s finger in my nostril I could ?feel? the scar tissue of an old sinus surgery. Then, through my palatine in the roof of my mouth to the scar tissue then down my dural tube through my hips and left knee (scars from surgeries again)and leg to my neuropathic foot. Afterwards, I regained more than 40% of the feeling in my left foot! Fascia is fascinating!
I have avoided multiple neck, spine, and hip surgeries and reversed scoliosis and stenosis today.
I can never thank you enough for your dedication and perseverance in developing your extraordinary form of manual therapy and authentic healing.
Much is written about the ?fight/flight response? and its impact upon our neuroendocrine system, however the ?freeze response? seems to be completely ignored by the vast majority of therapists and other medical practitioners. When this natural response to an overwhelming traumatic event occurs as the instinctual optimal act of survival?and we survive the traumatic event, discharge of this enormous surge of energy within our system is paramount to release the trauma and free our systems to restore homeostasis. Seems this is beginning to become recognized in various therapies, especially bodywork/somatic type approaches. John, your Myofascial Release Approach appears to be one of the few which recognizes how this holding can create tremendous tensions within the entire body. Using Myofascial Release to ease into areas where that instinctual freeze response has become woven into the very tapestry of the entire human form, thus recreating enormous dysfunction?and allowing for discharge of energy as it naturally needs to express itself? is remarkable!
It moves the therapist/patient from the limitations of considering how trauma not only impacts upon the nervous system and allows access to profound healing of the subconscious mind as it shapes and holds our very form.
Sheila Walker
As you can read from the above comments and how I mentioned in my blog about scars, do not underestimate even the tiniest scar, because if they are a source of a restriction, they too can cause significant symptoms.
I?m very interested in this previous thread on inflammation. I?ve been reading about chronic inflammation and how many now agree that this process is behind many diseases.
It leads me to wonder if the chronic, systemic inflammation caused by a diet high in processed foods leads to widespread gumming up and restricting of the fascial system, in turn affecting cellular respiration and degeneration.
I usually think of the inflammatory processes that lead to myofascial restrictions as being caused by the primary inflammatory processes associated with injury.
Do you think that the process causing chronic inflammation to manifest disease is born out by changes in the fascial system?
Testing this hypothesis, I turned to Dr. Dean Ornish?s book on reversing heart disease. He talks mostly about poor diet diminishing blood flow to the heart through plaque build-up, etc. I get how fascia is involved in hardening of the arteries but not in plaque build-up.
I know this is only one disease of many to consider.
I?d be very interested if you can offer even more insight than you?ve already offered into the subject of inflammation.
Thanks,
Owen Dodge
Hi Owen,
Thanks for your question. I recently had a well known Pathologist from San Francisco as a patient. He was very disappointed at the resistance of his medical colleagues to his and others new ideas. For many years as he dissected recently deceased humans, he saw the roughness of the inside of the blood vessels.
His years of experience and a multitude of recent research has shown that as the fascia on the inside of blood vessels becomes rough and solidified, it can trap the cholesterol. This can cause a thickening and/or blockage within the circulatory system leading to serious consequences. Fascia has a profound effect on the functioning and health of the entire circulatory and lymphatic systems.
This article discusses how my approach to myofascial release treats the biomechanical aspect but also uses different fluid dynamic principles that address our fluidity, which tends to solidify from trauma or thwarted inflammation processes. This article also talks about how a Myofascial Release therapist uses their genius by engaging the power of their intuition, instinct, and rational mind. This total engagement allows the patient to access their wisdom for authentic healing.
Northern Virginia is awash in blossoming peonies of all colors ? this spring?s crop seems particularly abundant. As we drove out to Leesburg yesterday, there were entire fence lines of the huge lush blossoms, hanging low as their strong slender stems valiantly struggled to support them.
I love the contrast of their subtle scent and their outrageous size and beauty. When they start to bloom something in me knows that spring has officially crossed a threshold. They make me smile.
For years I have tried to ?help? mine with what I saw as ?the annual struggle to stand up straight? – so their blossom-faces can smile up at the sun rather than being bowed over as though searching for something they lost on the ground. And each year the ones in my yard do stand a little straighter for a while ? reaching a little taller with the help of my modified tomato cages. But in the end, those gorgeous huge blossoms seem to feel more comfortable curving back toward the earth. Hmmm?
Yesterday I got it. I can let go of this crusade. The peonies are exquisitely beautiful just as they are. And I can enjoy them just the way they are, faces up or down. I have a soft white peony bush. Then there are the pale pink and the deeper rose colored ones. They are all fabulous. I think I?ll quit writing and go out in my yard ? allow myself to drink them in ? loving them just the way they are.
Yesterday was my day to reflect on what motherhood means to me… it began early as I woke up my 6′3” son and remembered how it felt to hold him as a newborn… as I chatted with my daughter at college… as I called my mom to begin her Mother’s Day by reminding her that I love her and wished she were here… as my wonderful husband prepared a delicious brunch that I shared with two women friends who have been at the core of my extended family throughout my 22 years as a mother. Each of them has a special place in the hearts of my children. One helped in the labor and delivery of both children. The other has been an active aunt, helping my daughter in numerous ways across the years. Then I got to catch up with another dear friend who has been like a second mom to my son. Across the day, I weaved the web of connection in my life by extending love and appreciation to those who have stood by me as I have done my best to mother my children.
Motherhood – it has many facets and is not for the faint of heart. I have never felt such tenderness and love, or such fear for another person’s safety. It has been one of the most fulfilling things I have done so far in my life. It has stretched me in ways I would never have thought possible – painfully as times - yet I am more whole, more capable, and more able to meet my life because of what I have experienced while weaving this web of life for these two exquisite souls who are my children.
Tenderness and toughness are required for good mothering, and they go hand in hand. Tenderness – that steady gaze of unconditional love combined with warm nurturing touch – is what feeds healthy emotional beings. Yet, extending only tenderness when firmness is appropriate, and the outcome is children who don’t understand healthy boundaries. Too much toughness leaves children with no sense of nurturing connection, no richness to feed their relationships. So I have done my best to extend both deep love and tenderness as well as a solid, grounded presence to my children. Time will tell if the balance I am offering is right for them. None of us do it perfectly, so I am sure I will hear about it later. And, that’s okay too.
To me, motherhood is ultimately about the web of life. Mothering (men do it too – did I mention that my husband created a fabulous brunch for us?) is the role of weaving together relationships – which make up the container that holds our lives, cradling us and giving us the emotional support we need to survive and thrive.
This web-weaving role is of vital importance in our world today. Its absence underlies many difficulties – personal and societal. Its presence offers immense rewards to all of us.
May we remember the gift of mothering everyday as we love and honor those who have loved us, and teach our children about the importance of these life-giving connections.
On this Easter Monday, I am struck by the meaning of this time of year for me. As many of you know, I grew up on the front pew of a Baptist church, with my father preaching almost every Sunday. The overarching message of Christianity for me is beautifully and simply said in an old Bible School chorus, ?And they?ll know we are Christians by our love, by our love, yes, they?ll know we are Christians by our love.?
I left the organized institution of the church when I left home, yet that primary teaching is still in every session I do, as it is for most of us if we are honest.
Christ?s primary message was one of love – agape ? unconditional positive regard for humanity even with all of its shortcomings. ?Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do,? were some of his last words, and also indicative of that agape presence for humankind.
When we hold a therapeutic presence for someone on our treatment table that positive regard is a key ingredient in the mix of the healing session. We care about the welfare of our fellow human beings. This caring is often a large part of why we do what we do.
As I hiked early Easter morning to greet the sunrise, I thought back to one of the things Christ did with his disciples at the last supper. He held and washed their feet. Their feet. Not their hands, or their backs, but their feet. As I felt my own feet touching the earth, I realized he was grounding them – and opening the doorway to connect with the rich field of the earth ? a healthy resource they would need for support as the coming events unfolded.
As we watch parts of the modern media twist Christ?s initial message – purposely whipping people into states of fear and hatefulness ? one way to counteract this energy is to create a wave of our own ? a conscious wave of agape.
How can you do this? Start by slowing down, and feeling your feet on the ground. Then feel down into the earth under you. Breathe in that energy of love from the delicious spring air around you and remember who you truly are at a soul level. Agape is found in one form or another at the source of most major religions of the world. I say this to remind us all that love and kindness are found everywhere.
This time of year offers us a wonderful opportunity to remember this principle - that serves and feeds us everyday in our practices and on out into our lives – whether we are Christian or Jew, Muslim or Buddhist, Hindu or Taoist. Weaving our common good into everything we do, in whatever way we make this connection for ourselves. The important thing is to remember to do more of it today and everyday. And, enjoy!
I AM SO excited to announce that the second edition of Full Body Presence: Learning to Listen to Your Body’s Wisdom is now available in local bookstores and your favorite online booksellers. And how timely it is! This “how to” guide is so helpful for people wanting to be more present in each moment – how to remain steady and calm under stress, as well as how to enjoy the sweet moments; and how to be more effective and energized in all that we do in our complex lives today.
We do indeed live in interesting times. The stress of daily life has never been greater. The wonder and joyful possibilities have also never been more available. And how do we navigate wisely through it all?
By living fully in the navigational system of the body with all its wisdom.
* More than ever we need to be in touch with and trusting of our gut hunches.
* More than ever we need the skills to support our compassionate hearts.
* More than ever we need clear discernment to ferret out deception and take action with integrity.
* More than ever we need to be able to walk in the world with our power and wisdom.
Full Body Presence offers you a step-by-step process that has depth and simplicity – so those who are advanced students, as well as beginners can find something of value here. It is the culmination and distillation of all that I have been teaching for the last twenty years, put into a form you can work with individually.
I firmly believe that at this time in history, books that guide us in quieting the inner critic and freeing us from the tyranny of fear are of vital importance. The more people who learn to live from their Full Body Presence, the greater our ability to meet the challenges and enjoy the sweet moments of our lives.
Would you share in creating the buzz?
Please support the launching of the second edition by helping me reach everyone who would benefit from the life skills and healing power of this book. Perhaps you could forward this blog to friends or clients who could benefit? The book is half the price of the original edition (the CD in the original edition has been replaced with an audio download), so more people can afford it. And, a high volume of sales in a single week can catapult a book to the New York Times Best Seller list. This increases the “buzz” in the publishing world, which in turn increases the likelihood of the book reaching the widest possible audience.
To help create the “buzz” order your books from BarnesandNoble.com or Amazon.com (at about a 30% discount). Retail sales are counted to figure such rankings, so please consider that option when you buy.
Read on for your thank you gift!
If you decide to purchase five or more copies of Full Body Presence, I invite you to join me for a teleconference as my way of saying “Thank You.” I’ll be discussing how to utilize the skills in the book to vision and manifest what you want to create in your life. Simple drop us an email at Office@HealingFromTheCore.com when you have ordered five or more books and we will send you details about the teleconference.
Have you already read the book? If so, would you take a minute to write a review at your favorite online book seller? And, could you do it this week? Let us know when you post your review and we’ll include you in the Thank You
Teleconference, also!
Waves of gratitude for sharing in my journey and deepest inspirations,
Living in the greater Washington D.C. area has its benefits and I got to experience one of them this past weekend. An excellent documentary “Most Dangerous Man in America” was showing at the E Street Cinema and there was a small paragraph in the Washington Post under the review, saying that Daniel Ellsberg was actually going to be there after the 7:30pm showing to answer questions. Out of curiosity about this man, we got tickets and somehow ended up on the eighth row.
It is an exciting, very well done film. It tells the story behind the major events that occurred – of Ellsberg’s profound change of heart – and how he followed his own internal moral compass as the Pentagon Papers (the top secret account of the deception perpetrated by a succession of U.S. Presidents from both parties regarding why we were fighting in Vietnam) came completely to light for the public to read and judge. As you may remember, one result was Nixon’s resignation rather than face possible impeachment.
It was a very important time in the history of this country – for free speech, for the ability of the press to publish pieces that were factual and yet very controversial because of how they exposed a weakness in our political system. It is clear from the film that he had no master plan when he began. He simply knew he had to do it. We get to watch as it all unfolds step by step - as he followed his sense of integrity and acted with courage.
He could have faced life in prison for trying to stop a war he had originally helped plan. His early complicity and then profound change of heart are all there – we know how the story ends, yet it held our attention in every moment. I found myself racking my brain to remember what happened next. So I tell you all this to say, “Go see the movie!” It is excellent and its message is vital for multiple reasons to each of us in today’s world.
But beyond the film is the man himself. As he took his place in the front of the auditorium at the end of the film, there was no mistaking him. He is 78 and his presence has not waned at all. He emanates a quiet, clear presence. His answers to pressing questions of today were well thought out, insightful and hopeful. I went with curiosity and no real expectations and I came away feeling much more optimistic about what I can do in my own world in terms of truth telling and courage.
The issue in the film is one of what to do with government secrecy - today the issues are multiplied and even more complex. He acknowledged that (in response to some rather pointed questions), and said something like: the circumstances may be different today, but remember that we should never underestimate the power of one person to effect positive change.
And then he went on to the importance of being open to possibilities that one might not have even conceived of up until that point in time. He cited the fact that no one expected the Berlin wall to fall or Nelson Mandela to be released from prison and go on to lead his country…and yet both of those events have happened since Daniel took his fateful path. Opening to new possibilities…important for all of us discouraged by recent Supreme Court decisions or the lack of positive movement in Congress…so, I left the theatre feeling hopeful. The added bonus was that my teenage son got to see a historical film that he actually found fascinating and see Daniel Ellsberg in person, all in one night. A great evening, I would say!
Going For Something Greater Than Yourself ? No Matter What »»
I am moved and inspired by recent remembrances of Ted Kennedy?s life and accomplishments. Something in the stories of who he was and how he lived has stirred something deep within me.
He was clearly a man who believed in redemption. He lived a full life ? full-hearted, full of mistakes. Yet he was also full of integrity, and the belief that the world could be a better place if he worked to make it so.
He was brought to his knees many times throughout his career, physically, emotionally and politically. Yet each time, his capacity to recover and come back better enabled him to go on.
He had more loss and responsibility placed on his shoulders than most people experience in three lifetimes. What?s more impressive is what he did in response.
Yes, he grieved deeply. But each time he chose to pick up the torch and go on, strengthening his commitment to what he stood for ? a better world where the voiceless get heard, where the poor are remembered, and where healthcare is universal and not a just privilege for those who can afford it.
Senator Kennedy was clearly a lifelong learner not afraid to try new things. With each mistake he made and each loss he suffered, he didn?t just endure them. He did not become more callous.
He grew from each experience no matter how painful, and he grabbed life more fully in the aftermath. His legacy of five decades of vital legislation and lasting friendships on both sides of the aisle bear witness to that fact.
He had another valuable trait that we all need to remember, especially now. He knew how to reach out for the resources he needed every step of the way.
His wife Victoria is credited with being a powerful resource that saved his life. The staff he trusted implicitly was a resource that made his work possible. Spending time on the ocean was a resource that renewed and healed him. Over and over, he connected with healthy resources that allowed him to carry on.
Someone shared that his generous spirit called those around him to higher ground, and to release their pettiness when there were differences between them. In story after story, I heard how he showed up for his friends, colleagues and family members in their own times of need and loss. He literally showed up at the door, called repeatedly, or used his presence to get them the help they needed.
Ted Kennedy was a man of tremendous presence, born from a family imbued with an essence that mandated them to ?do good? and create a better world. He clearly contributed to that. But what?s impressed me most was his hard work and unflagging persistence in ?staying the course,? day in and day out, for more than five decades in the Senate.
He used his gifts and he persisted. And his presence grew from that.
When all is said and done, Ted Kennedy?s hard work and daily commitment to what he believed in left us with a legacy like none other.
As bodyworkers, we have a tremendous amount to give in the ?do good? department. Now I?m even more inspired to make a difference in all ways, large and small, in my own world given my gifts.
None of us is perfect or even close. Ted Kennedy is a testament to that, too. But what we do supports health. What we do helps people relax and relieve themselves of pressure. What we do reduces stress and helps people manage their lives better.
We help them feel more at home in the incredible navigational system of their bodies. And living from inside their bodies leads to wiser decisions, better self-esteem, more creativity and more joy. That?s a vital role we serve in healthcare, now and in the coming decades.
So your mandate, should you choose to accept it, is to stay your own course. Grab life with both hands and live it. Grow from the adversity life hands you and learn from it all.
Learn to take care of yourself. People are depending on you.
And persist. Keep sharing your gifts. When the time comes, your eulogy will be filled with what you want it to say ? all the ways in which you made a positive difference in your world.
As I settle back into life in Virginia I am struck by the gift of diversity that I have in my life. I could not Twitter easily at Esalen with no cell phone service there, so I begin this blog with all the journal entries I could not send from California, and finish up with my re-entry into Virginia last week:
7/9 – My trip began with a visit to New World Library in Novato, CA. We talked through their plans for the second edition of Full Body Presence due out in March of 2010. I was really impressed by the quality and thoughtfulness of their team. I felt like they really understood the message of the book. I left there feeling very hopeful and excited.
7/12 – Late afternoon – Coming through the front gate at Esalen Institute! What a joy to be back in this place that feels like my second home. I soak in the late afternoon sun on the ocean, taking a mineral bath in one of the large stone tubs with my assistants as we catch up with each other before the course starts tonight.
7/13 – Early morning fog has rolled in from the horizon – I zip up my polartec jacket and breathe deeply. The air is exquisite – I can almost feel it feeding and rejuvenating my cells. I feel my heart open as I catch sight of the ocean on the turn in the path approaching the lodge.
7/14 – The smell of lavender and rosemary as I walk down the path to the lodge is so rich. The air is quite cool and crisp, yet it easily carries the scent of these healing plants to my waiting nostrils – ahhh…breathing is such a pleasure!
7/15 – The early morning bird sounds here are different than in Virginia – I am fascinated by the number of birds and their distinct calls.
7/15 – Late night singing in the moonlight sitting around the fire outside the lodge with Cole, J.J., and others. I love to sing almost anything!
7/16 – Soaking in a mineral-bath that I have filled at just the right temperature, looking out over the ocean…someone sights whales and we all turn our eyes to the horizon. Connecting with the whales and dolphins always brings me an expanded sense of who we are in the bigger of picture of all species on the planet. And that is done more easily here – with Daniel Bianchetta’s fabulous photography of whale and dolphin visitations he has made up and down the coast here, that is currently exhibited in the lodge where we eat all our meals.
7/17 – As Healing From the Core: Grounding and Healthy Boundariescomes to a close, I am struck again by the diversity of the participants who have shown up and learned skills to take home – giving them more resilience, more grounding, and better capacity to connect in their worlds with healthy boundaries.
7/17 – Congratulations are in order on two fronts – Lori Chinitz has finished her apprenticeship and is now a full certified Instructor of Healing From the Core: Grounding and Healthy Boundaries. Cheri Bailey is now a full certified Presenter. I am thrilled for both of them. Although I must say, I will miss having Lori team teaching with me!
7/18 – In the morning the garden here at Esalen is magnificent. The fragrance of the different flowers that bathe my senses as I walk through on my way to class lifts my spirits. Isaye Barnwell is here doing her magic – I am learning to write songs! Her gift for bringing us all into song are legendary.
7/18- In the afternoon, different flowers are sending out their scents to fill us all up as we wander through, humming our “would-be songs” under our breaths on our way to lunch. What a gift!
7/19 – I continue to be amazed at how the cool, ocean-charged air energizes me. I am already noticing that the hill walking is much easier, more effortless, even with my back pack on. My joints and legs are actually enjoying the climbing.
7/24 – The entire environment here is delicious. The food is delicious. AND someone else is cooking and cleaning up. The staff is friendly and helpful. The mineral baths are a gathering place for relaxed sharing. And, did I mention that the air is cool, clear and energizing?
7/31 – Being here with the relaxed schedule of “Esalen time”, allows me time to linger over my meals, talking to folks I might not have had time to share with elsewhere. For instance, I have loved getting to know John and Maggie Murphy and their family better this summer.
8/2 – John Murphy just taught a workshop called “The Miracle of Water” with Peter Zimmerman and it was wonderful by all accounts. His workshop reminds me that all the forms of water on this property are truly miraculous. The fog, the springs, the streams, the ocean – wow!
8/4 – Sharing is rich in this diverse circle of women, all here learning to heal the deepest parts of themselves.
8/4 – A magical moon fills the night sky as I walk back to my room – almost full, shining off the ocean. It feels like a movie set, it is so beautiful.
8/5 – 8-9 p.m. Got to share about “Full Body Presence” with the entire community in a Wednesday night program that was very well attended and received. I love what I do!
8/6 – Under the full moon - our women’s nurturing evening at the baths was rich and easy this year.
8/7 – 1o:30 p.m. Singing in the lodge with J.J., Pearl and others – Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah” seems to be a favorite this year. The harmonies are endless and we all end smiling.
8/7 -Late afternoon – two of my favorite co-leaders have arrived: Rachel Abrams and Lisa Carlton. We begin our collaboration tonight with all the participants in Becoming a Vital Healthy Woman.
8/8 – I am amazed by how much information can be transmitted to a group of open, willing participants when Lisa Carlton and Rachel Abrams are on my team! We have had a great time and it seems as though it has gone to a new level of ease this year.
8/9 – My time at Esalen is coming to a close. I am almost running up and down the hills now. I know I keep talking about the air, but there is something very special and healing about the clear, ocean air here that seems to soak into my bones – energizing me in a way nothing else does. I get in one last soak at the baths – again, a unique form of nurturing that I only find here at Esalen.
8/10 – As Jessica and I drive north on Highway One, I am awed by the coastline once again. The ocean’s light blue into dark blue color, the coves and beaches, the breathtaking views. I will miss you, Big Sur!
8/11 – As I emerge from Dulles Airport into the Virginia night, I am immediately struck by the rich velvet quality of the warm, moist air. It feels like it is hugging me, welcoming me back.
8/12 – I am walking again, around my home lake – Lake Audubon, and it occurs to me that the two environments are very complementary. The Esalen environment feels like to frees up something inside of me – creating a sense of spaciousness in my head. The Virginia environment hugs me close, letting me know that I am home.
8/13 – As I walk in the early morning here, I am struck by the orchestra of nature sounds. I don’t even need my iPod to have a rhythm for walking. The late summer insects are a veritable harmony unto themselves. Every time I think about putting on my iPod, I hear a new group join in as another one fades back. What a gift!
8/14 – Teaching my second Healing From the Core: Grounding and Healthy Boundaries course in a month – this one in my home town of Reston, VA. Again,I am struck by the diversity of participants and the skills they are learning. I am in awe of the deep healing I see people doing in the class.
8/16 – As we complete the course, I realize how wide spread the applications are for all of us in today’s world. I look back over the last six weeks and see how my perception of Full Body Presence has expanded. I know this may sound strange, because I am the author, but I was shown this summer, how universal and valuable the book’s message is. More on that in my next blog – hope you are enjoying your summer as much as I am enjoying mine!
I was driving the other day on a two-lane road that widened to include a passing lane for a brief period. I found myself automatically speeding up to pass the person in front of me.
They were not driving particularly slowly. I just unconsciously kicked into gear to pass them. As I did, it struck me that I have been doing that all my life. Raised with a brother only 15 months younger, and a sister several years behind him, I had spent my life pushing myself to stay at the head of the pack.
The rivalry between my brother and me was particularly fierce. When he died in 1996, I grieved deeply, and in that process, got to ask myself who would I have been without my brother? It was a mind-boggling concept to wrap around at the time. Now, 13 years later, I can answer it a little bit better.
So, this was not the first time I had realized that this default stance, or autopilot programming, was running behind the screen of my conscious awareness. Yet, I am still surprised each time I discover it (which I do periodically). Then I take the necessary steps to turn off the autopilot, once I realize it is “driving the bus” of my existence.
When I first discovered it years ago, I thought of it as a positive trait. I was somehow proud of it.
Then I came to realize how it kept me out in the future all the time. So I set out to let it go. That is easier said than done! But now, years later, I actually have skills that help me drop back and enjoy each moment more fully and easily.
In that moment, driving down the highway I just chuckled, “There I go again!” And then I slowed down and let my car drop back behind the other car. I took a few deep slow breaths and let myself relax. There truly was in no hurry. Just my autopilot gone temporarily amuck.
This experience reminded that I needed some attention spent in this area. Last fall, after spending over a year in high gear to get my book completed and published, this autopilot program was clearly running. I was stunned to realize that I was having a hard time slowing down. My family could have told you that easily, but I was oblivious. What was the next task? Put me on it, and watch me run!
So this year has been about reclaiming my ability to slow down and enjoy life. It has been extremely busy, but each time I catch myself speeding up unnecessarily, I laugh and let go.
How do I do this? First, I don’t judge myself. I take a deep breath… I take another deep breath. I feel my feet on the ground. I take an honest inventory of whether or not I really need to go faster. Then I act on that assessment.
I was rushing, packing it all in. However, since I recognized the autopilot pattern, I have been systematically letting it all go. I take a nap. I take a walk. (Note: not a run, a walk.) Maybe get a massage. Or a long catch up session with a friend on the phone. A long soak in a hot bath. Snuggle with my sweetie, my kids or my cats on the couch.
Life is too sweet to rush through. It took me a lot of years to realize this.
The issue of resilience is in the air since the publishing of Elizabeth Edward?s new book. It is a timely and valuable subject since so many people are facing such adversity in their lives right now ? emotional, financial, and health-related issues.
How we respond to stress and adversity defines the quality of our lives. Life?s stressors are not going away. The only thing we really have any control over at all is how we respond to what life presents to us. And, our ability to respond well ? defined as making choices that enhance our life experience ? is dependant in large part on our resilience.
In a recent interview about her new book, ?Resilience?, Elizabeth Edwards gives us her definition,
?I talk about my father’s dealing with his life after he had a stroke. I think that resilience is accepting your new reality, even if it’s less good than the one you had, the reality that you liked before. That’s what my dad did. He still grabbed hold of what was left and lived it as fully as he could.? (italics mine)
My own father had a unique and wonderful way of demonstrating this for me when I was growing up. If a difficult situation came up, rather than reacting negatively, he would use it as an opportunity to ?put on his thinking cap? and rise to meet the challenge, especially if someone tried to tell him that the problem was unsolvable.
My earliest memory of this talent was one Christmas vacation when I was about eight years old. We were driving to my grandparent?s cabin in Fort Valley, Virginia when it began to snow, hard. By the time we got to the final leg of our journey -a long dirt road up a steep incline to their cabin – the snow was almost three feet deep and still coming down. There were two other cars stuck at the bottom of the hill with my uncles huddled around them looking worried and defeated. They were about to abandon their cars and carry all their stuff on foot up the long steep hill through the deep snow. We were tired and grumpy as kids usually are after such a long time in the car.
However, when my Dad looked over the whole situation and yelled to my uncles that he was ?going for it?, our tiredness turned to excitement. I remember him backing up the car, getting up speed and charging up the hill, slipping and sliding all the way.
Over and over, we watched as he got part of the way up and had to back down and start again. Each time he would get a little farther up the hill, until, finally we were all at the top ? all three cars ? and everyone was feeling exuberant rather than defeated.
Then, there was the time (obviously before the days of security checkpoints), when we arrived late for a flight. The ticket agent looked at us and said, ? You have exactly nine minutes to make it to your gate.? Dad looked at all of us with that gleam in his eye and said, ?You want to run for it?? Well, run we did, and we made the flight, seconds to spare, breathless and triumphant.
He emanated this wonderful sense of adventure and creativity in times of adversity.
The other day I was working with a young woman in her late twenties who had recently been home visiting her parents. She went to sit down in a chair and it collapsed. She found herself suddenly sitting on the floor, unharmed, but to her surprise, feeling anxious and frozen in place.
As we explored it further, she told me that when she was younger, her Dad would beat her with a belt if anything ever went wrong. It didn?t matter whose fault it was, and it happened so frequently that it became an automatic response to freeze, waiting for the blows she knew were inevitable.
So her recent response was understandable, but outdated and crippling to her as an adult woman – to be frozen with anxiety because of something that was an accident?
In her trauma response, in that moment, she had no resilience, no ability to see the situation as it currently stood, and thus no ability to respond in a creative, life-enhancing way.
Slowly we worked together to release the old nervous system response and bring her body and its ability to be resilient, into the present moment where she is safe and capable of taking care of herself quite well.
Memories of my Dad coached me all the way – if he had been there when the chair broke, he would have gotten that gleam in his eye and probably headed to the garage for the tools to fix it, all the while engaging her in how to creatively solve the problem of a faulty chair.
When the time was right, I shared the image of my father?s likely response, and she was astonished. Then she laughed and decided that his was the attitude she wanted to hold next time something went wrong. My story helped expand her view about how differently a parent could react in situations like that.
By the time we finished, she no longer felt like a scared little girl. Her power had returned and she had practiced how she could respond in the future.
A colleague and friend,Kathy Burns, gave me another definition the other day as we were discussing this issue.
?Resilience is the ability to accept what is actually happening, with as little judgment as possible, so that you can take clear, wise action about it ? to make the best of it.?
Then she laughed and added,
?This acceptance issue is a huge step for most people, particularly when the situation isn?t what they bargained for, or even faintly wanted.?
Life can really throw some hard stuff at us these days. To be disappointed, angry, frustrated or depressed over a turn of events is normal and even appropriate at times. The problem is when you stay there, stuck in an emotional soup that keeps you paralyzed and unhappy.
The skill of knowing how to expand your lens on what is happening is one worth cultivating, so that you can get the perspective to be able let go of whatever judgment is hounding you. With this acceptance comes an expanded capacity to creatively problem solve, in ways that are not available when you are locked up emotionally, or frozen with anxiety or worry.
My father modeled resilience for me. It guides me all the time these days. And when I share his wisdom, it guides others as well. Although he is no longer walking on the planet with me, part of him lives on in me. I know that would please him to no end. Thanks Dad!
I am delighted to announce that Full Body Presence is stepping out into a wider audience ? New World Library (think Eckhart Tolle?s publisher of “The Power of Now”) has bought the rights to the second edition of “Full Body Presence”! Coming to a bookstore near you early next year. I am feeling deep gratitude to everyone who has helped me, my work and my first book arrive at this point.
The buzz about the book is growing steadily, and I am touched by how many people of all different ages, professions and walks of life are being positively impacted by what the book has taught them. I love hearing about it. It is encouraging and heartwarming for me.
Have you readFull Body Presence yet? If so, please comment here on my blog or email me directly at healingfromthecore@comcast.net . Please, share any insights you may have gotten as you read it and listened to the audio. Tell me how this book has made a difference in your life. Please, also let me know if I can quote you on my website.
AND, the upcoming second edition means that the remaining books are now limited edition items. So, in celebration of the contract with New World Library Publishers, all books sold through our website in the next month will be personally signed by me.
One of the other ways I am celebrating is with an Author?s Party, given for me by a local friend and colleague. If I am in your area in the next year, I would love to come and celebrate with you as well! Contact my office athealingfromthecore@comcast.net if you are interested.
Coming next month.…the book will be on iTunes, and on our website totally in MP3 audio format – I’ll keep you posted when that is available for those of you who are audio book fans!
And now you can also keep up to date with me and Healing From the Core with Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn. Stay in touch, and, enjoy!
Over time several theories have been proposed to explain the motion of the craniosacral system. Two are presented below. They are ?The Pressurestat Model? and ?The Traube-Hering-Mayer Oscillations Model?.
The Pressurestat Model.
In this model cerebrospinal fluid is produced in continuous on-and-off phases lasting approximately 3-5 seconds per phase.
During cerebrospinal fluid production the total amount of fluid within the craniosacral system (CSS) increases. This increase in fluid raises the pressure within the CSS and causes it to expand. During non-production of cerebrospinal fluid the total amount of fluid within the CSS decreases. This decrease in fluid lowers the pressure within the CSS and causes it to contract.
The raising and lowering of pressure within the CSS creates the craniosacral rhythm.
The Traube-Hering-Mayer Oscillations Model.
Traube-Hering-Mayer oscillations are a mixture of rhythms created by the the sympathetic tone of autonomic nervous system, blood pressure, heart rate, blood flow, cerebrospinal fluid movement, and breathing. These oscillations blend to create the craniosacral rhythm.
?Is there a special chart for CranioSacral Therapy sessions??
I am not aware of a special chart for CranioSacral Therapy sessions although many practitioners use the standard SOAP note chart. Recently I created the chart shown in this blog. I?ve found it helpful in my practice so I wanted to share it with you.
Another question I?m asked about charting is, ?How do you remember what the client worked on during a session if you can?t chart it immediately after the session??
If I don?t have time to complete a client?s session notes then I spend a few minutes after a session drawing symbols on the client?s chart. The symbols represent certain types of compromise, such as an arrow pointing toward the midline of the body means ?medial compression?. While completing the chart I use the symbols as reminders of patterns the client worked with during the session.
I trust that my hands remember the session. Sitting quietly with my eyes closed I listen to my hands as they review the session. This helps me stay in the felt experience rather using my mind to figure it out. Not only do I recall the session but also new insights regarding the client?s strain patterns and corrective processes often arise during these times of reflection.
“If I understand correctly, CranioSacral therapy basically aims to improve the functioning of the central nervous system. Is that right?”
Yes, that is correct. The central nervous system (CNS), which is comprised of the brain and spinal cord, is encased within three layers of connective tissue. These layers are part of the craniosacral system (CSS) that forms a somewhat flexible container that is filled with the brain and spinal cord. If the container is distorted then the contents will also be affected in some way.
When abnormal stress occurs within the CSS layers such as, twists, pulls, bends, overstretch, or compression, then the tissue of the CNS may become distorted. If the delicate brain or spinal cord undergo structural deformation then the tissue becomes overly stressed. This stress can alter the way cells work or inhibit their ability to work at all leading to a multitude of dysfunction.
One primary objective of CranioSacral Therapy is to assist the body in decreasing harmful strain within the CSS layers, which in turn helps to alleviate injurious stress of the CNS cells. As this occurs then the CNS cells can function, adapt or compensate to their optimal ability.
?How is it possible that such light touch used in CranioSacral Therapy (CST) can help the body correct problems??
Andrew T. Still, D.O., the founder of Osteopathy, said, ?The little things are the big things in the science of Osteopathy.? and ?It may be that by measurement we can discover a variation one-hundredth of an inch from the normal, which, though infinitely small is nevertheless abnormal.?
Minute strain patterns of the body?s tissues, nerves, or fluids, which are often overlooked, can cause compromise ranging from minor aches or pains to severe disabling pathology. In CST we are working with tiny areas of compromise. Sometimes dysfunction is due to only one area of compromise, and at other times many areas merge into larger patterns. The effect of a strain can remain in the area where the strain is located, or it can affect other regions of the body, even the body as a whole. Each person has their own unique patterns of compromise, and each person has their unique patterns of correction, both of which can be expressed in infinite ways.
In CST it has been shown that using a light and delicate touch aids the corrective process of the client, and helps the practitioner perceive stressful and corrective patterns. An example may be a cork floating in water. It requires minimal pressure to feel the cork moving and the smallest amount of force to help the cork move. If one uses more than minimal pressure to feel the cork then its patterns of motion will be disturbed.
A primary focus of CST is to feel tissue and fluid patterns as they are within the client?s body moment to moment. To do this a practitioner uses light touch which supports the unique corrective patterns of the client in response to treatment; the practitioner does not determine how to correct but rather supports unique patterns of self-healing as they arise within the client. At the same time light touch helps the practitioner perceive a client?s patterns since the practitioner?s touch is not disturbing the client?s unique expression of strain and correction.
Reference:
Still, A. T., Philosophy and Mechanical Principles of Osteopathy, Hudson-Kimberly Publishing Co., Kansas City, MO., 1902.
The next few blogs will be devoted to answering questions that students ask in CranioSacral Therapy (CST) classes.
Question: What am I feeling for when I?m working at the cranium or face?
Answer: It depends on the intent of the technique that you are using at the time. For instance, when applying decompression of the sphenoid then the intent of the technique, in Upledger CST, is to feel the sphenoid move in the direction of decompression. The following checklist can be helpful in combination with any CST technique we may use for the skull or face.
1. Does each bone feel like it has elasticity within itself while responding to the craniosacral rhythm (CSR)? As an example, when the occiput widens and narrows in synchrony with the CSR does it feel like its bony matrix moves easily or does it feel inflexible? If it feels stiff then techniques such as direction of energy or cranial pumping can help the bone gain pliability within itself.
2. Does each bone feel as though it has enough mobility within its sutures to move through its normal range without strain? For instance, while a zygomatic bone is moving in synchrony with the CSR is it moving freely or is it jammed into the zygomatic process of the temporal bone, or perhaps into the frontal bone, or the maxilla thus restricting motion? If restrictions are found then the application of specific techniques, such as zygomatic decompression in this example, can help the bone gain greater freedom and motion.
3. Are fused bones free to move along with the CSR with the least amount of strain? Fusion can take place due to normal processes, abnormal processes, trauma or surgery, and if fusion has occurred between bones then one focus of CST is to optimize balanced mobility of the affected bones. As an example, if the sphenoid has fused with the base of the occiput then using Sutherland Sphenobasilar Lesion Patterns and Cranial pumping can be very helpful to optimize mobility.
4. Are the craniosacral system membranes moving freely in response to the CSR? As an example, when the falx cerebri and falx cerebelli move in synchrony with the CSR are they moving easily, freely, evenly, and equally, or do they feel pulled, twisted, stuck, or lacking symmetry of motion? If they are not moving in a free and balanced way then CST techniques such as frontal and parietal lift, temporal and sphenoid techniques, as well as cranial pumping can help the membranes gain greater ease as they move in synchrony with the CSR.
I find the following quote a helpful reminder when working with the cranium or face. ?Do not look for movement as in other joints of the body. This is merely a resiliency-a combination of slight yielding or suppleness in the articulation plus the flexibility of live and pliant bone.?
If you have a CST question please feel free to send it to me.
Reference:
Magoun, Harold I., Osteopathy In The Cranial Field, Third Edition, The Journal Printing Company, Kirksville, Missouri, 1976
CranioSacral Therapy (CST) often helps children overcome ear infections, especially when a child?s Eustachian Tube (ET) is blocked or congested.
Ear infections can bring about problems beyond the infection such as ear and jaw pain, tiredness, irritability, fever, headache, crying, restlessness, vomiting and diarrhea. Speech, language or learning impairment may even be related to chronic ear infections and the immune system can become excessively strained over time.
The craniosacral rhythm (CSR) is constantly ?massaging? the ET. One day I followed a child?s ET in synchrony with her CSR. By the end of the session she felt better and a few days later her ear infection resolved. So now I use the following sequence along with other CST techniques in a child?s session if she has an ear infection.*
Visualize the purpose of the technique, which is to help the child decrease ET blockage or congestion, enhance ET drainage, decongest the middle ear, and equalize air pressure between the middle ear and the atmosphere.
Visualize the ET connecting the middle ear to the back part of the upper throat, about in line with the nostril.
Visualize the ET moving in synchrony with the CSR. The ET is minutely stretched open and lengthened during the flexion phase, and slightly squeezed and shortened during the extension phase.
The child should be upright because it places her ET in its optimal drainage position. Sit facing the child. Place your finger softly upon the mastoid process of her affected ear and your thumb of the same hand alongside her nostril. If the child can?t tolerate your finger in her ear then place it upon her mastoid process. Imagine your thumb and finger are actually resting upon the opposite ends of her ET while sensing her entire ET. Set the intention to use ?0? grams of pressure while following the ET as it moves into positions of release until you feel softening. Then follow the tissue with ?0? grams of pressure in synchrony with the CSR until you feel greater ease of ET CSR motion.
This technique can help to enhance the CSR massage of the ET. This gentle kneading can un-block the ET and pump substances through the ET, which helps to decongest the middle ear and to relieve excessive pressure from inside the middle ear. As this happens the child?s ear infection can resolve more easily and the middle ear can work normally thus leading to improvements in hearing and other problems caused by an ear infection.
* When working with children it is very important to follow the adaptations of CST for infants and children in the CS I and CST II classes taught by the Upledger Institute. Practice the techniques before working with children in order to refine your touch, to enhance your ability to sense and follow the CSR, and to increase your awareness of tissue patterns and responses to treatment.
Denticulate Ligaments (DLs) are strands of connective tissue that suspend the spinal cord within its membrane sac, which is called the dual tube.
The dural tube is comprised of three layers of membrane surrounding the spinal cord. The membrane layer attached to the surface of the spinal cord is called the pia mater. The layer surrounding the pia mater is called the arachnoid membrane, and the layer surrounding the arachnoid membrane is called the dura mater.
DLs extend from the inner surface of the pia mater, travel through the pia mater, through the arachnoid membrane and then attach to the inner surface of the dura mater.
There are 21 pairs of DLs on the lateral aspects of the spinal cord. The first is attached to the foramen magnum. The last is attached to the conus medullaris, which is the end of the spinal cord at L1, and a small portion of the Filum Terminale (FT) beginning at the conus medullaris. The FT is a band of tissue extending from the conus medullaris to the coccyx that is made of spinal cord glial cells surrounded by pia mater.
DLs and FT shortening, twisting, bending or immobility can place adverse stress upon the spinal cord leading to neurological strain and dysfunction. Conversely, balancing the DLs and FT can decrease spinal cord stress which in turn can enhance neurological function.
DLs are fascinating components of the dural tube that seem, to me, to create a ligamentous suspension system cradling the spinal cord. Very little DL research is available.
These questions arise when I ponder and work the DLs and FT:
1) Since the spinal cord needs to move in its bony container more than the brain tissue does in its container, do the DLs provide protection and flexibility while allowing motion?
2) The dura mater of the dural tube is only one layer thick rather than the two layers within the cranium, so do the DLs create additional tube strength without compromising movement?
3) As the spinal cord moves within the spinal canal do the DLs, like thousands of tiny interlinked bungee cords, help dissipate stress and allow the spinal cord to find its most favorable position?
4) Structures that can affect the spinal cord, such as the occiput, spinal column, sacrum and coccyx, dural tube, adipose tissue within the spinal canal and nerve roots can each have restrictive patterns that in turn can distress the spinal cord. Do the DLs help to protect the spinal cord by balancing, dissipating and fine-tuning tension that is transmitted to the spinal cord?
5) Some theories suggest that there is a down and up flow of cerebrospinal fluid within the dural tube. Since the DLs separate the dural tube into anterior and posterior compartments, could that then organize the flow of cerebrospinal fluid?
I hope you?ll join me next month to explore this suspension system further. I’ll share some ideas on how to feel and work with DLs and the FT.
References:
Cramer, Gregory D., D.C., Ph.D., and Darby, Susan A., Ph.D., Basic and Clinical Anatomy of the Spine, Spinal Cord, and ANS, Second Edition, Elsevier Mosby, St. Louis, Missouri, 2005.
Tubbs, Shane R., M.S., PA-C; Salter, George, Ph.D.; Grabb, M.D.; and Oakes, Jerry W., M.D. ; ?The denticulate ligament: anatomy and functional significance?, J. Neurosurg: Spine / Volume 94 / April 2001.
The Hypoglossal Nerve (Cranial Nerve XII) is the primary motor nerve of the tongue. When the tongue does not work properly then difficulty chewing, swallowing, speaking or breathing can occur. One cause of tongue impairment is harmful strain upon the Hypoglossal Nerve as it travels from the brain to the tongue. The opening through which the Hypoglossal Nerve travels is called the Hypoglossal Canal. It is an important area to assess and mobilize if your client has impaired tongue function or tongue atrophy.
There are two Hypoglossal Nerves, a left and a right. The Hypoglossal Nerves pass through the Hypoglossal Canals (HCs) on their way from the brain to the tongue. The left Hypoglossal Nerve passes through the left Hypoglossal Canal, and the right Hypoglossal Nerve passes through the right Hypoglossal Canal. Adverse strain of the occiput, occipital condyles, craniosacral system membrane layers, foramen magnum, structures of the upper cervical region, or fascia of the occipital cranial base can distort the shape of the HCs. This shape distortion can place harmful stress upon the Hypoglossal Nerves.
The following description is one way to assess and mobilize restrictions of the HCs. However since the occiput has not completed its ossification process until the age of eight, when working with children only use the assessment and mobilization steps #1 through #3, and use the utmost of delicate touch and soft intention.
Throughout this description the client is supine (on their back). The practitioner is seated at the client’s head.
Assess the area of the HCs:
Hand Positions:
Place hands under the occiput, finger tips at the occipito-atlantal junction (where the occiput articulates with C1).
1. Feel the shape of the occiput while using “0″ grams pressure upon the occiput.
Imagine a line drawn through the centerline of the client?s face and cranium from the center of their chin to the center of the top of their head.
Does the occiput feel symmetrical in relationship to this line? Does it feel tilted so that one side is more inferior (towards the feet) than the other side, or twisted so that one side is more anterior (towards the front) than the other side? Does one side or the entire occiput feel flat, or does one side or the entire occiput feel excessively bowed? These shapes indicate probable strain of the intracranial membrane system, occiput, foramen magnum, occipital condyles or the HCs.
2. Feel the occiput and HCs widen and narrow in synchrony with the craniosacral rhythm (CSR) while using “0″ grams pressure.
Is there an equal range of motion during the flexion and extension phases of the CSR? Does the quality of motion feel smooth, unencumbered and balanced; does it feel thick, rigid or lopsided? Imbalance or strain in synchrony with the CSR indicates probable strain of the intracranial membrane system, occiput, foramen magnum, occipital condyles or the HCs.
Mobilize the area of the HCs:
1. Mobilize restrictions of the thoracic inlet area.
Place hands on the upper thoracic area so that the posterior hand rests midline under the C7/T1 area and the anterior hand is upon the collarbones and upper thoracic area. Come to “0″ grams pressure with both hands, and then set the intent for the fascia and structures in this area to move into positions of release. Follow the tissue as is does so until a feeling of softening occurs.
2. Mobilize restrictions of the hyoid area.
Change hand positions so the fingers of one hand are under the posterior neck area. Place the thumb and second finger of the other hand upon the anterior, lateral aspects of the hyoid. Come to “0″ grams pressure with both hands while setting the intent for the fascia and structures in this area to move into positions of release. Follow the tissue as is does so until a feeling of softening occurs.
3. Mobilize restrictions of the tissue in the area of the occipito-atlantal junction and traction release the occiput in a superior direction.
While seated at client’s head, place both hands under the occiput with your fingertips at the occipito-atlantal junction. Soften the feeling in your hands while setting the intent for the client’s tissue to soften under your fingertips. Wait and follow the tissue until a feeling of softening occurs.
Then set the intention to traction the occiput in a superior (towards the top of the head) direction using ?0? grams pressure. Follow the tissue until a feeling of softening occurs in a superior direction.
4. Mobilize restrictions of the occiput.
Hands remain under the occiput at “0″ grams pressure. Set the intention for the fascia and structures of the occiput, both inside and outside of the occiput, to move into positions of release. Follow the tissue as it moves into positions of release until a feeling of softening occurs.
5. Mobilize restrictions of the HCs.
Hands remain under the occiput at “0″ grams pressure with a focus upon your fingertips. Imagine that your fingertips are delicately contacting the area of the HCs. Set the intent for the fascia and structures in the area of the HCs to move into positions of release. Follow the tissue with your fingertips as is it does until a feeling of softening occurs under your fingertips.
6. Mobilize restrictions of the Hypoglossal Nerves.
Hands remain under the occiput at “0″ grams pressure with a focus upon your fingertips. This time imagine that your fingertips are resting delicately upon the Hypoglossal Nerves as they pass through the HCs. Set the intent for the Hypoglossal Nerves to move into positions of release. Follow the nerves with your fingertips until a feeling of softening occurs.
7. Use the dynamic fluid motion of the craniosacral system to enhance and integrate correction.
Hands remain under the occiput at “0″ grams pressure. Follow the occiput as it widens and narrows in synchrony with the CSR at “0″ grams pressure. When the occiput arrives at end range of widening and end range of narrowing, apply the intent to encourage the occiput further into its end ranges. The intent to encourage lasts for about one second or less at each end range. Continue to encourage at end ranges until a feeling of softening occurs in both directions. In Upledger CranioSacral Therapy, this is referred to as “Cranial Pumping”.
8. Enhance correction by facilitating integration between the tongue muscles and the occiput.
While seated at the side of your client, slowly slide the palm of one hand under the occiput and gently place the fingers of your other hand at the area of the base of the tongue under the chin. While using ?0? grams pressure, set the intent for the tongue, occiput, foramen magnum, HCs, Hypoglossal Nerves, fascia, cervical area, craniosacral system membrane layers and brain tissue to integrate the corrections that have occurred. Wait to feel softening and a feeling of greater connection between your hands.
If you are working with clients who have difficulty chewing, swallowing, speaking or breathing; or babies having difficulty sucking or swallowing; then you may want to try the HC sequence during several sessions to see if it helps. Also, using this sequence periodically can enhance your client?s overall well-being, even if there is no tongue issue, since the occipito-atlantal junction is a common area of tissue restriction, fluid congestion and strain upon the central nervous system.
Dr. Upedger and I paused before going into the treatment room. Sammy, who had the left side of his brain removed to stop his constant seizures, was waiting inside with his mom. “Let?s work with Sammy?s stem cells to help him rebuild his missing brain,? Dr. Upledger said without reservation or apprehension. “Since stem cells can create any type of cell in the body, why shouldn?t they make a new brain?? He paused to let this idea sink in. ?You know, bone marrow in flat bones is a main site for stem cells, so his head is a perfect place to start. I?ll begin at his head. Will you start with his ribcage?? I nodded, ?Yes, sure.?
When we entered the room Sammy was lying on his back upon the treatment table, awkwardly trying to roll from side to side while crying and screaming. His mother, Alicia, introduced herself to Dr. Upledger, her eyes darting to Sammy then to Dr. Upledger, back to Sammy and then to the CD player. ?We Can Work It Out? by the Beatles seemed way too loud. Alicia, sensing our concern about the music, said, ?Beatles? songs help Sammy calm down.? Raising his voice a little Dr. Upledger said, ?I?d like to work with Sammy?s stem cells to see if they?ll rebuild his brain, OK?? “Sure, I’m open to anything that?ll help Sammy,” Alicia replied, her eyes continuing to fleet between Sammy, me, the CD player, Dr. Upledger, the wall, and back to Sammy.
We drew our chairs alongside the treatment table quietly so that we wouldn?t startle Sammy. Alicia, now singing along with the music to help calm Sammy, sat down, put one hand on his leg and began patting his leg just out of rhythm with the music.
Placing our hands upon Sammy, Dr. Upledger and I focused on sensing Sammy?s brain, body and stem cells. After about five minutes Dr. Upledger began to speak softly as he held Sammy? head, “Sammy, I’m John and I’d like to help you. Is that OK?” Brief pause. “I’d like to ask stem cells in the bones of your head to go and make new brain parts. Is that OK?” Pause. “Great, thank you Sammy.” Then, ?Sammy, you already know Tad, is it OK if he helps stem cells go from your chest into your head?? Pause. ?Great, thank you Sammy.? Twenty minutes or more passed. I could see Dr. Upledger?s mouth moving as he talked to Sammy, but I couldn?t hear what he was saying. Sammy was screaming louder, Alicia was patting faster, and she kept turning the volume up on the Beatles who were now blasting out “She Loves You”.
All of a sudden Sammy?s bones and blood began to vibrate as if the New York Symphony and the Mormon Tabernacle Choir were playing and singing the same note. In that moment, like a switch turned, Sammy became still and quiet, his eyes softened and stopped moving all around; Alicia stopped singing and patting his leg, slowly stood, turned, and clicked off the music.
Then, after time passed in this quiet state, Sammy?s body signaled that he had finished his session?s work. Dr. Upledger said, ?Great job Sammy, we?ll see you tomorrow, OK? Thank you.? We slowly removed our hands and pushed our chairs slightly back from the table. Dr. Upledger asked Alicia if she had any questions. She was staring at Sammy as he lay quietly on the table and said, ?Well, yes, but right now I don?t know what to say, can we talk tomorrow?? Dr. Upledger smiled and nodded, ?Yes.?
After two weeks of daily treatment Sammy and Alicia returned home to Iowa. Sammy came back to the clinic with his mom two to three times a year for several years, and he improved with each visit until he could manage at home with local practitioners.
Dr. Upledger is constantly using his intelligence, clinical experience and research to create and perfect his ideas within a CranioSacral Therapy context. He has a remarkable ability to investigate current thinking and research, and then distill the information into practical CST technique.
Dr. Upledger has shown me that each one of us is uniquely creative, insightful and perceptive, and when we embrace these qualities in ourselves to help others then the possibilities for growth, both of our clients and ourselves, is immense.
My infatuation with form began when I was a child and still is a constant wonder and focus in my work as a CranioSacral Therapy practitioner.
My parents owned a small Chinese antique store in Washington, D.C. A tiny repair room crammed full of damaged objects was in the back of the store. Stuff was everywhere: broken statuary made of porcelain, wood or bronze; stained or ripped paintings; tattered silk robes; fragments of jade; pieces of carved ivory, and dented cloisonné vessels. The floor was taken up with pieces of teak furniture and two huge ceramic foo-dogs so large they loomed over me.
I spent hours with these things. Their shape, color, and texture carried me into a realm of wondering. When I held the woman carved of ivory, I wondered about her, not in a specific way like who carved her or what happened to her. I wasn’t trying to create anything, I’d just wonder and wait… accepting anything that arose in my mind’s eye.
Before I knew it her missing hand would spring forth with its delicately pointing finger, or her smooth face would glisten suddenly, as if illuminated by the moon, pastel colors of pale green and poppy yellow emerging upon her gown. I’d pay close attention and hear stories murmered by water flowing over creek stones. At times her voice whispered sounds that I didn’t understand, yet somehow I felt better, as though wrapped in a warm blanket.
Eventually I became an artist making imagined things into objects drawn and sculpted. Yet something was lacking. I didn?t understand what it was until I began to learn and use CranioSacral Therapy. Then I realized what was missing, it was life?s motion.
Movement characterizes life. While practicing CranioSacral Therapy I am awe struck when feeling the life force within each cell which can be expressed as blood coursing within our vessels, oxygen filling our lungs, nerves conveying information, or particles entering and leaving our cells. This majestic motion is the way form makes itself known to me.
So when I work with clients, a state of wonder permeates each second of time. I feel the human being is majestic and our life force unfathomable, yet somehow palpable. I marvel at the depth of motion within each cell and I wonder and wait. As I wait images arise of cells moving freely, fluids energizing and vibrant. Other images may emerge of brain parts twisted, membrane coiled or stuck, nerves stressed, or vessels congested. I may see the entire body crumpled by a snagged string of fascia. A large part of my work is to gently support shapes as they shift and untangle.
I am constantly amazed how form is a gateway into the ordinary, the extraordinary, the glorious and the therapeutic.
Most people have at least heard of the term “body memory” or “tissue memory.? The Myofascial Release perspective believes that it is within the intricate matrix of the myofascial, or connective tissue that holds this memory and the myofascial tissue is literally the ?record keeper? of memory in the body/mind complex.
When trauma occurs, whether physical, mental, emotional or a combination of these, people respond with a flight/fight or freeze response. It is this unresolved freeze response that MFR therapists believe is what holds us back from fully and naturally healing from a traumatic event.
Kathy Monkman, BSN, LMT, who is a Myofascial Release therapist with over 20 years of experience, has had a very creative idea that I would like to share with you.
?I’m excited to share with you a project I’ve launched this week that you might want to affiliate with and/or help me promote.
Last year I had one of those “aha” moments related to returning service persons struggling with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and how I (we) could help them with Myofascial Release but really didn’t know how or where to begin. Life went on and this summer a pebble got kicked in me that started a momentum to get this project started and the ?In One Peace Project? was born.
The ?In One Peace Project? is created to offer once per month, 100% free clinics to returning service persons using John F. Barnes Myofascial Release to help them resolve issues with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and/or body/head injury. At my office the 3 of us MFR therapists are going to offer this service to this population each month for a full day of free sessions. As I say in the mission statement, ?we are here to serve those who are serving us.?
So, please take a look at my site, and friend me on Facebook and affiliate if you’re so inclined and help me get the word out! Thank you to John for giving me this opportunity to get this out there as well!?
If you are interested in helping those brave men and women who have risked their lives protecting us, please contact Kathy at: http://www.inonepeaceproject.org/.
Sincerely,
John
For more information about Myofascial Release, you can now access two separate excerpts from the Fireside Chat with John F. Barnes, PT DVD on ‘You Tube’! Just click on the following links:
Not only do Myofascial restrictions create pain, headaches, and the symptoms of Fibromyalgia, but they also seem to speed the aging process internally and externally.
In my Myofascial Release I seminar, I teach therapists the importance of doing self treatment, so they can treat themselves and so they can also teach their clients to treat themselves. As the therapists take my advanced Myofascial Release seminars, those that take my advice of doing regular self treatment state that they look and feel younger!
Over the years from habitual pain expressions, grimacing, and gravity the fascia tightens and deepens the lines and wrinkles in one?s face and neck. Of the many techniques that I teach is the ?fascial facial?. These techniques can provide a much more youthful appearance to your face and neck.
Obviously, the internal beauty of physiological health is also very important. The environment of every cell, the fascia?s ground substance, ideally should be fluid. Trauma and thwarted inflammatory responses tend to solidify the ground substance. This limits the amounts of oxygen, nutrition, biochemicals, hormones, information and energy that the 50 trillion cells receive. The pressure of the restricted fascial system is interfering with the delicate inner mechanisms of the cell. Recent research is showing that debris, waste products, and toxins that become trapped in the cell may be what can lead to the decline of the aging process.
I believe the solidification of the ground substance blocks cellular excretion and does not allow this and the toxins to reach the lymphatic system so they become trapped and cannot flush out to purify cells.
I believe that excessive pressure and dehydration of the fascia?s ground substance forces our molecules to tangle and stiffen with age. Cross links form, gluing the molecules together. Cross links stiffen our collagen and make our skin wrinkle. Chemists call this the advanced glycation end products, AGE.
The goal of Myofascial Release is to release the cross links and eliminate the pressure on our cells and their important environment.
Thanks,
John
For more information about Myofascial Release, you can now access two separate excerpts from the Fireside Chat with John F. Barnes, PT DVD on ‘You Tube’! Just click on the following links:
As mentioned in last month?s blog, Myofascial Release can be beneficial helping many Women?s Health issues, including fibrocystic breasts. Fibrocystic breast disease refers to benign (non-cancerous) changes in the tissues of the breast. Often times, fibrocystic changes occur during ovulation and before menstruation, due to changing hormone levels. The breast cells can start to retain fluid and develop into nodules or cysts. With Myofascial Release, the skilled therapist can help to release the restriction in these tight areas as well as addressing other restrictions in the body, on order to eliminate and prevent the cysts from occurring.
My new article titled, ?We are not Mindless Machines?, will be available in the print/newsstand version of Massage Magazine in July. This article discusses some new thoughts and theories about cancer and disease and I discuss how Myofascial Release can help many disease processes, while often times helping to avoid surgeries and/or unnecessary procedures.
You may also want to read my Therapeutic Insight Column titled, ?Breast Health? on the Massage Magazine website under the techniques section or at the following link: (http://www.massagemag.com/News/massage-news.php?id=9186).
Sincerely,
John F. Barnes, P.T., L.M.T., N.C.T.M.B.
For more information about Myofascial Release, you can now access two separate excerpts from the Fireside Chat with John F. Barnes, PT DVD on ‘You Tube’! Just click on the following links:
Myofascial Release techniques are successful in resolving many of women?s health problems such as: fibrocystic painful breasts, menstrual and pelvic pain, painful intercourse, and urinary frequency, urgency and incontinence.
You can now access my latest Therapeutic Insight Column titled, ?Breast Health? on the Massage Magazine website under the techniques section or at the following link: (http://www.massagemag.com/News/massage-news.php?id=9186).Also, be on the lookout next month for my new article titled, ?We are Not Mindless Machines,? which will be featured in the July issue of MASSAGE Magazine, and discusses the treatment of cancer with myofascial release.
Myofascial Release is safe, highly effective, and creates the possibility of avoiding medicine and surgery.
Thanks,
John
For more information about myofascial release, you can access two separate excerpts from the Fireside Chat with John F. Barnes, P.T. DVD on YouTube. Just click on the following links:
Myofascial and Myofascial Rebounding techniques are successful in resolving many of women?s health problems such as: fibrocystic painful breasts, menstrual and pelvic pain, painful intercourse, and urinary frequency, urgency and incontinence.
We’ve had many inquiries regarding how Myofascial Release differs from other forms of massage, bodywork, and energy work. To learn more about Myofascial Release it may be helpful to view this excerpt from my Fireside Chat DVD that we recently posted on ?You Tube?. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PWRuS9xAbMo<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PWRuS9xAbMo>).
The work of yours that I have heard about is perking me into a bit of a chat.
My only experience in a myofascial release class was not with you or your group but it was SO painful that I left it feeling unloved and certain that the work was not for me. You speak of things that do interest me, our intuition, water, emotion etc. What is your experience with the Trager Approach?
Virginia
Virginia,
The Trager Approach is excellent. Myofascial Release is the “”missing link” in this and other forms of therapy, massage, energy work, and it can significantly increase your effectiveness.
I have been teaching Myofascial Release seminars for well over 30 years. As you may have noticed, “Copy Cat” Myofascial Release courses are popping up and these courses do not teach the same principles or techniques that we do. They teach what we call the old form of Myofascial that is forceful, mechanical, and very painful and only produces temporary results. Many of the theories of these courses are based on information that has been obsolete for over 70 years!
My Myofascial Release principles were developed from my personal experience with pain. My theory of Myofascial Release is explained in detail in my monthly column titled, “Therapeutic Insight”. To learn more, you can click on the following link to read the first Therapeutic Insight column.
My approach to Myofascial Release is safe, gentle, and produces consistent results in reducing pain, headaches, and fibromyalgia symptoms. The goal of the Myofascial Release therapist is to return the individual to a pain free, active lifestyle.
As you know, the state of a current health care system is a hot topic among many people including politicians, health care workers and consumers. There has been a lot of speculation about what is going to happen to our health care system in the future. But what concept they are missing is that most therapists are taught obsolete techniques that only produce temporary results which drive up health care costs.
All of this consternation about the collapsing health-care system is to me no more than a reshuffling of the deck chairs on the Titanic. The Titanic is an inept health-care system based on principles that are more than 300 years old and were proven to be obsolete in 1923 by Max Planck, the founder of the Quantum Theory. Many of the principles taught in medical, dental and therapeutic schools have been proven to be wrong for more than 70 years and yet are still being taught. Medical theory has degraded into the biochemistry of disease, as if we were just mindless bags of chemicals. A massive amount of recent research supporting our experience with myofascial release has shown that fascial restrictions change the shape of the cell and the viscosity of its surrounding environment, the extra-cellular matrix.
Dear John,
Thanks to everyone out there sending me support with their prayers and love and light. It is greatly appreciated. I know I must have written you in the middle of the night and didn?t proof read my work prior to sending it out since my last name lost an ?a? in it. So just for the record it?s East, George Lee East, P.T. aka The Cayman Cat, Toast and Breeze. My email address is breeze_east@hotmail.com (that is an underscore between the breeze and east). I really do appreciate hearing from everyone and forgive me if it takes a while to get back with you right away, since I seem to be having a lot of low energy days lately and the pain meds make me feel totally out of it! I personally believe I am going to figure out how to lick this thing since I was just coming into my own as a therapist, energy worker and being able to reframe the consciousness behind the cause of my client?s problems when this happened to me. I would love to hear from the Old Mastery Group and anyone who is into alternative healing techniques, especially remote work. Anyway, The Cayman Cat Lives! I also can?t wait to come out to play again with all of John?s MFR family. I got way too much stuff on my plate to do before packing it up for good. Too much yet to be learned and too much fun yet to be had. So keep me in your prayers in a posititive light and if anyone needs a practice patient, pick me, pick me, pick me! Until then,
Lots of Love & Light,
George Lee East, P.T.
Breeze
The Cayman Cat
I just wanted to revisit the topic of scars and the concept of the treatment of scars. As you may remember, a couple months ago there was a blog titled, “Scars” which discussed the importance of assessing and treating scars, no matter how large or how small, once they are healed. You can access my “Scars” blog at the following link:
I have been dealing with the aftermath of my accident for 14 months now. I have scars from the initial facial surgery and neck fusion. Most recently I have new scars from revision facial surgery. I have a new scar in my naval where they withdrew fat to inject into my lips. Knowing what I know about the fascial web, I was still amaze at how a tiny incision in the naval could cause soreness all the way up to my ribs and down to the pubic bone. I could feel the fingers of tender fascia. I was also aware of the tiny restrictions created in my lip margins from the injections. As tiny as they are, they feel significant. All the scars have had an impact on my entire structure from head to toe and I believe my functional progress has been largely due to receiving MFR throughout the past 14 months. I have specifically requested scar releases as I believe as long as there is a tight scar it will pull any other work out of alignment. I hope the greater medical community will understand the importance of this work (especially scar releases) in achieving improved function.
I knew very little about ?scar tissue? before attending Intensives and Healing Seminars you offer.
The first week a therapist did a psoas release on my right side of my abdomen near my old appendectomy scar. I would experience pain on my left side ribs, lats, and rhomboid! The fascial connection was obvious.
Later, when being treated intra-orally with a therapist?s finger in my nostril I could ?feel? the scar tissue of an old sinus surgery. Then, through my palatine in the roof of my mouth to the scar tissue then down my dural tube through my hips and left knee (scars from surgeries again)and leg to my neuropathic foot. Afterwards, I regained more than 40% of the feeling in my left foot! Fascia is fascinating!
I have avoided multiple neck, spine, and hip surgeries and reversed scoliosis and stenosis today.
I can never thank you enough for your dedication and perseverance in developing your extraordinary form of manual therapy and authentic healing.
Much is written about the ?fight/flight response? and its impact upon our neuroendocrine system, however the ?freeze response? seems to be completely ignored by the vast majority of therapists and other medical practitioners. When this natural response to an overwhelming traumatic event occurs as the instinctual optimal act of survival?and we survive the traumatic event, discharge of this enormous surge of energy within our system is paramount to release the trauma and free our systems to restore homeostasis. Seems this is beginning to become recognized in various therapies, especially bodywork/somatic type approaches. John, your Myofascial Release Approach appears to be one of the few which recognizes how this holding can create tremendous tensions within the entire body. Using Myofascial Release to ease into areas where that instinctual freeze response has become woven into the very tapestry of the entire human form, thus recreating enormous dysfunction?and allowing for discharge of energy as it naturally needs to express itself? is remarkable!
It moves the therapist/patient from the limitations of considering how trauma not only impacts upon the nervous system and allows access to profound healing of the subconscious mind as it shapes and holds our very form.
Sheila Walker
As you can read from the above comments and how I mentioned in my blog about scars, do not underestimate even the tiniest scar, because if they are a source of a restriction, they too can cause significant symptoms.
I?m very interested in this previous thread on inflammation. I?ve been reading about chronic inflammation and how many now agree that this process is behind many diseases.
It leads me to wonder if the chronic, systemic inflammation caused by a diet high in processed foods leads to widespread gumming up and restricting of the fascial system, in turn affecting cellular respiration and degeneration.
I usually think of the inflammatory processes that lead to myofascial restrictions as being caused by the primary inflammatory processes associated with injury.
Do you think that the process causing chronic inflammation to manifest disease is born out by changes in the fascial system?
Testing this hypothesis, I turned to Dr. Dean Ornish?s book on reversing heart disease. He talks mostly about poor diet diminishing blood flow to the heart through plaque build-up, etc. I get how fascia is involved in hardening of the arteries but not in plaque build-up.
I know this is only one disease of many to consider.
I?d be very interested if you can offer even more insight than you?ve already offered into the subject of inflammation.
Thanks,
Owen Dodge
Hi Owen,
Thanks for your question. I recently had a well known Pathologist from San Francisco as a patient. He was very disappointed at the resistance of his medical colleagues to his and others new ideas. For many years as he dissected recently deceased humans, he saw the roughness of the inside of the blood vessels.
His years of experience and a multitude of recent research has shown that as the fascia on the inside of blood vessels becomes rough and solidified, it can trap the cholesterol. This can cause a thickening and/or blockage within the circulatory system leading to serious consequences. Fascia has a profound effect on the functioning and health of the entire circulatory and lymphatic systems.
This article discusses how my approach to myofascial release treats the biomechanical aspect but also uses different fluid dynamic principles that address our fluidity, which tends to solidify from trauma or thwarted inflammation processes. This article also talks about how a Myofascial Release therapist uses their genius by engaging the power of their intuition, instinct, and rational mind. This total engagement allows the patient to access their wisdom for authentic healing.
The statement that was released by the Board of Directors was short and offered no details behind the departure. It read:
The AMTA Board of Directors has accepted the resignation of our long-time Executive Director, Elizabeth M. Lucas. During her more than 10 years as Executive Director, and in her years before that as Director of Communications and Marketing, Liz provided AMTA, the National Office and staff with outstanding leadership, while carrying out the direction of the national board. The board and staff thank Liz for all of her contributions and wish her all the best as she pursues other career opportunities.
The board will begin its search for a new Executive Director for both AMTA and the Massage Therapy Foundation. In the meantime, Shelly Johnson, who has been AMTA Deputy Director for more than 8 years, will function as Interim Executive Director. All AMTA day-to-day activities will continue as scheduled.
AMTA Board of Directors
The timing of this is interesting; the National Convention is only three weeks away. I had in fact personally e-mailed Ms. Lucas this past week to express my opinion about the NCBTMB being prohibited from exhibiting at the convention, something I?ve known about for some time. I haven?t previously thrown it out on the blog out of my respect for AMTA and not wanting to look like I was accusing them of behaving badly, but it?s gotten to the point where it isn?t any kind of secret. It?s now common knowledge. When it hits Facebook you know the word is out.
For over a year now, the National Certification Board of Therapeutic Massage & Bodywork has been working quietly behind the scenes to eradicate massage schools?or rather, diploma mills?that have been handing out fraudulent transcripts and diplomas, lacking any operating authority, and committing a host of other ethics violations. Since June of 2009, 11 schools have had their school code suspended, three have been revoked, and one school voluntarily withdrew their code after being notified that they were suspended.
To clarify the meaning of these actions, a school must have an assigned code in order for their students to sit for an examination offered by the NCBTMB. 39 states currently accept those exams, and they are often utilized by therapists in unregulated states who want to set themselves apart as professionals. No school code means no students from those schools will be able to take the NCB exams. California, where this investigation was concentrated, currently has voluntary registration for massage therapists, and is in fact in the middle of further turmoil because of AB 1822, a proposed massage bill that treats therapists little better than prostitutes. Even though the investigation and subsequently revoked and suspended schools are located in California, the implications are far-reaching, including my state of North Carolina.
Our Board noticed months ago that a high number of applicants for licensure were coming out of two schools in particular, one in California (the East-West School, which has had their code suspended pending further investigation) and one in New York. The applicants first attracted attention because they have all had the same address. In one instance in North Carolina, an applicant from one of the suspect schools was denied a license based on his criminal record. When he appeared to appeal that decision, we discovered he could speak no English. His daughter translated for him, and stated that they had immigrated to America based on the promise that they could go to massage school, get out quickly, and start making a lot of money. I actually feel sorry for these people, because the unscrupulous schools are just taking advantage of people who don?t know any better. It?s a sad situation for the students who paid money in good faith that they were going to get a real education in massage therapy.
While the NCBTMB has in the past revoked certification of individuals found guilty of ethics violations, this is their first widespread effort to put a stop to schools operating in an unethical manner.
Paul Lindamood, CEO of the NCB, gave me the following statement about the NCBTMB’s school compliance program:
NCBTMB is in a unique position with its vantage point on massage in America. Because we monitor, approve or exchange critical data at many touch points of the profession, we are at the nexus of a great deal of information flowing to and from our certification specialists. This gives us the ability to get an overall snapshot of the profession in specific areas relevant to schools, students, educational methods, curriculum, test dynamics, metrics, practitioner activity, etc.
About a year ago, members of our school outreach, compliance, eligibility and ethics departments identified the emergence of some alarming developments when overlaying and studying school data. Specifically, we began to spot ways in which individual schools were giving the appearance of impropriety through inconsistent and unreliable data, irregularities or shortfalls in curriculum standards, falsification of application information and the appearance of fraudulent activities sufficient to cast doubt on the legitimacy of these schools or institutions.
With this knowledge, NCBTMB board and staff recognized the need to immediately create a standardized, legally sound process that would allow us to identify, investigate, sanction or revoke suspected schools that could not pass muster, and thereby prohibit them from being able to have their graduates test via National Certification Exams. The program was developed and received board approval at the beginning of this year. Since then, school investigations have been ongoing via our compliance and ethics departments, and sanctions and revocations have been issued and communicated to the schools, state boards and pertinent law enforcement.
In addition, in the states and surrounding regions where these schools exist, we have made authorities aware of school code suspensions as well. This includes local law enforcement, regulatory agencies, state massage boards and attorneys general. Currently, we are working closely with law enforcement officials and state board representatives on investigations in several states, sharing both intelligence and resources.
It’s that time of the year again: Election time at the American Massage Therapy Association. For the second year, voting is online. I encourage all members to exercise their right to pick your leaders. In fact, let’s change that from “encourage” to “beg.” Last year’s showing on the election was less than ideal–a lot less. Imagine an organization that has well over 50,000 members, and then imagine that only the people who were at the national convention voted. Yep, that’s about it–somewhere in the vicinity of 1800 people. Some of that can be attributed to the fact that it was the first year voting was offered online. Some of it can be attributed to complacency or feeling like your vote won’t make any difference and that’s just wrong. It will make a difference.
AMTA is the only member-driven non-profit massage therapy association. We have state chapters and the leadership of those chapters is voted in (and out) by the membership. The same with the national association. As is my usual habit, if I don’t personally know the candidates, I of course read their candidate statements and almost always contact the ones I don’t know in person, if I don’t get enough out of their candidate statement and/or recommendations from my friends in the organization who do know them. And I want them to know me; that’s why I call them. I want the officers to know who I am and what I want to see happen for the organization. I want to know who to pat on the back and who to complain to.
I have the same attitude with AMTA elections that I have with the government elections: if you don’t vote, don’t complain. This is your opportunity to pick the people who are going to be leading the organization, so make use of it. Here are my picks for this year:
President-Elect: Cynthia Ribeiro. Cynthia Ribeiro is a member of the CA Chapter. She has an impressive education and the necessary skill set for being an effective leader. It’s my desire to see the minimum standards for massage therapy raised, and Cynthia is a great example of someone who exceeds the minimum by hundreds of hours. She also shares one of my pet agendas–advancing the profession through research. She’s a member since 1987 and has been volunteering at the national level since 1997. Cynthia is Nationally Certified in Therapeutic Massage & Bodywork and is an Approved Provider under the NCBTMB. She’s the owner of the Western Institute of Neuromuscular Massage Therapy in Laguna Hills, CA. I met Cynthia last year when she taught a class at our annual meeting. She gets my vote.
Vice-President: Nancy M. Porambo. Nancy is a member of the PA Chapter and is the owner of The Therapy Option in Jim Thorpe, PA. She’s Nationally Certified in Therapeutic Massage & Bodywork and is an Approved Provider of Continuing Education under the NCBTMB. She has been an active volunteer on both her state and the national level. Nancy really hit the floor running…she won her Chapter’s Meritorious Award in 1995, just two years after becoming Nationally Certified. She also has a Master’s in Clinical Health Psychology. I think every ache and pain in the body has an emotional component; wise choice on her part to pursue that. I’ve met Nancy twice when she taught at our chapter’s meetings and in fact had the opportunity to talk with her at our annual meeting last weekend. Nancy gets my vote.
Board of Directors Member-at-Large: Ed Sansbury, Joan Nichols, and Kathie Lea. Ed Sansbury is the Immediate Past President of the North Carolina Chapter. I won’t support him on that account; I’ll support him because he is an individual with an abundance of integrity, energy, and the desire to do the right thing, always. Ed has been a tireless worker for our chapter and he will do the same at the national level. Ed has expertise in the field of government relations and that is a big deal to me. He has a practice in Raleigh, NC. He gets my vote.
Ditto for Joan Nichols of the Georgia Chapter. Joan shares my belief that research is the key to propelling our profession forward. She is Nationally Certified in Therapeutic Massage & Bodywork and has a practice in Stockbridge, GA. She has been a volunteer on the state and national level and is currently the Immediate Past President of the GA Chapter. She brings experience and leadership qualities to the job. Joan is a supporter of advanced education and credentialing. I met Joan when I taught a class for the GA Chapter last year. She gets my vote.
Kathie Lea is the 1st VP of the Louisiana Chapter. She is Nationally Certified in Therapeutic Massage & Bodywork. Kathie has been a member of AMTA since 1988 and National Member-at-Large since 2004. Normally I’m all for new blood. However, I don’t like to see an experience deficit…I definitely think one or two “old hands” is a good thing. She served as the LA Chapter President 2000-2002 and participated in the process of bringing licensure to her state. Kathy is committed to her own continuing education and has studied with many of the best teachers in the business. I like therapists who think we need to keep on learning, no matter how much we think we may know. She gets my vote.
Commission on Candidacy: Christopher Deery. Christopher is the Immediate Past President of the OK Chapter. He’s part of a dynamic duo–his wife Xerlan Geiser-Deery is the current Chapter President. I’m happy to say both of them are friends of mine and they both bend over backwards for AMTA. He possesses leadership qualities himself and therefore knows what it takes to do the job. He gets my vote.
There you go. Whether you vote with me or not, please vote. The right to elect our leadership is one of the perks of being a member. Take advantage of that and just do it. All the candidate biographies can be seen here.
Yesterday when I posted A Few Steps Forward, A Few Steps Back, I wasn’t counting on having to back up and punt, but unfortunately I have to do so in the form of a correction. A few months ago, when I started reporting on the zoning ordinance in Chicago, I had been checking their legislative updates and apparently looking in the wrong place.
This morning, two Chicago therapists have contacted me to let me know that the dreaded zoning ordinance, which was tabled in May, slid into home plate on June 9th in a move that blindsided everyone. Apparently it has also escaped AMTA’s and ABMP’s attention, as their legislative updates don’t mention it, either–two places I often look for verification when it comes to checking on what’s coming down the legislative pike.
Title 17 of the Municipal Code of the City of Chicago was amended to prohibit massage establishments from the same areas zoned for business that hairdressers, barbershops, and nail salons are allowed to be in. Why have we been singled out in this manner, and honest hard-working massage therapists relegated to areas zoned for heavy commercial and industrial use? Are hairdressers and nail technicians more moral and law-abiding than most massage therapists?
This is pathetic. This zoning change was sponsored by Ray Suarez, Alderman in the 31st Ward, and the vote was 30-8 in favor of the ordinance, with 11 members not voting. You can read the list here.
It is my fondest hope that EVERY massage therapist in the city of Chicago checks to see how your Alderman voted, and vote them right on out. Contact them to express your extreme displeasure at the way they are discriminating against massage therapists and let them now you’ll be expressing that when they need your support.
The massage profession has made a few good strides lately–and taken a few hard hits, as well. On the “moving forward” side, the wake-up call to the therapists in California over Bill 1822 was answered when more than 2000 therapists e-mailed their legislators in less than 48 hours, causing the bill to be favorably amended. The same happened in Cook County, IL a few months ago when therapists protested loudly about a detrimental zoning proposition that would have limited massage therapists to practicing in areas zoned for heavy industry and taverns. I’m glad people in the massage community are finally rising to the occasion. Complacency is not a good thing.
On the “moving backward” front last week, Delaware’s proposed action to do away with tiered licensing and raise the standard to 500 hours across the board was vetoed, in spite of the fact that the plan included a three-year grandfathering period for bringing everyone up to snuff. In the past month, we’ve also had to deal with the Al Gore controversy, the nincompoops on The View giving massage a bad name, and the unfortunate circumstances leading to the demise of one of the providers of liability insurance to massage therapists.
Like any other industry or profession, we have our share of problems. I think the key is to keep on plugging away until we have regulation in every state, and have educated every member of the public to what massage therapy is really all about. In spite of the fact that massage has been documented in cave drawings and in the pyramids, we’re far from the point of being able to rest on our laurels.
A number of our state regulatory boards are still in their youth, and are too busy dealing with the business of getting established to conduct effective public education campaigns. And it’s not just the general public who has to be educated, it’s the legislators. While our professional associations all have government relations representatives, they can’t go everywhere and they can’t be everywhere at one time. There’s only a few of them, but there’s 250,000 or so of us. It’s up to us. The call to action in CA and IL and the subsequent outcry is the proof that enough therapists rising up can stop detrimental legislation in its tracks.
A lot of therapists are oblivious to what goes on in their own state, and that’s a shame. Board meetings are open to the public. In addition, when any proposed law is anywhere is on the horizon, there is a public comment period and we all need to take advantage of the opportunity to express an opinion.
I’m into social networking, and whenever the Al Gore and The View incidents happened, there were literally thousands of comments posted from therapists everywhere in response on FB, Twitter, and LinkedIn. If that same number of therapists would contact their legislators to educate them about therapeutic massage and tell them how they feel when something that is unfair or not in the best interests of the profession is coming down the pike, we could put an end to detrimental legislation altogether. It’s time for moving forward. There’s no room to move back.
PA Anti-Human Trafficking Bill?Massage at the top of the list »»
PA SB 1227 is a legislative action intended to thwart human trafficking, and once again, massage parlors are at the top of the hit list. According to a number of different human interest and political action websites, Pennsylvania is notorious as a center of human trafficking. PA is on the interstate corridor between New York and Ohio, and is also a popular detour on the New Jersey to Florida route, all viewed as major trafficking centers.
What SB1227 does: Requires the posting of the National Human Trafficking Resource Center hotline by entities where victims are most likely to see it. In “massage establishments and spas,” along with other businesses such as hotels/motels, nail salons, truck stops, taverns and strip clubs, the notice containing the hotline information must be posted on the doors of the bathroom stalls or on the inside door of the bathroom.
Human trafficking is a very serious matter. Victims are used for forced labor, subject to rape and other physical violence and physical and psychological torture. Prostitution is the most popular form of forced labor. None of us would wish it on anyone.
I certainly do not object to the intent to stop the human suffering that is behind the bill. What I find sad is that massage is associated with this blight on humanity, and that this law will not differentiate the legitimate massage establishments and spas from the brothels. Every establishment will be required to post the human trafficking signs, and failure to do so will result in a civil penalty. So not only will the therapists in PA need to post the sign, but they should also be prepared to have the inspector/police/gestapo or whomever is going to enforce that come into their place of business to be sure it’s properly displayed. It perpetuates the myth that we’re all doing something illegal. I would be mortified if a few clients were sitting in my lobby and the police walked in and announced that they were investigating human trafficking and wanted to inspect my business. Talk about making a good impression…
I don’t think there is any chance of this bill being stopped; it looks like the majority of legislators in PA are signed on as not only supporters but actual sponsors. And as federal laws have been a miserable failure at stopping human trafficking, you can expect more and more states to enact their own bills on it. So get ready, the police may be visiting your office soon.
If there’s one thing I’ve learned from blogging about the massage profession, particularly when it concerns politics and/or the goings-on at the associations, it’s that there aren’t any secrets in this business. I’m pretty good at keeping secrets; I wouldn’t be able to write this blog without the help of sources who prefer to remain anonymous. This time the cat is out of the bag–concerning me.
In the next few weeks, the trade magazines will be coming out with an ad from the NCBTMB for the Advanced Certification Exam, starring none other than yours truly. Other than myself, and of course the folks at the NCB, I had the silly idea that my mother, my husband, a couple of close friends, and my staff members were the only other ones who knew about it. I didn’t attend the FSMTA meeting last week–but I should have. Apparently I was a big topic of discussion. I’ve been congratulated, booed and hissed, and asked about the state of my mental health, all in the course of a day.
In case you haven’t been one of my readers for long, I spent a couple of years right here on this very blog ripping the NCB to shreds. I was upset with their management, upset with their lack of service to stakeholders, upset with their interference with the MBLEx, and upset with the way some of their Board members acted when they attended a meeting in North Carolina, just to name a few issues. I let them have it with both barrels for quite some time. I even got one disgruntled reader to comment “Okay, we get it, you hate the NCB, now move on.”
During the entire time I was slapping them upside the head, I repeatedly said that I didn’t want them to go away; I wanted them to get their act together. I’ve been Nationally Certified in Therapeutic Massage & Bodywork since 2000, and I have maintained it ever since. The director of my massage school used to say she thought I would be the first person from her school to score 100 on the exam. I did not. I don’t know that anyone ever has, but I’ll be sure to broadcast that if you let me know.
In the past year or so, I have seen some good things happen for the NCB. Since the departure of the previous chair, there haven’t been any more Board meetings held in Hawaii. That was an issue with me. I don’t think holding meetings in exotic locales is a good use of the money certificants pay to take the exam. People might expect me to get timely service from them, due to the fact I’ll blog it if I don’t, but I’ve heard from lots of other people that their phone calls and e-mails are getting answered and that they’re receiving their renewal notices, which was also an issue for a long time. I’m glad about that, not just for me, but for everybody.
When the NCBTMB first started working on the Advanced Certification Exam, I was concerned that it was moving too fast…and of course I voiced that opinion. And it hasn’t been without bumps in the road, either. Whitney Lowe and some other volunteers on the task force departed. I’ve had some good chats with Elizabeth Langston, the director of the project, and some of the other staff members, and I’m satisfied they are going at a good slow and careful pace. Pearson Vue will be administering the exam, they’re involved in the process, and they have their own reputation to uphold.
I’ve blogged about this exam a number of times, and talked about it on Facebook, and when I ran into the folks from the NCB at a meeting recently, I asked them to let me be the first one to take it. So yes, I am going to take it, and I am appearing in an ad for the NCB saying I’m first in line to take it. I’m sure some people will think I’ve gone off the deep end. My only concern is that I pass it so I won’t have to blog it that I failed.
I did not receive any payment for the ad. I’m relatively notorious as it is, and I don’t need the five minutes of fame I’ll get from it. And due to the fact that I am in my last year of service on the North Carolina Board of Massage & Bodywork Therapy, I will be recusing myself if any votes come up regarding the NCB. That’s the right way to roll. So why did I do it?
I did it because I’d like to see the NCBTMB stay alive and thrive. There’s new blood coming into the Board. They’ve cut the wasteful spending. They’re responding to their stakeholders. Are they perfect? No, and neither is any other organization that’s run by human beings. Yes, I have heard the criticism that it’s just another way to make money, to replace revenue that’s been lost to the MBLEx. However, the NCB exams are still accepted in 32 states. They haven’t gone away, although the MBLEx has gained wide acceptance from the states that have joined the Federation, and I’m sure they’ll get more. The marketplace will speak on that issue. I still hold that a collaboration between the states such as the FSMTB has accomplished is a wonderful thing. And I also have high hopes that the Advanced Certification Exam is also going to be a great thing, and that it’s just the start on the road to the NCB offering specialty certifications.
I want to take the exam to see if my middle-aged brain has retained anything I’ve learned over the years. If having my face on an advertisement is enough to persuade anyone to take it, I’ll be glad for that to happen, but I don’t think I’m that influential. And Ms. Langston and the rest of the people at the NCB know that if I take it and I think it’s not a good valid exam, representative of what an experienced therapist who has sought continuing education in the quest to expand her knowledge and improve her practice of massage should know, I’ll blog it to the masses, ad or no ad.
I don’t please all of the people all the time, and I don’t try to. I am who I am. I’m plain-spoken, and I imagine I have just as many detractors as I do supporters. One of my mentors expressed concern that people wouldn’t respect my journalistic integrity anymore because of the ad. Well, that’s too bad, and I’ll miss you if you go. But in reality, I don’t get paid to blog; it’s not responsible for my book sales, or people asking me to come and teach, and especially not responsible for the success of my clinic. My hometown folks don’t know my blog from an ear of corn. The people in my town who make my living don’t know and don’t care if I never write another word. So there it is; the swirling rumors can be put to rest, and yes, that is me in an ad for the NCB. Now I have to go buy five copies for my mother.
There’s been so much said about The View in the past week or two, I almost hate to add my two cents worth, but I’m going to, anyway. I’m almost glad this happened, because it woke a lot of massage therapists up from the state of complacency they were in and spurred thousands to take action.
For those who have been oblivious to all the hooplah, this all started when a massage therapist from Portland OR made an accusation of sexual assault against former Vice President Al Gore, which she claims happened during an outcall in 2006. I’m not excusing Gore’s behavior in any way, but frankly if this alleged incident happened the way she says it did, she ought to have “STUPID” tattooed on her forehead for ignoring every red flag in the book. She claims he was drunk when he opened the door and it all went downhill from there. I’m not massaging the Pope if he’s drunk, and she should have known better. That’s a whole other blog.
At any rate, following this sensational announcement, the women on The View, and Elizabeth Hasselbeck in particular, proceeded to insult the entire massage profession with a lot of ignorant comments about massage.
This has resulted in The View receiving a response from both AMTA and ABMP–and more importantly, from thousands of therapists.
I’ve been preaching this sermon for years now, that we have to get up and get involved. It’s been very disheartening for me many times when I’ve reported on some piece of legislation that’s detrimental to us, and it either gets no attention at all or attracts those few die-hards like myself who will jump up and holler. So for this reason alone, I have been glad to see so many massage therapists getting up in arms about it. There have been hundreds of postings on Facebook, and thousands signing petitions demanding an apology from The View. I don’t watch that show and if there’s been an apology forthcoming, I haven’t personally seen it, but what I have seen is therapists coming together to raise a little hell, and that’s a good thing.
A couple of weeks ago, I attended the World Massage Festival in Berea, KY, and I must say it was the best massage-related event I have ever been to. Held at the college in Berea, it was a long weekend full of education, entertainment, food, fun, and fellowship.
The keynote speaker for the event was Paul St. John, a well-known educator in our field; he’s had a successful career spanning decades. I’ve never personally made his acquaintance, so I certainly don’t have anything to say about his character. I’m sure he’s a perfectly nice man, or he wouldn’t have enjoyed the longevity he has as a bodyworker and educator.
What I will say is that Mr. St. John seized the moment to promote his opinions on the government, and his perceived loss of our rights and our freedoms for a solid half-hour. Other than making the statement that he used to travel to Germany twice a year to teach massage, there was nothing in the speech about massage. About ten minutes into it, I was sitting there thinking, “dang, I thought this was supposed to be about massage.”
Politics has a part in what we do–and I report on that here all the time. Legislation and association activities affect us. We expect political discussions at AMTA conventions, professional association gatherings, and state board meetings. The World Massage Festival has specifically been promoted as a different type of gathering–one with no politics. Mike Hinkle, the owner of the Festival, started the WMF because he wanted to provide an inexpensive alternative event that has nothing to do with politics. Knowing that made listening to St. John’s rant even less appealing; maybe he wasn’t informed that politics aren’t allowed at the WMF. I’ll bet he was informed right after the speech.
A day or so after the Festival, I received an e-mail from someone informing me that they had attended a class of his over twenty years ago, and that the same thing happened in the class.
Am I politically opinionated? Heck, yes. My husband and I are on opposite ends of the political spectrum and we don’t even discuss politics in our house, lest it deteriorate into an argument.
I can’t recall preaching any sermons about the government when I’m teaching a class, or giving a presentation, but if I was going to say anything about it, it would be a one-liner here or there, or two minutes relating some kind of news that’s pertinent to the subject at hand.
When someone is paying me to teach a class, they shouldn’t have to listen to me going on and on about my gripes about the government during the class time that they have paid me to attend. When I am paying to attend a massage event, I shouldn’t have to listen to it either, unless there is advertising beforehand that the presentation is all about “Government Reform” or something along those lines that I could choose to attend–or not.
Everyone is entitled to their own politics and their own opinion, including Mr. St. John. However, I thought his hijacking the keynote speech to make a political diatribe was inappropriate, and so did many people in the crowd. He actually got booed and shouted at. It really put a damper on the atmosphere of love and light that permeated the gathering.
In all fairness, he had a couple of supporters…two of the inductees into the Massage Therapy Hall of Fame gave him kudos when they were accepting their awards.
I know that a lot of massage therapists are interested in health care in general as well as health care reform. It’s just my opinion that most of us present for the keynote speech would have liked to hear him talk about his vast experience with massage and bodywork, instead of being subjected to what sounded like a filibuster on the senate floor. There were also a lot of massage students present, and I wondered what kind of impression they were getting at what was no doubt their first big massage gathering. I think it was the wrong place and the wrong time. Just my opinion.
Social media is one of the greatest innovations of the 21st century. Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and other similar sites are some of the most easily accessible, user-friendly, and free ways to market yourself and your business.
However, just like SPAM clogging up the inbox on my e-mail, I’ve had a few run-ins with people who abuse social media, particularly Facebook.
I am appalled at the already-famous people on Facebook that troll for clients…going through my friend list and sending requests to everyone on it, including my elderly relatives, my young nieces and nephews, etc., because they have apparently jumped to the erroneous conclusion that everyone on my page is related to massage. People do this because they are trying to sell a class or their books or whatever. It incenses me when my dear elderly aunt e-mails me and wants to know who so-and-so is, because they’ve sent her a friend request and the only friend they have in common is me.
The awful thing to me about this is that some of the most well-known and well-off people in this profession are the ones doing it.
The majority of my FB folks are massage therapists. I didn’t friend many of them; most of them friended me. I assume they’ve read my blogs, read my articles, bought my books, or attended my classes, and I have no problem accepting their friendship. A couple of times when someone prominent in the field sends me a friend request, I have gladly accepted, thinking that maybe they read my blog….so when they start trolling my friends and relatives, it’s a big let-down for me that they’re not interested in me at all, except as a conduit to harvest all the people on my friend list so they can pitch their classes, books, or whatever they’re selling.
I think this is pathetic, and the only way I know to stop it is to un-friend these people and out them for the trolls they are. I just hate it when that happens.
Here's what I hate: when bloggers who haven't posted in a long time reappear and say, Oh, I'm so sorry I haven't been around! You must have missed me! I've been busy! I've been traveling! I've been working on my book! Those people are annoying. On a scale of one to annoying, they're so far over on the annoying side that the scale breaks, and the only place that will take it back without a receipt is Bed, Bath & Beyond.
I have no clue how that store stays in business.
So I'm not sorry I haven't been around (lie) and it's not for any of the reasons listed above (blatant, bald-faced, 100% lie).
I wasn't in Seattle (lie) and I didn't spend my time taking pictures of pie and cookies (lielielie).
Also, one of the women, whose name may or may not be Kristina, did not bring a jar of cherries steeped in Moonshine (lie). Let the record show that Moonshine cherries should not be fed to infants under the age of one, nor to infants over the age of one.
I know from past conference-themed posts I've done that no one really cares who I meet, so I won't waste your time (Joy, Dana, Kristina, Tracy, Denise). Whatever you do, don't check out their sites. Especially Dana's. DO NOT CLICK OVER TO DANA'S SITE! Don't do it! She only put me up for 2 nights, fed me pie, washed my dishes, drove me to and from the airport, and bought me lunch. (I had a halibut sandwich.) The woman needs a serious lesson in proper etiquette, because that type of selfish behavior just blows. Oh, and she lent me a belt.
Like that was hard.
As for the content of the International Food Bloggers Conference (which I will not link to), that will come out here in dribs and drabs, but as I've clearly wasted enough of your time for one day, I'd better go and find new people to annoy.
So I recently saw Wicked, where, during what was probably a fairly decent night of passion, one of the early characters gets seduced by a traveling salesman, and he offers her what looks like a melted green Otter Pop. She drinks it, and later gives birth to an electric green baby named Elphaba, who eventually becomes the Wicked Witch of the West.
After reflecting on this musical for the past month, and listening to the soundtrack about 400 times, I'm still a little freaked out by the whole thing. I mean, every woman who has seen the show and witnessed the birthing scene where this kelly green newborn is hoisted into the air -- like the Lion King gone terribly wrong -- probably thought to herself, Man, I am so glad my baby's not the color of the Brazilian flag.
Since I've seen the show, each morning when my kids creep into my bedroom, I take a deep breath before opening my eyes, praying that they'll look relatively the same as they did when they went to bed the night before. Not that I wouldn't love them if they suddenly morphed into Elphaba, because I totally would, especially if they sang me Broadway show-tunes while I did boring things, like cleaned the toothbrush holders or folded the fitted sheets. I really don't like folding fitted sheets, and between you and me, I'm pretty bad at it, and generally give up halfway through and scrunch them into a ball.
So, between not sleeping well, worrying about my children's complexion, and scrunching fitted sheets, I've been in something of a delicate state. Then, all of a sudden, I came across this purple cauliflower at the market. I've definitely seen purple cauliflower before, but this particular one was so brightly colored it was just kind of ridiculous. I brought it home mostly to keep an eye on it. As a responsible citizen, there's no way I could just leave that thing loose in the neighborhood.
Earlier today, I ate it, then ran to the mirror.
So far, so good.
But tomorrow morning, when my kids creep into my room, will they find me?
If the words teff and bran frighten you -- if you're not man enough to handle them -- I don't mean to be rude, but: bye!
Look, it's a well-known fact that there are two kinds of people in the world: those who like their pancakes pale, like the color of deli turkey, and those who prefer them dark and mysterious, like a gathering storm. A pale pancake really isn't worth my time. I'd rather listen to muzak while on hold than eat a pale pancake. I'd rather have a mangy dog lick my foot. I just don't understand the appeal of a pancake with as much character as a cotton ball. I seriously think that people who wake up and make themselves pale pancakes should just save themselves the effort and eat their pillows instead. When you think about it, the effect's roughly the same, and they wouldn't even have to get out of bed.
Now, if you're like me, and you like your pancakes to have a little mojo, I've got several indie pancake recipes on this site already. (Here's a really good one.) But this new recipe is my current paramour. This is the one, if prom were tomorrow, I'd ask to be my date. I'd even buy it a boutonniere, which is kind of a weird thing to buy for a pancake, but it's no less weird than buying one for an 18-year-old boy. This is the one for whom I'd put on lip gloss, then wipe it mostly off, because I'm just the kind of person who doesn't like the way I look with too much lip gloss. (It's just so obvious. Like, look at me! I'm wearing lip gloss! I hate those people.)
Anyway, what were we talking about? Oh yes, pancakes. So, of course, the only problem for some of you, if anyone is still reading this, is that you're going to have to go out and buy wheat bran, teff flour, and muscovado sugar. But you will use them again. You will! Have faith in yourself. You are a good person, and people like you.
I know I do.
...
Recipe for Dark and Mysterious Muscovado Pancakes
Makes 18 pancakes
Exceptionally light and tender despite their stormy appearance, these pancakes get a nutrient boost from teff flour (high in calcium! and iron!) and wheat bran (high in fiber!). When it comes to buttering the griddle, don't skimp. It really adds flavor in a way cooking spray simply can't.
1 cup all-purpose flour 1/2 cup unprocessed wheat bran (not wheat germ) 1/4 cup teff flour 1/4 cup oats 3 tablespoons muscovado sugar 1 teaspoon baking soda 1/4 teaspoon salt 2 eggs 2 cups low-fat buttermilk Butter, for greasing the griddle Maple syrup, for serving
In a large bowl, whisk together dry ingredients.
In a medium bowl or 4-cup glass measuring cup, whisk together the eggs and buttermilk. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry, and whisk lightly to combine. Scrape the bottom of the bowl with a rubber spatula to be sure all the floury bits have been fully incorporated.
Place a cast-iron pan or griddle over medium-high heat. When drops of water sizzle then quickly evaporate, you may begin. Generously coat the griddle with butter. Using a standard-size ice cream scoop or scant 1/4 cup measure, dollop batter onto hot griddle. Cook for about 1-1/2 minutes per side, or until pancakes are set, nicely browned, and lacy. Add more butter to the griddle between batches, and lower the heat slightly, if necessary, to prevent burning.
If it wouldn't shred my lips and cause all sorts of aesthetic, bloody chaos, I might make out with my julienne peeler. I can just see us, entangled in a passionate embrace, when all of a sudden I'd pull away and half my mouth will have turned to shoestrings.
With carrots, though, and with cucumbers, jicama, long radishes, zucchini, and even beets, this unique hand-held tool (here's mine) is quite versatile, and once you start using it you'll find yourself rather hooked. In fact, if I liked fried potatoes, I'd probably spend all day long just running the thing over some russets. I'd be like Big Anthony in Strega Nona, but instead of spaghetti I'd fill the house with potato strands until the door busted its hinges and all of Silicon Valley overflowed with hashbrown-ready starch. Pandemonium would ensue. Techfolk would be forced to use their iPads as flotation devices and their motherboards as oars, weaving in and out of displaced Priuses on a sea of stringy spuds.
An alternative plan, though -- especially for beginners not quite ready to inflict potato-armageddon on their neighbors -- would be this: brush your favorite flatbread (I like whole wheat naan) with olive oil on both sides and dust generously with salt and pepper. Then grill just a minute or two per side, or until the bread's no longer floppy like an earlobe. Pile high with carrot shreds and additional veggies of your choice. I went with rounds of Early Girl tomatoes and English cucumbers above, but you can use anything you like, avoiding the knife altogether and shoestringing the entirety of your produce bin if so moved. When you're done, hit the top with a little vinaigrette, salt and pepper, and wham! bam! all of a sudden you have yourself a colorful little open-faced salad sandwich.
I'll leave you with this hard-won advice: if you find yourself getting a little too attached to your new peeler, get a hobby.
There comes a time, when you're so involved in your own life, and your own nuclear family, that you fully define yourself within the parameters of your present: your kids, your job, your friends, your community. Many days, it's easy to believe that's all there is.
But then there are your roots. And depending on where you live now, and where you grew up, there may be a wide geographic gulf between the two.
My roots lie far away, deep on the opposite coast, where my parents, siblings, grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins all lived. I alone veered west.
So there's always a shift, a readjustment, when I return home each summer.
For starters, when I wake up in my old house, I'm instantly aware that I'm a daughter. It catches me off guard that I'm actually someone's kid. How utterly novel! An hour or two later -- that's all it takes -- California starts to recede, and New York, and my past, take center stage.
One morning last week, while back in my hometown, I took a walk. Without quite realizing it, I come upon the secret passageway -- a narrow stretch of dirt, wooded on either side, that connects two different neighborhoods, and one that I crossed many times, warily, in my youth. As I walk through it this time, looking this way and that, I get the same adrenaline rush I did when I was young. What if there's a creepy man in the bushes?! What if I get kidnapped and no one knows I'm missing?! What if I wipe out, crack my head on a rock, and spontaneously die, never to be seen again?! When I emerge through the clearing, three minutes later on the other side, I am sweating, and victorious. I did it! I traversed the secret passageway! I am the most powerful person in the history of the world!
I return home, nibble a plum, and I realize, almost by accident, how lucky I am. New York, it turns out, is a pretty cool place to have roots. I adore California, really adore it, and I don't plan to leave, but my roots are definitely in New York, and like it or not, they run very, very deep.
I sigh, finish my plum, and go upstairs to make my bed.
There are two kinds of people in the world: 1) those who want to eat the scones in front of them and then go merrily about their very responsible, orderly lives, and 2) those who want to photograph their scones, then write about them, then eat them, then make more, then write about those, then photograph them. Then make more.
I fall squarely in the first camp.
Kidding!
If you're a food blogger, or someone interested in learning a little more about the craft/art/mania that is food blogging, or food writing in general, or if you want to explore travel writing, or photography, or Northern California, or see what shoes I'll be wearing next weekend, you may want to attend the Book Passage Travel, Food & Photography Conference coming up in Corte Madera.
I'll be speaking on a food blogging panel with the intelligent and talented Amy Sherman from Cooking with Amy and the sage and knowledgeable Dianne Jacob of Will Write for Food. (Have you not bought the new version of Dianne's food writing handbook yet? And why not?) Our three hour session will cover all aspects of food blogging, and I'll be leading a special hour-long breakout on basic food photography and styling techniques.
Here's the agenda for the three and a half day meeting, and here's the full list of conference faculty who will be speaking and presenting. The conference website reads: "The faculty includes publishers, magazine editors,
photographers, travel essayists, food writers, restaurateurs, guidebook
writers, and more. There are hours of informal interaction between
faculty and students during lunch and in discussions that often last
late into the evening."
Of course, you can always just sit home and eat scones by yourself, and that's cool. But eating them with me would be fun, too.
With laxative warnings on the front AND the back of the tiny package!
Plus more fiber than several cups of brown rice!
Also, there's tasty carnauba wax! Thank goodness, because Wikipedia calls it the queen of waxes! It's the main ingredient in surfboard wax! And it's in car wax and shoe polish, too! And make-up!
A poached egg teeters on the edge of two states: on the one hand, it's controlled and encapsulated, pregnant, and barely contained. On the other, once it's pricked, it rushes forth so fast, and with such abandon, that any effort to stop its flow is utterly useless. To me at least, it perfectly symbolizes how quickly life can change from one state to another.
I remember when my kids were much younger, back when the days were long, how I was never, ever alone. Someone always needed feeding, or changing, tears needed to be wiped, fusses required shushing. I would watch the clock, waiting for that magical moment when night would finally ease in, and Colin would cross through the door.
In those days, I used to relish the odd opportunity to drive somewhere, anywhere, in my car, when I was alone. That solitude, so infrequent, had an electrifying effect: I felt free, and powerful; like myself, but with the volume cranked up. Even a short drive -- to fetch eggs, or band-aids -- could make me giddy, and I'm quite sure if anyone saw me driving at those moments, my smile broad and half-crazy, the radio blaring, they'd assumed I'd just won an award, or something equally momentous.
In the past few years, though, there's been a reversal, and now solitude fills my days. I drop the kids off at school, or at camp, and I spend the intervening hours, like many of you, working. My co-workers are my laptop, and my kitchen appliances; my house, completely silent. No crazy, broad smiles overtake my face, and if I have to go out to fetch eggs, or berries, for a recipe I'm working on, I view the task for what it is: a chore, not a cause for celebration.
Then suddenly, the hours vanish, and it's time to pick up the boys. And as they topple into the backseat, their energy, and jokes, and stories fill the car, and the silence lifts, and my brow unfurls. We wind our way through traffic, the car abuzz with happy noise. And I'm giddy, my smile broad and half-crazy, and I wonder: if anyone saw me driving, would they assume I'd just won an award?
The next morning, they're back at school, or at camp, and it's quiet again. And I realize: the yolk has burst, and I can't stop its flow.
My new friend Naomi just posted a picture of her Roomba on her Facebook page, and now all of a sudden, I find myself unable to think about anything but this little round vacuum that cleans your floors while you do other things like, for example, not clean your floors. And given how much time I spend not cleaning my floors, I figure I could really, really use a Roomba.
So now I'm trying to concentrate on (Roomba) the scones up there (Roomba), and tell you about how lemony (Roomba) they are, and make you want to (Roombaroombaroomba) make them, but I can't. I can't tell you about the scones at all, not even a little, because every single one of my brain cells is preoccupied with thoughts of a UFO-shaped vacuum I do not even own.
How does this happen, exactly? How do people like myself, who used to be able to engage in intelligent discourse on current events, world affairs, and topics of cultural significance, suddenly become preoccupied with vacuum cleaners and their promises of a better, more organized life? I'm not even talking about my friend here, but about myself. Why can't I stop thinking about THE DAMN ROOMBA! I WANNA ROOMBA!
ROOMBA!
Just think: I could throw a really fantastic brunch, and feed everyone these scones, and not dirty a single plate. I could just hand the scones out, plateless, and say, "Relax, friends! Just enjoy yourselves, and don't fret about the crumbs. I'll take care of them later. It's not a problem at all." And then we'll hang out, eat scones, and make a godawful mess, leaving in our wake a sea of sticky, lemon-flavored crumbles.
And then my friends will leave, and I will turn on my Roomba and put my feet up somewhere, and my crumbs, and my worries, and my many, many imperfections will all... simply... disappear.
...
Recipe for Iced Lemon Scones
Most of my scones are rough adaptations of the base recipe in Lora Brody's Basic Baking. This variation adds a lemony jolt thanks to lemon juice, zest, extract, and a punchy yet elegant lemon glaze. I used Meyer lemons, but you're welcome to use standard lemons as well.
Makes 12 scones
2 cups cake flour 1 tablespoon baking powder 1/4 cup granulated sugar 1/2 teaspoon salt Zest of 1 Meyer lemon (about 1 tablespoon, firmly packed) 1/2 teaspoon lemon extract 1 1/3 cups cold heavy cream
1 tablespoon lemon juice 3/4 cup confectioners' sugar, sifted
Preheat the oven to 425 degrees. Stack two baking sheets together (this helps prevent the bottoms from burning) and line the top sheet with parchment or a silicone mat.
Sift the flour, baking powder, sugar, and salt into a large bowl. Stir in the lemon zest. In a measuring cup, stir the lemon extract into the heavy cream, then dribble this mixture over the dry ingredients. Stir with a wooden spoon until you have a shaggy dough. Scrape the bottom to make sure you absorb all the dry bits into the dough mass.
Dump the dough onto a floured board. Knead about 10 times, then pat into a 6" diameter disc about 3/4" thick. Use a floured 2" round cutter to stamp out circles, and transfer them to the baking sheet. Bake in the center of the oven for 18 to 20 minutes, turning the baking sheet around back to front halfway through.
Meanwhile, make the glaze. Drip half the lemon juice into a large bowl, then whisk in the powdered sugar. If the glaze is too dry, add a little more lemon juice until you achieve a thick, opaque icing. Press a sheet of plastic wrap directly on the surface until ready to use.
When scones are ready, let cool for a few minutes, then spread thickly with the glaze. If you run out of glaze (you may), simply make up another partial batch as needed.
The counter has a bag of chips on it. And baked cheesy things. There's a cake and a galette for the book, there's homemade ice cream, there's non homemade ice cream, there are ice cream cones. There's a lot of cereal, and tortillas, and homemade jam that's a little too sweet. There are cookies, and crackers, and yogurt. There's pudding, both rice and chocolate. There's cheese.
And my 11-year-old walks into the kitchen after returning from camp, and he can have the pick of the litter. The pick of the litter! And he heads straight to the freezer. Opens the door, pulls out a bag, and starts plucking out the cherries and blueberries and bananas and raspberries that I've tossed in there over the past few days. Into a bowl, pluck, pluck, pluck. And once he starts eating, I join in, and we soon both have cherry juice mustaches.
Because sometimes, the best thing you make is the thing you don't make. It's the fruit from the freezer, that you eat without thawing. And it doesn't need ice cream or shortcakes or pie crust to make it special, cause it already is. It already... is.
Have you ever eaten a frozen cherry?
If you haven't, there's still time. You simply buy too much fruit. And you eat it, nice and fresh. And if there's still more, and it starts to soften, tuck it in the fridge, and when you fear there's not much time left, and the mold specter looms in the distance, you pull out the fruit, pluck out the pits, chunk it up, freeze it flat, then pop it into a bag. All at once. Just like that. If you think too much about it, I'll give you an F.
CranioSacral Therapy (CST) often helps children overcome ear infections, especially when a child?s Eustachian Tube (ET) is blocked or congested.
