Now that I’ve gotten your attention, disconnect from all of the thoughts, albeit a few possibly a bit excited, relax, take a deep long inhalation, blow the air out, and whisper ahhhhh. Come back to the breath, your life connector, take note of your body and soften to it. If it is a twitch in your shoulder, hands clenching, back aching, or thoughts whirling that distract you, do not resist, soften. Some find the imagery of scarves waving in the wind useful. Do what is right for you.

You think I’m bonkers, don’t you?

Seriously, movement is important, even when, but actually especially, when you’ve got discomfort.

I wouldn’t put this video up of me, and sideways too, unless I thought otherwise. Call me to discuss your unique situation and we will work together to pattern movement that is right for you.

In the meantime, this is to get you started.

The Basics of Healing Movement:

1. Just start moving. Don’t judge.

2. Go slowly, noticing painful stimulus.

3. Play with ways to move that feel good, even if it means moving just your foot. Gradually, you will find many ways that feel good.

4. Use imagery, including shapes or hobbies, such as reading, cooking, or hiking to inform your movement. Everything goes here.

4. Move into softness and out of your joints. Like a garden, don’t under or overwater.

5. Stimulate, don’t push. Like turning a light on and off, it only takes a little.

6. Wherever  you feel tension, soften.

7. Instead of control, use intention. Attend to intend.

8. Notice the quality of your breath. Do you breath high, low, fast, slow? Just notice.

Conscious breathing helps us to move more fluidly, and as medical studies have proven, its benefit go much further than momentary relief and calm. When you calm the mind, you allow your brain, which is the central conductor of your entire physical body, to relax. Hmmmm.

See me for a healing movement session….

More to come….happy moving!

Body Feathering

Fan your fingertips along your skin, as if to feather or brush yourself. Begin at your face, then head, then shoulders to hands, chest, then front/back to waist, thighs, calfs, feet. Gently squeezing here and there is very soothing. This technique can be useful in recalling dreams. Because it is calming and stilling to the mind, you may go back into your delicious slumber and savor more of the bliss. If your dream is unpleasant, it will draw you out of it and into the pleasantry of your physical body.

Soothing ~ Connecting ~ Relaxing ~ Grounding

Wrist and Ankle Rotation

Support the wrist with the opposite hand by gently holding the lower arm if needed. Let the wrists flop forward and back, then make circles. Repeat with same with the ankles.

Tip: Release hands to rotate wrists and ankles.

Tip: Add shoulder and hip rotation. Rotate the joints where your direct experience sends you, my master friend.

Promotes circulation ~ Warming ~ Prevents injury

Thigh Rolling

Lying down or standing up, grasp one thigh at a time and roll it, as if you are rolling and squeezing a water ballon, side to side, beginning slowly and then speeding up if desired, pressing the base of your hands into the tender areas squeezing and rolling.

Tip: Roll thighs while applying cream after shower. 

Connects the upper and lower body ~ Grounding ~ Enhances circulation ~ Prevents injury

Toe Pulling

Support foot with one hand. With the other, grasp one toe at a time from the bottom, and pull. Really tug. Then, squeeze the tips of each toe, one at a time, holding them front to back. Just thinking about this makes me relaxed!

Tip: rotate toes for extra flow.

Tip: Combine with ankle rotation.

Enhances circulation ~ Releases tension ~ Grounding

Body Tapping

To top everything off and to get started with  your amazing day, tap the sternum, chest, and belly with the tips of your fingers. Keeps the wrists loose so that they resemble a woodpecker tapping. Let the fingertips bounce off of your body.

Enhances breathing ~ Relaxes muscles ~ Connecting ~ Used in lymphatic drainage

There are numerous studies about the body/mind connection, but it is your direct experience of it that is essential in grasping this concept. There is nothing intellectual about it; rather, it is direct knowledge. Trust it. Work with it. Adapt it as needed, my master friend.

Allow yourself your creative process. My motivation to work with you is dance, which helps me to be present and fluid with you. Bodywork will help you get in touch with your purpose, your motivations, so that you will be able to do what you want and need to. Perhaps your purpose is to spend more time with your kids in a more peaceful way, without as much pain or anxiety.

My clients simultaneously become empowered in their lives as their bodywork process develops, as they notice limiting patterns and replace them with new ones.

What is your purpose in life? Your motivation? What would it be like to have a plate of colasally sized eggs served to you? What would you do with them?

A little tired on arrival at the Union Station metro stop in DC from Baltimore Airport, I put out some “help me” feelers. Besides the food, which looked oh so good, The Chair Massage station was equally enticing.

The Massage Therapist Louis wanted to know as many details about me as possible for those 10 minutes of bliss and relaxation I would soon experience. Where does it hurt? What is my profession? What kind of pressure do I prefer? My left calf was throbbing from over-dancing, shoulders and neck were stiff from traveling, plus I was running on four hours of sleep. When I shared with him I was also a Therapist, we had a good laugh and a congratulations for my taking care of myself.

Louis began the session like a whale making a major plunge into the waters. “A little too deep” I uttered, my back feeling like pieces of electric currents going on and off. As he shifted his approach and eased his way into my fascia, musculature, circulation, and centers of energy, my every thought of imbalance, expectation, or imperfection began to shift.

I let my body sink deeply in the chair and into the crevasses of my mind. The currents I previously felt in my back began to calm, shades of yellow and orange flashed in my mind, my breathing deepened. I was revived in those 10 minutes.

There is a theme in this that relates to feeling better, living better, and playing better, which is the byline that continuously comes up for my clients. When we feel better, we are living better, and therefore, playing better. In my example, the pain in my shoulders was mitigated, therefore, I could take in the experience of DC more fully and be able to relate to others more openly. Sure, the word “play” can be misconstrued and may not feel fun. In this sense, it means that you are disengaged from the anxiety portion of whatever it is you are doing. It’s not a feeling to go for, but rather, a state of being present, however you may authentically express that.

We know that the mechanical aspect of Massage by default has many positive affects, including, but not limited to, enhancing and improving the immune, musculoskeletal, and circulatory systems. The relaxation aspect is the brain releasing enkephalins and endorphins into circulation, nature’s natural opiates. When your body is relaxed, it can let go of pain and stress more easily.

FEEL BETTER, LIVE BETTER, AND PLAY BETTER!

Ooh, now that sounds good! Feel, live, play!!!

An elderly male patient had been admitted for chest pain and labored breathing after having had open heart four weeks prior. The surgery seemed to have gone well. There were no apparent complications. The wound was healing properly, and all of the blood work was within normal range. Oxygen saturation levels 97%, pulse 80, can’t remember the blood pressure, but it was not alarming. The patient had “unspecified” chest pain and trouble breathing, had trouble focussing, was yelling out “help me, I can’t breathe.”

Antianxiety medication allayed him to a point, but did not soothe the chest pain or emotional tsunami, which like a visceral explosion, an uprising. Something was wrong. The doctors could not “figure out.” I felt useless. The line “relax” becomes ignorant and disrespectful. He would if he knew how to. I never said “relax,” to him.

My first clinical thought was that the patient sorely needed magnesium and not sulfate like the hospitals use, citrate, which is a better quality. I imagined it being injected intravenously into him or topically applied to his skin for quick absorption, seeing him relax more and more. It is incredibly useful in relaxing smooth muscle, including cardiac. Of course I was thinking about all of the B vitamins to relax his nervous system, with the same imagery.

I imagined his blood pH to be perfect with each cell functioning optimally, knowing exactly how to communicate with one another on the greater whole. I imagined him in my own treatment space, soothing music, warm packs, mineral water to sip on.  I just listened, and asked him if  I could put my hands on his feet. He agreed, and then said “that hurts!” I lightened my touch around the sole of his feet, ran my fingers around his heals and toes. I let him process his thoughts moment by moment. He let me keep massaging his feet. I spoke lightly to him, saying phrases like: “breathing comes easily,” ”breathing comes easy to me” and “it’s easy to breathe.”

As I let go of of his feet, I lightly placed one hand on his heart and the other on his forehead. Aftering blurting out ”Oh, it still hurts” for the last time, he took a long, deep breath in, then out, and began to cry. He called for his wife who had been watching all along, helpless and frightened. They embraced. ”I can breathe! I’m okay honey. Doc, this really works! It does! The pain is better. I can breathe! I want to take her home. Can I doc? I want more of this! Doc, what was it?” The doctor grins and replied “I don’t know,” glances over to me and proceeds with his rounds.

I was there to help facilitate this openness, this admission, this expansion. Without trepidation, and as if we had already known one another, she admitted to being nervous most of the time, with gripping stomach pangs, continuous muscle aching, and an overall feeling of never being able to relax. She went on to say that as a child she carried many family burdens and even tried running away at age 15. She couldn’t remember the last time she had wept.

I was mystified by the contradiction in her well-kept-up and attractive exterior; very friendly and composed. Taken by the immediacy in her voice to open the gates, I felt this woman knew what she needed: a connection with her internal voice, her inner knowledge, her inner doctor, to feel free. She had never shared this with anyone before.

I had a massage chair, hands, body to listen, and heart to care. I felt compelled to let her know my concern, my opinion on her current symptoms, and gave her some medical advice, a number for an integrative healthcare practitioner as well as my own. And, I wanted to honor her, a spirit in a body of pain, knowing that with some guidance, resources, and willingness this very woman could someday experience peace in her body. Confident I had done all I could have in the moment, I entrusted her to her inner wisdom, to manage the gates, now that they had opened.

What’s your sign?

Are you like some of us who try to gain new perspectives about the world, including relationships, by comparing signs? Well there’s another way to look at the world, which dates back some 5,000 years! The Chinese were said to have lived in these elements, which are Earth, Fire, Wood, Metal, and Water, each associated with a corresponding season, color, time of day, organ, emotion, taste, smell, and the list goes on.

For example, the element Metal is associated with the Fall season, its color is white, its peak time is 3am-7am, the organs associated with it are the lung and large intestine, grief is its emotion, and the flavor is spicy.

It is associated with substance, strength, and structure, as in minerals and described in the expression “salt of the earth.”  When your Metal element is off, so to speak, you may have a cough, digestive problems, feel down, closed off and isolated.  We are all a part of nature, and our external environment shows up in our bodies and health. It is the ultimate harvesting of our own energies.

We’re transitioning into Winter, and for farmers, it is the harvest. It’s the same with our own energy. We have to gather it, nurture, so it’s available to us.

In order to strengthen your Metal element, slow down and take stock of what’s really important to you, try to sleep more, reach out and talk to people, stay off the junk food, exercise, and, by all means, don’t sweat the small stuff!!!