Body Tuning Massage

Body Tuning's goal is to balance the body's structure in order to improve everyday life. This is achieved through training sessions utilizing techniques from Massage, Yoga, Pilates, Tai Chi, Meditation, and Hydrotherapy. These sessions explain and explore the body's dynamic function while teaching base geometric equations of movement. The following text briefly explains some to the principals that are covered during these sessions.

Basic Principals of Movement

1. Movement begins with the breath
2. Find neutral as a starting point
3. Keep the body stacked at all times - don't compromise, compress, or hyperextend your joints
4. Move from your center of gravity (Hara, Dan tian, Core, Sea of Qi)
5. Quality of movement, not quantity
6. Control of movement - avoid flinging and collapsing
7. Strengthen with lengthening - use full range of motion (ROM)
8. Strive for balance while re-sculpting your body
   1. Strengthen muscles in their proper positions with out recruiting others
   2. Stretch muscles that are tight and hyper-toned (then re-strengthen fully)
   3. Strengthen muscles that are overstretched and weak
9. "Where it is, it isn't" - Ida P. Rolf, PhD (see next section)
10. Let your Qi flow

"Where it is, it isn't"

Where you feel your pain or discomfort is not necessarily where it is coming from. It can be originating somewhere else and manifesting itself in this area. A good example of this principal can be illustrated through common neck pain. Most necks tend to ache in the posterior (back) and are forward of the vertical line. The anterior (front) muscles (scalene & SCM) tend to be short and locked off, so the posterior muscles are pulling like the reigns of a horse in order to keep the head from falling forward. Therefore discomfort is felt in the posterior that is caused by a short/weak anterior.

What are knots?

Tight muscle tissue is similar to a rubber band that is being overstretched. A rubber band will rip under excess stress. As a defense, your body will "knot" up its own tissue in order to prevent tearing. This creates a micro-support system within the area and throws off the physics already established for balance.
A knot can also be created in an attempt to brace against an injury. The tissue under stress will stick together in order to prevent a harmful movement. The same sticking can apply to repetitive motion and your basic postural habits (sleeping, how you sit, etc.). Releasing these areas of trapped energy helps to restore ROM, function, and to relieve nerve impingement. In short you are able to move with less resistance and friction.

Creating New Muscle Memory

When you use your body in an everyday-routine action, it travels along planes of the grid that has been designated as the default (automatic) movements (muscle memory). This applies to the simplest, such as picking something up off of the ground; to the more complex; running, skiing, etc. By starting simple and building on that foundation, Body Tuning helps to reprogram these movements. The more you focus on the basic, the sooner it becomes routine. This turns everyday routines into structurally sound exercise, rather that wearing-down repetition. Do you ever see a monkey go to a gym?

The Human Body is a Dynamic Structure

If there is an imbalance in the body, the entire structure will adjust in order to compensate and find a new position. Similar to a gentle tug on a T-shirt, the whole structure's relationship is affected. Much like how your body shifts when you lean on one leg all of the time.