Help you help yourself.

At this moment I invite you to join me.  Join me and take a moment to step away from your busy life.

It won’t take long, just a few moments.

Okay, now come with me and take this time to imagine what it would be like to feel good in your body.

No aches and no pains.  No nagging tension lingering in the back of your neck from too much computer work.  No carrying the weight of the world on your shoulders while your traps throb.

Just ease.  Plain ease in your body with every movement that you make.  You feel light, open and free.  Nothing is weighing you down and you feel able to move around in anyway you please.

Do you believe that this is possible?  Even just for a moment?

If you answered, “no,” not to worry, you’re in good company as many people in our current society rarely state that they feel good in their body on a regular basis, but today I’m here to tell you, it is possible.

I know that you’re shaking your head as you read this.  Come on, you don’t believe me?  Honestly, I didn’t even believe myself once upon a time and yet, through experience, life taught me what I just told you….it is possible.

You see, several years ago, I was living in consistent pain.  Mind you, I had a very active first career as a dancer but I found myself consistently in more pain or experiencing more injuries compared to the countless dancers I performed with.  I couldn’t understand it.  I didn’t understand why was I always getting injured and they weren’t.

I would wake up in the morning, on the daily, feeling uncomfortable in my body.  Sore and achy from hours of rehearsal the day prior, wasn’t an unusual occurrence, yet the constant throbbing and swelling that would live in my knees were what was concerning me.  I wanted to know the secret as to why other dancers could move with less pain or free of pain and I couldn’t.

I would constantly ask myself, why was my body doing this to me?

What I found during my search was this…my body wasn’t doing anything to me.  My body was just sending me signals that I was living out of balance and I needed a course correction.

What I also learned about myself during this exploration, was that I didn’t give my body time to stop to rest and heal.  I would constantly place demands on it by going, going, going and by the time I got home I was so exhausted that I would just crash!

My body was crying out for help.  

It was telling me that I needed to take time to consciously rest.

Consciously rest?  I used to think to myself, what does that mean?

It means making a conscious effort to slow down and offer our bodies time to get out of fight and flight mode and move into rest and digest mode.  This rest allows the body’s natural healing processes to take over and counteract the effects of strenuous demands.

It also meant, for me, that I needed to move my body in such a way where tension that was built up in the fascial tissue, had an opportunity to release.

This is where the foam roller, therapeutic balls and therapeutic movement came into play.

Consistently laying on the balls or roller helped my tissues melt and release.  Over time, not only did I start to feel better with practicing self care in this manner, along with receiving myofascial treatments from a MFR therapist; it also allowed me to feel a sense of empowerment.  I wasn’t taking the pain lying down anymore.  I was doing something about it in a constructive way.  I no longer walked around wondering why my body was making me hurt, but rather, I started thanking my body for helping me move in the right direction.

These myofascial release tools are here to help you, help yourself.  

Here are some other tools:

• Pause and take a deep breath in through your nose, then slowly exhale out through your mouth
• Take a walk outside and get some fresh air
• Schedule a massage, myofascial release or bodywork session
• Stretch!
• Expand your self care knowledge by participating in workshops and put those techniques to use
• Meditate

If you consistently take time to practice these simple suggestions, over time, you will find yourself empowered and living from a place of understanding that your body is not doing anything to you, it’s just trying to help you pay attention.  And when you pay attention, miracles can happen and a decrease in pain becomes a side effect of taking care of yourself.

You can do it.  I did, even when I thought it wasn’t possible.  Just make the choice to do so and see for yourself!