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Ta k e 5 a n d t r y t h e A B M P F i v e - M i n u t e M u s c l e s a t w w w. a b m p . c o m / f i v e - m i n u t e - m u s c l e s . 87 Because acupuncture teaches us that meridians are the energy pathways in the body, Smith says that early in his acupuncture training the meridians represented the anatomy of energy. "Meridians were for me, for a while, what energy was. However, one day I was working with the meridians, and I had the insight that meridians were actually just one form of energy movement; that, at a deeper level, there was the unseen world of pure energy or pure vibration—the underpinnings of the body," he says. "To me, this resonated with the quantum physics idea that the fundamental building blocks of nature are energy and structure, the particle and the wave." It also resonated with the current models of the field. "From this broader perspective, we are all fundamentally in a 'field' of vibration or energy— nodes in a multidimensional web of what is. These ideas are all woven into the world of Zero Balancing." MIXING ENERGY AND STRUCTURE So how does Smith see energy and structure as related? "Of course, in the scientific world it's Einstein's E = mc 2 . However, to understand the relationship of structure and energy in a more meaningful way, I use a model of a sailboat. Talking in metaphor is sometimes easier than reciting facts to help convey ideas in an image-able way. "In the sailboat metaphor, the wind represents the energy and the boat represents structure. Somewhere, the wind meets the sail; somewhere, energy meets structure. Some people have an easier time sailing than others, depending on their skill level. A skilled sailor is able to tack the boat into the wind in a manner that serves his navigation. In our bodies, our energy meets our structure. A fundamental health question is: How well tacked is a person into their own energy flow? Some people are better integrated in themselves than others. There are a number of ways to improve this relationship, which improves one's function and feelings of well-being." BECOMING A TEACHER While Smith was studying acupuncture, Worsley's students began asking Smith to share some of his methods for evaluating the structure and functions of key joints they were working with. Later, they asked to be shown the techniques he was employing to arrive at better balance. This core group organically gave rise to Smith's new role as a teacher—and his groups of students in the UK and US spontaneously grew. By the mid-70s, Smith's ideas and techniques became known as Zero Balancing, which implies that the physical body is leaning neither right nor left, front or back; that it is in balance, at the zero point. Later, Zero Balancing became more explicit—that this work also helped evoke emotional, mental, and spiritual alignment through the mindful engagement of energy and structure. For Smith, all his years of study coalesced into an awareness that the structural armature is also the core energy pathway—or what Chinese medicine identifies as ancestral chi, and what yogic philosophy describes as the deepest energy flows of sushumna, ida, and pingala. In fact, it's the direction his Zero Balancing took—focusing on the skeletal side of the musculoskeletal system. "One reason for this is that the skeleton is the core of the body and conducts the strongest currents," Smith says. "Bone is also piezoelectric. Because of its density, it is an easy tissue to palpate, perceive, and affect energy directly. Bone contains our ancestral history, early childhood conditioning, and some effects of major trauma. Although energy is everywhere in the body, bone gives us a unique doorway into a person's body, mind, and spirit to help integrate and balance the person." Smith soon found himself teaching Zero Balancing in the UK, in a variety of US cities, in Mexico, and eventually in India, Japan, Spain, and Switzerland. The The Fulcrum Zero Balancing seems to engage the person in profound ways through apparently simple hands- on work. Smith says that comes from the Zero Balancing working tool, called a fulcrum. "A fulcrum is a field of tension that we create in the client's body and then hold it stationary to allow the opportunity for the person to respond to it. Some of the fulcrums I've developed come from listening to people who have a worldview that makes sense to me, like Deepak Chopra or the Dalai Lama. I may hear an idea and then design a field of tension, a fulcrum that creates a kinesthetic experience for the client that may transfer that idea into their experience."