Issue link: https://www.massageandbodyworkdigital.com/i/1153082
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 . 83 • "Bad to the bone"—bone as repository of essence • "I feel it in my bones"—deepest level of intuition The experience of joints, interestingly, is profoundly conveyed through the origin of the word joint, which comes originally from Sanskrit and is the same word that gave rise to "yoga"—yugam (or yoke), meaning to bind, join, or unite. Bones and Joints: They're Alive! As a result of inadequately detailed teaching of the skeletal system, often we forget that bones and joints are alive. Every bone is an active, living organ within us. They, and the joints connecting them, are responsive tissues—just like the muscles, skin, fascia, and nervous system. Yet, we often think of bones as just rather dry, static things in us. Two-dimensional anatomy books don't help; even wonderful 3D online learning tools depict bones only as inanimate structures. But bones and joints are wondrous, dynamic, and living within us! Consider that our bones: • Produce all of our red blood cells, most of our white blood cells, and our platelets • Continuously change shape and volume, depending on our body's need for calcium, phosphorus, and other essential minerals • Are active in the regulation of the endocrine system • Store crucial nutrients and lipids • Help regulate blood sugar and the deposition of fat • Provide living support and protection for other organs • Enable us to move articulately • Are living support for our postural alignment • Convey the deepest, strongest energy currents through our body (according to Chinese medicine) • Communicate with each other through their cells The Zero Balancing studies appear to lead us to a corroboration that a therapy that aims at triggering energetic/neurological shifts (based on high quality of touch and movement) has a measurable and positive affect on the autonomic nervous system (energy). This can, as do therapies that help relieve the chronic stress of excess sympathetic dominance, have an effect on the health of all the organs and systems affected by the autonomic system. So, through these studies—and the years of practice and teaching—Zero Balancing founder Fritz Smith and other Zero Balancing teachers and practitioners are developing a new picture of what we do as bodyworkers. It is this unique focus on the deepest structures and energy in the human body that places Zero Balancing, alongside others, at the very frontier of modern body-mind therapies. David Lauterstein is the cofounder of The Lauterstein-Conway Massage School in Austin, Texas. He is the author of The Deep Massage Book: How to Combine Structure and Energy in Bodywork and Life in the Bones: A Biography of Dr. Fritz Smith and Zero Balancing. He teaches in Austin, as well as in workshops throughout the US, in Costa Rica, and in the UK. Resources Buenzli, Paul and Natalie Simms. "Brainy Bones: The Hidden Complexity Inside Your Skeleton." Accessed July 1, 2019. www.theconversation.com/brainy-bones-the-hidden-complexity-inside-your-skeleton-38713. Hamwee, John. Zero Balancing: Touching the Energy of Bone. Philadelphia: Singing Dragon, 2014. Lauterstein, David. "What is Zero Balancing?" Accessed July 1, 2019. www.tlcschool.com/what-is-zero-balancing. Lindgren, Lenita. "Emotional and Physiological Response to Touch Massage." Doctoral thesis, Umea University, 2012. Smith, Fritz Frederick. Alchemy of Touch. Taos: Complementary Medicine Press, 2005. Smith, Fritz Frederick. Inner Bridges. Lake Worth: Humanics, 1986.