Archive for Pandiculation
Letting Go of Muscle Tightness
Posted by: | CommentsA number of people have been telling me how they try to let go of their muscular tightness, discomforts or pain by either breathing into it, visualizing or using positive mantras.
These methods can be quite useful but we may not always be successful with these approaches.
Your brain is set up to use the natural process of a pandiculation by using Somatics Exercises. These unique exercises send a message from your brain’s cortex through the spinal cord and out to the muscle or muscles which need to let go.
If you practice Somatics, you may be aware how to use the simple 3 step process by actually contracting your muscles followed by the s-l-o-w release and pausing to sense the effect.
When you feel or sense the release of yourself letting go, you are in a state of learning and reminding your nervous system as to the “how to” of actually letting go.
We often try to deal with accumulated stress, tightness or pain by just breathing into it. This works “if” you already know how to let go in that particular area of your body.
Using your mind to communicate with the muscles, reminds them of their function, and serves to creates a memory pattern which reinforces the learning of how to let go.
You are actively creating and releasing the chemicals of relaxation into your body through the 3 step process of a pandiculation which you can use any time you feel the need.
In other words, you’re also creating a reservoir of the feel good chemicals of relaxation which you can bank on.
The more you practice with the 3 simple steps, the more easily you can tap into your natural resource of turning off stress, tightness, discomfort and pain.
Then once you have the hang of it, and your muscles know and remember how to let go, then breathing, visualizing and following through with your intentions and mantras will move you up a notch in realizing your healthy lifestyle.
Letting go is easy once you know how… you can join us on Saturday, August 14th for a live webinar on how to use the P word to get your muscles to let go in your legs, hips, knees, ankles and feet.
Somatic thoughts on Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution
Posted by: | CommentsSomatics is defined as the body experienced from within. Thomas Hanna coined this term which not only relates to movement as is taught in Hanna Somatic Education®, it also relates to our entire being.
While I normally comment on movement as a key to well-being. Moving to the refrigerator and in the grocery store or sitting down for a prepared meal in a restaurant is another part of a strategy to well-being.
If you’re loading yourself up on packaged foods and expect your body to move well… please try it again and see if you get the same result. I applaud the efforts of Jamie Oliver’s television show and his intent to plant seeds to improve not only how school children eat… it’s a lesson for us big kids too.
Moving well also requires you to nourish your being with food that gives you positive energy and one of the simplest of foods is merely drinking clean and healthy water.
Lack of hydration, ill nourishment and medication, both legal and illegal will take you away from moving well as nature intends, otherwise, all the pandiculators, the healthy vertebrate animals would be in a mess too. Some of them are on account of what they have access to as well as your children and the community you live in.
I know when I travel and can’t get organic food, I’m in a literal bind, which thankfully only lasts for a small duration and when I discover areas which have co-ops and healthy restaurants which I even discovered in Sin City, Las Vegas in a soccer tournament I was competing in…
My hope is that Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution will re-spark what so many have come to understand how food is delivered to children at school, what is available at the grocery store, and what we ingest as fast food.
Healthy minds thrive on good food, physical activity, great relationships and the inner feeling of connectedness. This is somatics. To move with intelligence is our birthright as is evidenced by how we pandiculated in our mother’s womb. To continue to move well is fostered by this intelligent act of pandiculation.
To eat well is a choice to wield another and further intelligence to allow us to move, think and act freely with a consciousness promoting well-being for all of us. Our health care reform moves onward when we all participate in promoting well-being and practicing it… and modeling it for all children.
It’s not always easy to take the time to prepare a good meal, move with intelligence, think clearly and act in a positive manner… but when the seed is planted and we repeat the simple practice of hygiene in all it’s varied forms, then we truly progress to living life as easy and as well as it can be.
It’s an effort that is well rewarded with feelings of pleasure, confidence, and self-actualization. Life is simple… eat well, move well, think well, be well. The paths can be varied, overlap and your somatics sense of yourself will feel and know it. It’s just practice and revolutions such as Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution remind us of our greatness, our capacity to feel it, and that desire which calls us to move forward.
Related Blogs
Apolo Ohno Pandiculates to 8 Medals
Posted by: | CommentsDid you get a glimpse of Apolo Ohno right before he races?
Check him out on Live with Regis and Kelly.
Did you also notice that after what appears to be a yawn… how relaxed he became? Of course you had to watch it in progress to see him show the response of relaxation.
When you’re at the top of your game or wanting to keep pace with younger talent, you’ll use any edge necessary, though in this case, Apolo is using nature’s process of a pandiculation…
And he may not even know about it, as most people don’t… but it doesn’t matter what it’s called since this is just like many natural processes we use without knowing why.
Healthy animals with spines use this little known process to remain agile, quick and strong.
They’ll practice a series of pandiculations first thing in the morning and periodically self-adjust throughout the day. This explains how well they can move and it serves notice to us what we may need to remind ourselves on a daily basis…
How well you move is up to you? 
Can you improve with age? I think so and though I was living in chronic pain for the better part of two decades… years later I earned only a couple of medals in my 40’s.
My secret training method… pandiculate of course. Now I’ve got some work to do to catch up with Apolo and the rest of the healthy animals.
