Los Angeles, December 4th, 5th, and 6th...
...over 600 muscles in our bodies...
priceless!
Okay, so we didn't stretch all 600, but it felt pretty darn close.
Fasciae is connective tissue. It is like the bag that contains the muscle. The muscle takes the shape of the bag. Fasciae is a mixture of carbs and protein, collagen (a fibrous scleroprotein in bone, cartilage, tendon and other connective tissue) and water. If the fascia is compromised due to dehydration, injury, poor training, the fascia is restricted and cannot move fluidly. When this happens, the fascia gets stuck and anything that the fascia encapsulates - muscle, viscera, joints - has compromised movement. This could mean that the rotator cuff muscles become tight and "freeze" up, that the liver is not elastic enough to detox the body without stress, or that the colon cannot move feces up hill and out of the body.
The goal of Myofascial Stretching is freedom...freedom at the level of articulation. Between all the muscles and ligaments there are sacks of bursa or sponges. The more hydrated the bursa, the fuller the sponge. Myofascial Stretching keeps the bursa plumped up.
Myofascial Stretching is working with a controlled movement. It is not ballistic. One needs to have the muscle on the brain. One of the first rules of this kind of work is stretching in the correct posture for the joint above and the joint below the fascia being worked. One stretches the muscles, the joints, and the fasciae.
The time for stretching each muscle in the body is different. Who can remember the time needed for each of those 600 or so muscles? The quality of muscle is different from person to person, each muscle has different fibers - fast, slow-twitch, horizontal, vertical, mono or polyarticular. When any Myofascial stretch is held for 30 seconds, the muscle loses its defenses
and quality stretching occurs. The stretch is done three times for 30 seconds each time with 15 seconds of relaxation in between.
It is impossible to have MOTILITY ( intrinsic movement of the viscera) without MOBILITY. Movement is alive. The anatomy never changes. What does change is how you train, for what purpose. Myofascial Stretching allows one to stretch a muscular chain within a fascial chain.
My thanks to Guy Voyer, D.O., and the Institute of Applied Somatherapy. The breadth and depth of knowledge presented through this forum is life altering!
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