Anatomy Trains, Kinesis Myofascial Integration
This past August, I submitted myself into a 500-hour training on the coast of Maine with Thomas Myers, in Anatomy Trains, Kinesis Myofascial Integration™ (KMI), which is a version of Structural Intigration, similar to Rolfing™. There were 32 students from as far as Australia, Hawaii, LA and the UK to Massachusetts, Vermont and Maine with diverse backgrounds ranging from medical doctors to fishermen to cooks and lots of bodyworkers. We have completed the first of six modules. Number two starts this week.
It was a true delight; rigorous, very informative, playful and dynamic. Must of all, it seemed to capture in me a fresh, flowing energy and vision; a gained purpose to how I could best help people to draw their focus into their moving bodies and joyous hearts. KMI is just the beginning of a greater study for me, and it is a great beginning.
KMI is primarily about integration within the moving body. Like all modalities, it starts with a question; how does our functional structure supports the movement we want to make and what quality of our motion supports the function we are trying to perform? When we move free of stress, with an awareness of ease and openness in the body, then the whole situation can become more delightful and successful. We accomplish our tasks easily. That is because the body holds strong patterns of emotion, protection or beliefs, on a very physical level, within the “walls” of its’ structure, the fascia or connective tissue. Over a lifetime, these walls begin to form into a shape that, sometimes painfully, sometimes beautifully, reveals our central beliefs or attitudes on life, whether we want to reveal them or not. This fascia wraps around our entire structure, top to bottom, inside, out.
When we allow the fascia to be lengthened and opened through deep touch work, it can unravel complex patterns of misuse or injury, it can facilitate the ease of pain, loosen restriction, open movement, align posture, decrease stress or reveal and resolve somato-emotional stasis. It also can support a personal journey toward wholeness. Integration is the balance of being stable, mobile and ready to receive the constant shifts and changes in the currents of life.
Since I began to integrate this work into my practice, remarkable shifts have begun to happen. When a client comes to see me, I see more of them then I had before and I seem to also see how they want to see that too. Their bodies tell amazing story about being a human being and facing the encounters of life. Sometimes it seems that people come, just to be able to take off their armor of defenses for an hour and allow me to go in with fine and sensitive tools that are gentle but strong, allowing them to restore a part of their original form as it is meant to be; fully integrated, strong, courageous, open and light-hearted.
Throughout my life, I have been drawn to the wide range of body-centered practices from dance to meditation to yoga to bodywork. They all have helped me feel more whole in my life. Movement, mind and body have been my inspiration and I have learned from the earthy, physical density of tissue to the light, quick and vast nature of mind, to the liberation of expression in movement. I feel equally drawn to the beauty and integrity of any one landing pad on the spectrum of authentic experience yet, I also know that I am coming around again on a circle, going deeper by beginning again.
“We begin with the Body”, was a slogan printed on the brochure of the first body based training I did, Somatic Movement Therapy, after graduating from college with a degree in dance. KMI is a way of getting under the skin in a quiet, careful and explorative way. I plan to go deep with that. From there, my body opens and begins to dance and feel more and I will go on to move further back into dance and expression. May this investigation encourage my clients and students to rouse a growing energy within them as well, taking delight in the foundations of their immediate world.
Da Vinci image credit: KOC University (http://home.ku.edu.tr/)