Finding Your Core
In January I decided to dive deeper into the Melt Method, so I started taking an online Melt Performance class three times a week, and I also started training in a new level of Melt techniques.
I love taking classes and learning. I really do! My high school self would be rolling her eyes at me right now, listening to her future self say such a thing. While I've always loved school supplies, organizers, and notebooks, and such things, my younger self just wasn't that interested in studying school stuff. My love for taking classes and learning was yet to be realized.
It wasn't until I started my coursework to become a personal trainer, and then again my coursework to become a massage therapist at Blue Ridge Healing Arts Academy, that I really fell in love with studying and learning.
At Blue Ridge there were Anatomy and Physiology classes, a reflexology class, Movement Therapy and Yoga classes, and a very interesting and eye opening Eastern medicine class. Exclamation points for all those! But my all-time favorite was Psychosomatics. We studied the mind-body connection and the chakras, and energy work - for weeks on end, and in great detail. It was fantastic!
My Psychosomatics instructor was Sharon Faw. I'll never forget how passionate she was about what she taught. She would guide us through these lessons and meditations that were so moving that she would well up with tears. There was something about her passion that often moved me to tears, too. Somehow witnessing her passion gave me permission to be passionate, too.
When I started studying myofascial release around 6 years ago, I started to feel that familiar and undeniable passion rising up inside of me again. You know, that feeling deep in your gut, deep in your core, like you've found something really important, but maybe you don't really know how to explain it, and when you try to do so, it just doesn't sound like it actually feels inside of you? Anyway, if there's one thing I've learned, it's that it's important to pay attention to those feelings.
And, as it turns out, that deep sense of knowing in the core of my being is what has helped me discover not just physical healing, but emotional and mental healing as well.
So, now that I'm immersed in this new level of Melt training, I'm feeling passionate and compelled to use this space to write about and more deeply understand the science behind what it means when I teach the physical concept of "Finding Your Core". I hope you'll find it interesting and useful, too.
The Foundation of the Melt Method is built on something called The Living Body Model. Two elements of The Living Body Model are The Autopilot and The NeuroCore. The Autopilot is the part of the body that protects, supports, and stabilizes us without our voluntary control or conscious awareness, and The NeuroCore is what I'm talking about while I'm teaching, when you hear me say "Find Your Core".
Your Autopilot uses your NeuroCore mechanisms like a superhighway that creates vibrational communication through your body by way of diaphragmatic motion and pelvic positioning. The NeuroCore is a deep grounding mechanism of connective tissue and muscle - a dual neurofascial stabilizing system that runs from the inner arches of your feet up through the deep spine and into your skull.
In a nutshell, it keeps your body grounded, it mechanically helps sustain the heavy masses of your head, ribs, and pelvis over your feet. It also stabilizes your spine and protects all of your internal organs.
This is kind of a Big Deal, because when these mechanisms and reflexes aren't working properly or lack proper timing, you have a higher chance of a wide variety of issues, including digestive, spinal, leg, and arm issues, as well as neurological disorders.
But here's the cool thing:
In Melt, through the use of conscious diaphramagtic control, breathwork, and learning how to activate your core reflex, we can open the door to altering the efficiency of our Autopilot.
Melting is an opportunity to make a direct connection with the deep stabilizing mechanisms and reflexes in our bodies that give us inherent stability, upright mobility, and protection for our organs. These mechanisms and reflexes allow us to transfer load and transmit force from the spine and trunk to the legs and arms when we move.
The NeuroCore techniques we use in Melt encourage these mechanisms to work properly, so they automatically stabilize, support, and protect our spine and organs by reacting efficiently to the movements we create. This is what we want for our bodies - not just to eliminate pain issues, but to maintain vibrancy throughout our lifetime!!!
I hope this helps shine a little light on the fact that The Melt Method is SO MUCH MORE than just rolling out your muscles using balls and rollers. The Melt Method is an amazing way to reconnect with the automatic mechanisms in the body and remind them of what they're capable of doing, especially if they've gone astray.
Do you have pain issues that you wish to resolve? Do you wish to maintain your vibrancy as you age? If yes, consider joining me for an exploration of The Melt Method! I offer 1-on-1 Instruction, in-person group classes, and convenient on-line classes.
I hope to see you soon!
