Alexander Technique

When we go about our daily business without consciousness of the body, the various stresses and strains that occur day after day can begin to take a physical toll before we know it. F.M. Alexander looked carefully at the unconscious habits that take this toll, and in so doing, he discovered a method for moving freely while comfortably maintaining a healthy posture, by addressing the disconnect between mind and body.

By re-learning everyday movement such as sitting, standing, and walking with the Alexander Technique, you release the reflexive tensions that occur during movement, and enable your body to recall its inherent ability to coordinate itself. As this approach becomes the basis for all movement, it can be applied to a variety of situations, from everyday things like posture and walking, to sports, to performing arts contexts such as dance, theater, and music. In much the same way that a newborn baby learns how to use the body and grows, we also can consciously learn this technique tailored to the body’s natural workings.

Vinyasa Yoga

The word Yoga is derived from the Sanskrit root “Yuj” which translates to “to yoke” or “to unite”. Vinyasa Yoga is a discipline of Yoga that seeks to unite a series of “asanas” or poses in harmonious movement with the breath in a continuous flow. This form of practice also works to build heat in the body to stimulate the cardiovascular system. Vinyasa Yoga improves mobility, range of motion, flexibility, reduces stress, improves mood, and calms the mind.

Restorative Yoga

Restorative Yoga is the intelligent use of props to support the body in positions of comfort and ease to facilitate conscious relaxation of the nervous system particularly the parasympathetic nervous system. The parasympathetic nervous system, sometimes called the rest and digest system, slows down the heart rate, increases intestinal and gland activity, and relaxes the sphincter muscles in the gastrointestinal tract.

Gyrokinesis

The Gyrokinesis Method is a type of movement that addresses the entire body, opening energy pathways, stimulating the nervous system, increasing range of motion and creating functional strength through rhythmic, flowing movement sequences.

You will sit on a chair and learn the special breathing method and spiral movement in this exercise. Gyrokinesis classes can be done by people of any age or fitness level.

PNF (proprioceptive neuromuscular facilitation)

This is a manual technique that is used to retrain the lost connection between the muscles, nerves and brain because of compensatory patterns or injuries. 

Proprioceptive : Stimuli produced within the body by movement of its tissues eg : the sensory receptors are stimulated with any muscle movement.

Neuromuscular : The ability of the muscles to have appropriate initiation, strength and endurance.

Facilitation : Increase ease of performance of any action, resulting from the lessening of nerve resistance by the continued successive application of the necessary stimulus (Webster)

Application : A patient with low back pain may lose the stability in the core muscles due to improper body mechanics and injury. Thus, the therapist will use PNF principles to help the patient retrain the core muscles to increase the stability in the spine and avoid future injuries.

Postural education

Proper spinal alignment is important for efficient body mechanics and optimal health. Imagine your spine as blocks. If each block is stacked one above the other, the vertical pressure from above will go straight down through all the blocks into the feet and the system will be fully stable. On the contrary, if some of the blocks are shifted due to injuries or surgeries, vertical pressure applied from above will not be evenly distributed leading to uneven stress on some parts of the body. The manual therapist will use assessment to test the stacking of two major components :

The position of the thoracic block over the pelvis.
The angulation of the thoracic block.

After thorough assessment of the spine, the therapist will teach the patient how to work on their alignment in sitting and standing postures and then eventually train proper body mechanics keeping the alignment with all different functional (lifting, reaching, pushing, pulling,etc) and recreational tasks (squatting, running, jumping,etc)