Most people, including doctors, physical therapists and even yoga teachers don't actually know HOW to get tight contracted muscles to effortlessly lengthen.
When Beth and I lived and worked together as Bikram Yoga Teacher in Indonesia back in 2014, we didn't know this was neurophysiologically possible. As a yoga teacher, Beth was versed in anatomical challenges such as hyper mobility because of her own personal experience with it. When we met in 2014, I was in the throws of a identity crisis that stemmed from living in chronic pain that my yoga practice did not seem to resolve. Coming to terms with my hyper-mobility and the fact that I had continuously been injuring myself for the sake of "the fetishization of flexibility" was a huge ego blow that I was contending with on a daily basis. Beth was a great mentor and support to me during this time.
Flash forward to 2022 when Beth and I began to reconnect over social media because I had actually found a POWERFUL answer to my bendy, injury prone and painful body.
When Beth joined the winter 2022 round of Radiance I was pleased to be able to give back to her in a rich and lifelong way with this incredible somatics practice.
Now Beth uses the incredible skills that she learned in my program every day with her clients. She has used the method to resolve her chronic neck and shoulder pain and SO MUCH MORE.
In this fun, and thoughtful interview we explore:
-Our careers as former Bikram Yoga Teachers and the problem with yoga that isn't adequately personalized.
-Hyper-mobility in Yoga. Is it a problem if it doesn't hurt?
-Hanna Somatics as a practical, evidence-based, neuroscience-explained nervous system tool
-Some fascinating case studies of applying somatic principles at her physiotherapy practice
-Guru Culture and dogmatic tendencies in the world of body practices
-Her personal experience in the Radiance Program and appreciation for experiential learning
And MORE...
Beth Warner is an Australian Physiotherapist and Senior Professional Yoga Teacher. She applies Hanna Somatics and Somatic Principles with her clients to educate them and help them understand why they have been experiencing pain and how they can come out of it. For inquiries or to reach Beth for comments, contact her at betswarner@gmail.com.
To learn more about acquiring the lifelong skill of lengthening your tight, contracted and painful muscles visit www.freeyoursoma.com to learn about the Radiance Program. Podcast listeners will get $500 off!
Reading While Listening!
A: Every day there is a forgetting and every moment there is the possibility of remembering. Remembering who you truly are, awakening to your body, to the inner world and experience of being alive. Here is where you find the beauty, the joy. Here is where you free your Soma. Hello and welcome to Free Your Soma, Stories of Somatic Awakening and How to Live from the Inside Out. I'm here with my wonderful friend, colleague and recent graduate of Radiance, Beth Warner. We have known each other for quite some time and we watched each other really evolve in our body practices, not only as individuals but also professionally. I'm so excited to have her here today to share about her expertise and the things that she's up to as a physical therapist or as they say in Australia and other countries, physiotherapist. Welcome, Beth. Please introduce yourself a little bit to our audience.
B: Thanks, Amy. Thanks for having me. I, as Amy said, I am a physiotherapist. Prior to that, I was a Bikram Yoga teacher full time for a very long time, which is how I met Amy initially. I taught yoga in Australia, in the States and in Indonesia for several years. Teaching yoga was a fantastic job and I got a lot out of it and I really enjoyed working with bodies and working with people at that time. I got to a stage in my life where I realised that I needed to do a little bit more with my brain or something different with my brain. And one of my yoga students actually who was a physiotherapist said to me after class, you should be a physio. And initially I was like, sports injuries and stuff. Like, I don't know anything about sports.
What is that? Because I had a limited understanding of what it was to be a physiotherapist. But once I looked into it and I realised the breadth of the scope that you can have as a physio, I realised that it was actually probably the right thing for me to do. And so I went back to uni, finished my degree and had been working full-time as a physiotherapist for the last three years.
A: Excellent. Yes, yes. And I love that you're doing that because you are always so passionate and knowledgeable and curious. There's a lot of curiosity that I feel like you have. And as a yoga teacher, I felt like that was really, really heartening or something. Like, it felt like you were genuinely interested in why my body or somebody's body might be doing something or something might be taking place. There was a genuine curiosity that you had about what was going on with that, so to speak. And I think that that kind of curiosity, first of all, it's contagious so that it brings the student into a deeper curiosity about themselves.
And there's this lack of judgement in it too. There's a lack of when you were more curious about things, it's different than being skeptical or it's different than being determined or something that things are already some way. Curiosity is this openness that I feel like you have. And that always was something that just encouraged and delighted me as your colleague and as your students. So it makes sense to me you're in this field where there would be a deeper learning about this stuff.
B: That's a very delightful way of putting it. Thank you. I appreciate that. I think that you have that same quality too, which is why we got along so well when we were teaching yoga together. But I think you're right. I think that curiosity is probably the driving force in all areas of my life. That is probably just an essential component of who I am is generally being curious and also being open and really not being judgmental.
And I think that those things are really helpful qualities in teaching yoga, but also in physiotherapy. But this is also why this is a very good job for me. Like there are many avenues for me to, I guess, employ my curiosity, both in terms of working with the people who come in, the people in front of me, but also in terms of broadening my own skill set and my knowledge. And I feel like if you have an approach that is curious, you can't get bored in the job and you can't get fatigued with it or over it. I think there are limitless possibilities for things that you can explore in ways that you can think about the human body and areas of treatment that you can investigate. And that's what I find to be really rewarding about the job, as well as the interaction with people, which is the number one best thing about it.
A: Right. Absolutely. And, you know, that's that curiosity that's led you into, you know, you're a physiotherapist, professional yoga teacher. Now you have taken an integrative breathing training and your integrative breathing training practitioner. And now with the skills, the somatic skills that you have personally acquired in the Radiance program, you are really kind of diversifying your knowledge base and your approach is going to become, I can just see it becoming very specific and integrated and holistic and really individualized, like personalized to the person that's in front of you, because you're going to have all these different pieces that you can pull in and kind of bring into a treatment plan for somebody.
B: Yes, I think that's true. And I, in terms of all of the, the CPD that I've done and the different bits of training that I've done over time, I realized that that's, I guess, the overarching purpose of all of those is to have a skill set that means that I can be flexible and responsive to the individual patient that's in front of me. And rather than having like a sort of one way only approach to it or just having a few limited skills that you've got diversitivity to approach treatment in a variety of ways. And I often bring the breast stuff in, I bring the somatic stuff in, I can bring yoga stuff in, I can bring the conventional physiotherapy stuff in. And, and it means that I certainly feel that I've got more tools and more ways of connecting to people and also giving them treatment options. But it also, all of those are employed. And you talked about this briefly at the start, but really, I guess the main thing is people helping people to understand what is happening in their bodies to connect to their bodies and to then have their own tools for how to manage discomfort and pain and dysfunction. So that they are actually empowered to do those things, sometimes have a great understanding of those things in themselves.
So that eventually, you know, you this time, I mean, you know, they're released from physiotherapy basically, that's the idea. And I think I've been very fortunate in the place that I work that I have bosses who are very supportive of that very understanding about that, you know, as well, too, that I don't just have to take a conventional sort of physiotherapy approach that I can bring in all of these broader experiences that I have and skill sets that I have.
A: Yeah, you know, that is important the time and the place and I mean, we both experienced that I'm sure just in our professional yoga teaching careers, sometimes there were studios that wanted things done a certain way and would get particularly fussy about things being a certain way in the way that you were teaching, you know, and wouldn't budge about certain things. And then there were other studios that would be like way more flexible about how something was done in a yoga class because they were open to considering, you know, things like hyper mobility, or ways to handle injuries that were not necessarily in the script that we were given when we did our yoga training, right, people who were kind of more open minded about, you know, embracing different approaches to the same practice, you know, because for those of you who don't know for the listeners who aren't really familiar. Vikram hot yoga is a very disciplined very can be a very strict style of yoga with the same 26 postures over and over and granted I was really into it for a long time because it is a powerful practice. Right. And at the same time, I ended up injuring myself without realizing it because I didn't have proper guidance about some of these particular issues that were going on in my body. And during my time in Indonesia, Beth was a great support to me. I learned a lot from her because she had actually already been down that road of looking at certain issues like hyper mobility, right, and looking at how that how that fits or doesn't fit within a yoga model and what's to be considered. Can you say a little bit about your own discoveries around hyper mobility?
B: Yeah, so I think first of all, I didn't realize I was talking mobile until I started doing Vikram yoga. I was just in my body and I was always very clumsy and more likely to sprain ankles and had those types of injuries and things like that and just generally a little bit wobbly in my joints. But it wasn't until I started doing Vikram yoga that I actually realized that it was not quite normal and that I did bend a bit more than other people in ways that were not necessarily healthy for me. And so in some ways it was frustrating, but it was also a very productive journey to go through of realizing this and then of having some mentors and some teachers who were knowledgeable and very helpful and some who just had no idea were not helpful at all. Yeah, and trying to sort of learn for myself and advocate for myself and then eventually advocate for other students, that was a very productive and character developing thing to have to go through.
But I think I remember there was one time when there was a teacher, Lin Whitlow, who we know who's a very senior teacher in the Vikram yoga community and she'd come to visit Australia where I was practicing in the studio. And I've been having these issues for quite some time with my knees being very hypermobile and having a lot of knee pain and hip pain and discomfort and feeling like I couldn't balance and feeling like my knee went too far back and it just wasn't right. And the teachers that I had at that time, and this is not their fault, this is how they were taught, you know, and they were just repeating what they knew. And so they would just say to me, oh, you just need to push your knee back, you just have to push it back, you just have to get stronger. As though, magically, by pushing my knee all the way back through its extreme range of motion, it was going to miraculously become straight over time, which is just not going to happen. But Lin Whitlow came and taught a workshop and I plucked up the courage to ask her about it and she was like, no, your knee bends too far backwards.
That is not correct. And she made me learn how to hold my knee straight. And it was a very weird experience because she said, okay, now your leg is straight. And I was like, no, that feels bent. And she said, your brain does not know where your knee is. And I was like, that is true. It doesn't know. It was a real revelation to me to be like, oh, that's right. And that part of what I had to do was train my brain to understand better where my body was in space, to make my brain and my body connect better so that they actually could understand each other and communicate better. That was a real turning point for me in understanding what was happening in my body.
And then as a teacher being able to understand, this is before I was a teacher, this happened, but then later on as a teacher being able to understand what was happening for other people. Yeah, that was the beginning of me going, something, something's happening.
A: Wonderful. Yeah. And I mean, it continued to, I feel like there's more, there's so much more awareness about it now within. I mean, I'm not really tapped into the Bikram community as much anymore, but there's so much more awareness of it now. What would you say about that? Do you think that there's more awareness of it?
B: I definitely think so. I see a lot more about it in just in sort of yoga publications and things like that. I see it more in blogs. And I think what's happened to is that when I was practicing, it was maybe at the peak of sort of Bikram yoga being really popular. But I think what happened is you had this massive uptake of yoga and a massive uptake in this particular style of yoga. And so suddenly you're just having a lot more people who are having mobile coming in and initially people not knowing what to do or how to deal with that. But that over time, the industry has got better at recognizing that this is actually a thing. And at talking about it and having debates about it and working on how to deal with it. And in fact, a couple of days ago, I did some talks at a yoga teacher training and the teacher trainees themselves were much more aware about it and much more receptive to talking about how can the building and how to manage it that I've encountered previously. So I do feel like there is a shift just generally of people having a better idea about what this is, which is very heartening to see. Right. Well, and part of it also I'm assuming is that there might be, and I know this was the case for me before I started having pain as a result of my banana leg, my leg bent backwards, was that it, you know, if I wasn't experiencing pain from it, then it's not a problem.
B: Right. Well, and part of it also I'm assuming is that there might be, and I know this was the case for me before I started having pain as a result of my banana leg, my leg bent backwards, was that it, you know, if I wasn't experiencing pain from it, then it's not a problem. Right. That's not a problem that I'm pulled out of natural alignment that I'm, you know, kind of twisted and bent backward. But the truth is, and what I discovered myself is it's not a problem yet. But it is a way that we can end up overextending, injuring, even tearing muscles, damaging ligaments, all these things. And so there's a lot to be learned, you know, even as someone who, you know, maybe has been practicing for a while. Like for me, I was practicing quite a while before I learned that I was hypermobile and that there was an actual issue and I learned about it through pain. Right. And I learned about it in like a kind of a difficult way, like having to, you know, face my ego that was used to being able to go a certain distance in a pose and have to pull back and have to relearn how to do that pose differently. Right.
B: Yes. And I think that sort of the fetishization of flexibility is, is a big part of that. And it's obviously that's not an every single yoga practice. And it's not in, you know, every single brick and yoga studio. But there can be, people get a lot of positive validation for going very deep into postures.
That scene is being advanced. So it's seen as being good at Asana, at physical yoga postures, is to be able to go deep into it. And I think that that idea, first of all, prevented people from seeing the hypermobility and recognizing that it was a problem. It was just seeing people being really flexible or being really good or being able to get really deep into these postures. But I also think then that there is this challenge for practitioners of yoga, as you said, to to back off from their depths and to lose that sense of validation or to lose that sense of affirmation that they get from being flexible and from being good at yoga in that way and getting deep into postures. And that is very challenging to do. And it can be very challenging as a teacher to guide somebody through that journey of backing off and learning how to actually stabilize through your joints rather than going to end range or rather than going to flexibility. And I think you're right. I was probably fortunate in that I had pain very quickly in my yoga practice that I had a lot of knee pain and I was like, this seems bad. You know, even though I had people saying to me, oh no, it's okay. Pain kills the pain. This kind of sort of rubbish statement actually. But I in myself was like, no, I don't think that's right. I don't want to do that to my body. And I think I was fortunate with that fairly early on.
A: And you know, now that I'm thinking about it, you know, I think I did have pain, but I was really good at ignoring my pain and I was really good at overriding my pain and the pain wasn't consistent enough, right? That I was paying attention to it. It was only once it became like very consistent that I could no longer ignore it. It only became until I was like literally limping around and other people were commenting on the way that I moved that it became this thing that I had to look at. And you know, that of course is related to my own personal journey, the lack of proprioception that I had in my body in general, you know, where these signals weren't fully being received. Like in the moment, there was like a lag time between like doing a thing and then like the result of that thing actually catching up with my brain and going, oh, I think I hurt myself or something like that, right? Because I didn't have that body awareness that I, I mean, I thought I had it. We don't know what we don't know, you know. I thought I had it, but then it was layers upon layers of realization to get me to the point where I was like, oh, I actually really don't know where my body is unless I'm wearing tight pants and staring in a mirror at myself. I actually have the idea.
B: Yes, and I think like that's such an important point because that is extremely common in hypermobility. People who are who, you know, and that's more than just having a couple of joints that are a bit fendy, but people who are hypermobile generally have full proprioception. They don't have good joint position sense. They don't have good awareness of where their body is in space. They don't have good interception. They sometimes don't have very good like recognize recognition that they're actually hungry or tired or thirsty. All of those things can be a little bit impaired and so that is, that can be an issue because they are not necessarily going to pick up on this stuff until there has been not so much damage, but quite a bit of, I guess, threat to the body into the into the body systems until like you until the body is actually really yelling, listen to me, please. There is a big problem. Please stop doing that. The signals, the signals don't get through so well and theoretically, and if taught well, brick and yoga can actually be a very good tool for teaching proprioception because you do have visual feedback. You have a mirror because you do also have verbal instruction because you are doing static postures because you have repetition of postures. So if it's taught effectively, it can actually be a good tool for people over hyper mobile to learn how to tell where their body is in space.It's just not often taught in a way that facilitates that for people, but that doesn't mean it's not possible.
A: Right, and I agree with you and you know that was my first, you know, body practice and I loved it. I mean, it was absolutely, I mean, I'm probably addicted to it in terms of the feeling that it gave me in so many different ways, right? And the, you know, even just the, you know, the looking at myself in a mirror for 90 minutes, you know, and and doing something getting through something hard, you know, and the sweating and just the way that it puts you in an altered state of reality. It was a trip. I mean, for sure, like the years that I spent doing that practice were a huge part of my development as a person and they're they're not separate from who I am now, even though I've chosen to go. Well, not even chosen. I'll feel like it sometimes with my dad. It was like kicking and screaming being dragged in another direction where where I didn't even know where I was going and I somehow ended up here and it's, you know, it's been quite an amazing journey. You know, but I love that you are still connected to the yoga sphere and you're bringing in, you know, those pieces from yoga into your physical therapy, but you're also bringing wisdom and knowledge back into the yoga world through these small in these small ways so that people can learn more about this and so that people can, you know, protect themselves from hurting themselves.
B: Yeah, I really, I enjoy being able to do that and it's satisfying for me, especially having been through this sometimes frustrating journey of trying to trying to talk about the stuff of people to now being in a position where I feel like I can offer something that's helpful and that is really received very well by the trainees that, you know, I go and give these lectures to I think and part of that is because yeah, I agree with you, like Bicca members are a massive part of my life for a very long time and it did very powerful things for me. It fixed my insomnia. Like I had long term insomnia and it just fixed it. It fixed my renails. Like it actually it like as well as sort of all of the character development stuff and the friends that I made the community through that all of that. It actually had some power physiological effects upon my body and I will always be grateful for that and because of that I still see that it can have a really important role as a therapeutic tool for people. I do believe that that is still part of Bicca yoga and so because of that I still I like to be able to be involved in a way that I feel that I can I guess redress some of the things that I think are not great about it or just provide a little bit of a different perspective for people so that they can use this therapeutic tool more effectively for more people and for different bodies. Yes, yes for different bodies.
A: That's a really great point because you know, even just something as simple like for a long time in my Bicca yoga practice I just had my feet just like right next to each other and for my hips it turns out that was like problematic and when I just separated my feet a little bit wider for my particular body I could balance better. I had more like awareness of my feet. I had better balance in my you know, ab and abductors just something small like that, you know, and I think that you know from what I understand it was you know individuals were always like their individual needs were usually like addressed in when Bicca yoga was a smaller scene, but as it expanded and grew massively there kind of was like, I mean I mean he the man the the controversial man himself almost called it like likened it to McDonald's himself. He did that and that's what I feel like the quality can get you know diminished because we're no longer like really addressing individuals, but we are kind of just giving everybody a formula and expecting them to fit into that.
B: Yes, and I think I mean my Bicca yoga training had 400 people in it. That is absolutely massive. On the one hand, it's pretty amazing to do pranayama breathing to be breathing in unisim as 400 people like that is a pretty incredible experience, but you you cannot with just that size and that volume get into things like individual variation and I think particularly that you know the development of the dialogue of the script that's used that was it was meant to bring some consistency to teachings. I understand the reasoning behind it, but I think it had a lot of unintended consequences, which is that you did lose that individualization of teaching and also because just the the trainings were just so big in terms of the quality of the anatomy and education it was really was really not that great, you know, so you're just missing a lot of that sort of stuff and I think this is not the whole of Bicca yoga. They're obviously very experienced and very qualified teachers who have been teaching in a way that is individualized as a therapeutic for people. Like they're always happening throughout the history of Bicca yoga, but just that as a whole a lot of that was really missing and that's what's really great about doing what I did because I just was there a couple of days ago and one of the first things we talked about actually was the fit-together thing and about people who have valgus needs, who have nocneys or people who have internally radiated hips or people who just have sort of different sort of structural things that are going on in their bodies and how to approach that and how to teach effectively for those people. That's one of the first things that we talk about is that instruction and it's really nice to have the opportunity to do that so that these teachers at the very beginning of their journey are going to go out knowing that there are such things as individual variations like their bodies are different, you know, and that they can be they can still teach the practice effectively without applying a one-size-fits-all approach or without thinking that what you're trying to do is to force every single body into this one template. That there's a blueprint somehow that everybody's meant to be returning back to and that to just challenge that idea a little bit that's been really valuable for me to be able to do.
A: Right. And I mean, as I branched out later on into other yogas and got trained into various other forms of yoga, it was interesting for me to realize that, you know, even if they had a different flavor, there were those similar tendencies for yoga communities or yoga practices to become kind of dogmatic about a particular thing, whether it was like alignment, right, or whether it was how the alignment for this posture is supposed to look or something, right. And then they might not be dogmatic about something else entirely. You know what I mean? There was like these different flavors of like these rules. And I feel like when we do that, we lose the ability to accept what's actually happening in this person's body and work with what's actually happening because we're trying to fit this into a model that might not even be relevant to this person.
B: That's right. It's a trap. And like, and it happens in all, all groups of people, doesn't it? Like I think it happened in physiotherapy too, you know, like it just, it sort of happens and people will, you know, come upon something or have a particular approach that can be really successful and can be a really helpful tool. But then people sort of attach themselves so strongly to that, it becomes the one way and the originator of that way becomes the guru. Like guru culture happens in physio as well.
Guru culture happens everywhere. And like that's one of the traps of that is that things can be like there is a tendency towards dogma and there is a tendency towards then a kind of tribalistic approach to it of like, this is how we do things and this is the right way and you know, and, and this sort of thing. And that is, I mean, as you say, I think you described that perfectly because it prevents you seeing what's in front of you. It stops you from actually seeing what is there because it's a model that once you adhere so strongly to it, you are just going to keep applying over and over again and actually prevents you from engaging with what's happening. And I think that's where actually curiosity, curiosity is the antidote to that. Like if you are perpetually curious, then you are not always, you are not going to fall into that trap of just ascribing to, to a dogmatic way of viewing things or thinking that there is one way of approaching things. There is, there are always multiple ways of approaching different things.
And I think being able to be open minded and responsive and curious and flexible allows you to better appreciate what is actually happening in front of you and better respond to it as well to do. But I also think I'm thankful to Bikram Yoga for I had to go through that to come out the other side, you know what I mean? Like, and to see that but also, you know, that there are Bikram Yoga teachers are not at all like that. But, but to sort of see this powerful coercive force, like the power of that sort of that dogmatic impulse or, you know, the power of that Guru Kothi, what it to see how that happens and to go, you know what, no thank you. That's not, that's not for me. There's a lot that I love about it and there's a lot that I have taken from it and it's instrumental in my development as a person, but actually, no thank you. But then when I see it in physio I'm like, I like that approach. Am I going to adopt that as my entire personality and clinical professional approach? No, thank you. You know, you can see the barriers of that tendency towards dogmatic behavior and Tennessee words Guru culture everywhere. Once your eyes have been open to it, they will never be closed again.
A: Right. Well, and I love that, you know, some people when, you know, I guess when they realize that that's what's happening or they see that there can be this like throwing the baby out with the bathwater stuff that goes on, like a rejection of it or like a, you know, complete dismissal like well now it doesn't mean anything. None of this matters now, but I love in what I really appreciate about you as your pragmatism because I feel like I have that too. I'm able to be like, oh, I really like this part of this. Wow, this is wonderful. That part. Nah, nah, not for me. And it's okay to do that. Like, I feel like sometimes, you know, people don't want us to pick and choose for various reasons, but that's actually a really intelligent and wonderful thing to do to have some discrimination, but to be also able to appreciate something, right, that is providing value, while also seeing that it's not totally perfect. Right. And that's, I mean, that's something that you can carry over into just thinking about your relationships to other humans in general. Like nobody's going to be perfect. You know, everybody's going to have flaws. Everybody's going to, you know, piss you off sometimes if you get close enough to them, you know what I mean? Like, it just happens. You know, but can we like see the good things and accept that? And then when the things that are not so pleasant show up, can we also accept that too without like, you know, having to fully embrace it for something?
B: That's right. And I think like it's interesting because obviously physiotherapies and evidence-based practice, right? So, you know, we, describe, we adhere to the scientific method, you know, we tend to be evidence-based in all of our treatments, but one of my colleagues is very fond of saying you're always dealing with N of one. So, you know, sample size of one. Like it's always that one person in front of you. And to recognize that you can be guided by the evidence and you're guided by sort of the best quality of evidence that you have in terms of treatment, in terms of assessment and stuff. But you are always, always dealing with an individual human being who is not necessarily going to fit perfectly into the strict requirements of that particular study. And I think that's really important to hold on to. And I also do like, for me, that just feels like a very natural approach. Like, it just feels very obvious that like, yeah, nobody's perfect. There is no one way. There are always these different ways to approach things and that you can always take from here and take from there and discard that, you know, whatever. And that just feels, that just feels like a very natural approach to my job, to me, and to life.
A: Yeah, no, and I totally relate. And, you know, that's probably like you said, why we get along so well. But what's so cool is that, you know, I, it was just about this time last year that, you know, we had done like a session together over Zoom, and I had shared a little bit about somatics with you. And then I just, I reached out again and I invited you to join the cohort and you did. And I got to have this wonderful experience of, you know, someone who had given me support and helped me in Indonesia when I was having all this difficulty with, you know, my ego and my practice and bloody blah, right, my knees. That I was able to feel kind of like a contribution to you getting to share this really awesome tool of hemismatics and expose you to kind of this new way of viewing hypertonic muscles, maybe even a new way of kind of looking at the challenges with hypermobility and the reasons why our knees might bend backwards all the time and stuff like that.
Would you share a little bit about how working in the program and what what somatics has contributed to you on a personal level.
B: Yes, I mean, firstly, it was such a great thing for me to see that progression in you and where you had ended up because we when we're in Indonesia with sort of at this, this point to where we were both trying to grapple with these things in different ways. And I guess we're the beginning of trying of trying to get somewhere, you know, like that they were the beginning of this but but that it was, you know, I was with you at a time where you're having a lot of pain, a lot of frustration, a lot of confusion and a lot of difficulty and also to questioning this this system of yoga that had been so influential for you but that actually was starting to feel like maybe maybe you're in a different path like and that that's a very, that's a very interesting position to be in and I think sometimes people can shut down to that, but you sort of fully went into it, or maybe kicking and screaming maybe drank by your dad whatever but he went into it you know and it was really like I just felt really proud of you for having gone through all of that and then ended up being in a position where you had become an expert in something that was both very restorative and extremely helpful in your own life but you're actually able to share that with people.
And I was excited for you to do that and and also to like I think because I because I trusted you because I know that you are curious and that you are you do approach things in in a curious way but also not in a skeptical way but sort of just not in an entirely credulous way that I trusted you to know that if this was something that you were teaching in felt it was worthwhile that it was probably legitimate that there was that there was actually something there that was going to be useful and so. And I was also when we when we started doing it I was at a point in time where you know I broke my hip I had a big injury I was struggling to come back from that I still had a lot of issues going on with some hardware and stuff like that and so I needed and I was finding the big from yoga practice to be provocative and I needed something else I needed some kind of physical practice that I could do that was not going to be provocative and that was going to be effective for me and so it was just the right timing to do this thing and it was apparent immediately to me what. What this was and how effective it was in my own body, but also is apparent pretty much from the beginning that I was going to be able to use this in my professional practice and this is going to be helpful for people. And in particular that this was like the final piece or a bridge in terms of helping people to understand what was happening in their bodies. That's a key thing and being able to use this as a tool to empower people to understand what was happening, but then also to be able to do something about it, which has always been a part of what I've tried to do in my work but that this was the little the final little thing that I needed in order to be able to do this in a way that was, I guess, gentle and helpful that was educational, but there was experiential. Like it needed to have all of those components right because I, I strongly believe that for the most part the learning of this like the understanding of your body, the development of better proprioception and interception. It has to be experiential people need to actually do it has to come through the body. And so that's where I think a lot of the power of this practices and that's where I could immediately see once I even had the first session with you as like this is going to help people who come into me.
A: Yes, awesome. I love that and you know, that is something that, you know, when I was creating this program, I wanted to create something that would get really deep in in a substantial amount of time you know and that's why I decided three months intensive three months support six months in entirety, because I felt like it would take that amount of time would take a serious dose of like 90 days of this practice to really have it sink in to somebody's consciousness. Right. Obviously for you you caught on pretty quickly that like this was something that was doing something substantial in your brain that you could literally feel like pathways shifting probably right in terms of, Oh, my shoulder was here and now it's over here it's it's changed position, you know from this tiny little micro movement. Right.
Yeah. But for many of us including myself, it took me quite a lot of time practicing it to really feel what can happen when my body relaxes, because we relax and layers, right. And some of the first layers, you know, are painful. They're like the layers where our pain is is present. And then as we get deeper and we're not in pain anymore they're still releasing that goes on, but it's not nearly as dramatic because it's not like oh I was in pain and now I'm not in pain. It's, it's like there's a deeper relaxation that becomes more and more possible in our bodies right. Of course, it's always the aches and pains that are going to call us back into this movement technique, because that's kind of like our body talking to us and saying, hey, he's getting a little tight back here.
Right. But would you share a little bit like your clients that you've started working with. You started experimenting with using this technique with them what did that look like.
B: I think initially what what I started using it with with with back pain, but basically what I recall just muscle related pain, musculoskeletal pain people coming in with sore backs, so hips so knees where there was no obvious other pathology or anything going on but also with those people to. But what I what I found when I first started doing it and even the most simple exercises like the simple arch and curl was that it was immediately very effective in terms of symptomatic relief. Like, and the what happened is you get people coming in and acute back pain and they can't sleep and they can barely walk and the counselor down and everything's uncomfortable. And then you do this tiny little thing, and they get up and they can walk out and they feel better. It is transformative. Like, first of all, if you can do that very quickly in a session, you have immediate bind with people, because you have made a change to their significant pain that they're experiencing. And that that I guess was the first cohort that I started using it with but I now use it with so I use it with neurological patients where they've got a lot of spasticity or increased time. And use it definitely with hyper mobile patients have a lot of hyper tenacity. They use it with anybody who basically has a lot of muscle tension, which is most people, but particularly with the pain stuff and it was interesting to me how straight away.
It could be really effective for people, but also that people kind of understood it. The way that I use it to is that I find so when I do it I use a combination of like manual therapy so you know massage and other kind of releases and stuff. And I can use that opportunity for when I'm doing manual therapy with people to do a little bit of education about why this is happening, why it hurts, why it's tight, what's going on. And a little bit of that just education about you know sensory matter and need to which is what semantic education talks about but so, but about why this might be happening so you sort of like while you're actually releasing muscles and giving people a big pain relief, you know, just sort of lay the groundwork for doing this, and then talking about how we're going to do the exercises and how they work and then getting them to do them and getting them to feel them and giving them a bit of a tactile feedback while I'm doing it, so that they know where to pay attention to in terms of feeling it and and that sort of stuff and so, like I found that it can be very successful just in one appointment to make a bit of change to give people a bit of relief. And the other thing about it that I actually think is really effective is that you don't have to do that many repetitions. And but this is a key thing, because often people come in and they're sorry and they're busy and they've got a lot of stuff on and you can give them like 20 exercises to do.
But if you can give them if you can say to them, you're going to do three of these, you're going to do this small number of these things. But you know, you've got to try and do it once a day that is very achievable. And that is also important that it is an achievable thing for people to do that they can do it and then they feel that they get relief from it.And so, again, you're going to have better buying with it and people are more likely to actually continue to do it because it's accessible it's achievable they feel relief from it. So, what I started finding was, particularly with say acute back pain and acute musculoskeletal pain was that I had better results more quickly using anesthmatics, then using, you know, just manual therapy or using exercises such as extensive basal function based or whatever the other method of exercises that it was that I would have better immediate results with that. Now, for some people that you're then going to go on to do targeted strengthening and a lot of other exercises as well too you're going to address the other things are going on, but in a sort of like immediate putting out the fire a symptomatic relief, I found that to be incredibly effective for people.
A: Right well if you have a hyper tonic muscle. It's going to shift and change the entire way that that other exercise would be done. It's going to get in the way and interfere with the functionality of that person that area of the person's body. You know if they're hip or they're glued or some part of their leg muscle is hyper tonic and you're trying to get them to do a strengthening exercise they're going to be cramping. They're going to be uncomfortable. If they might not even be able to they might feel incredibly weak because that area and their body is clenching so tight it can't do any more contraction. It can't literally is at the end of its rope. And so you change that and now suddenly the whole machine is going to move.
B: That's right and it's something that I often talk about with with people as well too is that when when muscles are perpetually tired of perpetually contracted. They generally are weaker they don't work as well they can't work as effectively if they can't return to their resting length and so they can be doing all the right things but they're not actually going to be effective for them to to by doing them and also what happens to is that people end up with lots of compensatory muscle patterns in terms of doing exercises because they cannot use the appropriate muscles effectively and I think actually people intuitively understand that a lot of time people come in and they go I think it's muscle.
I think it's this I think it's that they kind of know what's going on. If you can go yeah I agree with you I think that's what it is we need to do with that first before we can start doing the strengthening and doing the mobility work and doing other stuff that we need to do and it's interesting because oftentimes I've had people so backs is one thing but also I've had a lot of people with knee pain a lot of people with hip pain coming in and they think they think oh no I'm going to need any replacement because the pain is that bad. I'm going to need any replacement I'm going to need a replacement I can't go up and downstairs anymore I can't whenever I try and go up and upstairs my leg doesn't work properly and you know you do an assessment and you allow things like is there something wrong with the joint is there some you know significant pathology going on and you go actually this is actually just incredible muscle tightness like that is what's happening like the muscles are actually just way too tight and stopping you from being able to do this effectively and you teach them to do releases for those muscles and suddenly they can walk into the back the back the And then you can walk can walk downstairs again without paying and you have not done anything else in terms of strengthening and probably still do it too. But you don't do anything else in terms of strengthening and they can suddenly walk up and downstairs without paying and they do not think that they're going to need a hip or any replacement that is actually profound.
A: It feels miraculous because I've definitely had clients like that who you know are coming to me saying I you know I got my hip replaced 10 years ago and I think it's wearing out again and I have to get another you know and we do a session and we do some so as releases we do some blue releases and suddenly they are hiking you know up up you know whatever they're they're right they're hiking group they're doing all their activities again and they're not even thinking about needing a hip replacement anymore. You know so it can be really profound and I think it's mind blowing for a lot of people because they don't they don't think that's how it works in terms of like you know if I'm having this pain it must be because I'm getting old. It must be because you know my body's wearing out rather than just there's some muscle in your body that's clenched really tight and there is an actual way that your nervous system can unclench that muscle and it's actually very practical and very accessible. You know but the fact that people don't know about it it sounds like something kind of out there. You know, but I mean that's right. That should before it's it's neurophysiology.
B: It's just that's right. And I remember when I said to you I was like you need to tell me the near you need to talk neurophysiology with me I want to understand how this works you need to explain this to me and then no deus most scientific way possible. But I think I think, I think this is some of the benefit of having taught yoga for so long is that like I already knew that just being stiff just having incredible muscle tightness could be a significant generator of pain, because I had taught for so long and see people coming in who are so tight and watch them use a method that did actually help with some of that and get better. Like so for me I was like, yes, it can always be the muscles, you know, like, and okay you have joint pain what are the things that are acting upon the joints. What what is it that loads of joints you know like it's the muscle so you know so for me that was not such a shocking concept I was like yes I believe that actual just muscle or hyper tonicity can in and of itself be a significant driver of pain and reduce function and reduce mobility. That was a no brainer to me but I realized for a lot of people that seems like a revelation but I was just like that. And we don't realize that our muscles stay contracted, unless we release them, or unless our nervous system down regulate significantly right or unless there are certain kinds of movements that we do that reciprocally inhibit those type muscles.
A: We don't realize simply laying in bed at night. You know there's these unconscious contractions going on running all the time, wasting our energy, way having us wake up stiff and tight and sore in our necks and backs like we just were working all night long. Right people wake up like that they wake up tight and stiff and sore. But when you start turning off those unconscious habituated contractions and lower the baseline tension of your body. You wake up not stiff and tight and sore because your muscles aren't running all night long. But it's something people don't realize I mean I had no knowledge of this I didn't know that my muscles were doing that, even though I knew that I was waking up in pain and I was waking up with back tension. That was clear, but I didn't, it was unconscious I didn't know that my body was doing that.
B: And I think to and I think we said before is that the narrative around particular just getting older is that, oh you do just get tighter, and you just do just get pain, and do you just get more mobile and these things do get harder and so people just sort of think oh this is what happens to bodies. This is what happens to human beings. You just have back pain now. You just get tight now we need to start now, you know. And so there is a level that have sort of acceptance of something that I actually don't think people need to accept. But also, I think what's what's key and what's really profound for me about this is that it is, it's a global solution, it's a central solution, because you can work on the local tissues, you know, the local muscle, the particular muscle, the particular joints you can work on those things but if you don't change what's happening in the nervous system, you won't get long term and change.
And you also won't get. I think the sort of the, the understanding, the understanding of what to do. And when, because I now talk to people about this a lot and people do understand it and usually when you open up their conversation people will be like, I actually, I know that I'm always tight. I know that I always hold my attention here. When I was having that conversation with my daughter I could feel that my shoulders are rising up like suddenly they start to go, oh, I can feel that some of this, this tension or this tightness in this pain. It's generated not from me doing some heavy exercise or movement, but say it's my emotional response to start it's my stress response like it is actually coming from my nervous system. And so when people can understand that, then I think they can understand the concept for time training your nervous system to be able to actually release muscle tension and let it go and getting and getting how that process works. Because as soon as you start talking to people about that they're like, oh, yeah, I have always been tired. I've always hope intentionally this I sometimes I just find that I'm like clenching every muscle in my body. Sometimes I just find I'm really clenching my glutes and I don't know what you know something like oh yeah I'm doing it.
A: Yeah, well you realize that you're creating it. It gives you back your power because you realize that there is a way to undo it if you're doing it. There must be a way that you can stop doing it. Right or that you can train yourself to do something else.
B: Yes, it's massively empowering for people instead of like just thing that have just been inflicted upon them, or it's just a natural part of aging or like being in a human body, but that actually it is something you can learn to voluntarily control. You can change, you can become aware of it and then you can actually change it and that is extremely empowering. But also that you can do it. it in the moment. And you can do it in ways that are really gentle and feel good to do. And I'm painful.
A: You know? Yeah, it can be even pleasurable if you get, you know, really get into it in the moment, releasing your neck, letting that tension dissipate and letting that stress pattern integrate back into your body feels good. It feels really good. And that can be a thing that, you know, some people aren't used to in the beginning. They're not used to it feeling good to let go. They're used to it being kind of painful and difficult and scary to let go. Right? Yes. And so there's a whole retraining of that as well that people get to experience in this work is retraining themselves to, to, to actually feel released from letting go.
B: Yes. And I think often too, particularly with physio exercises, people come in expecting that you're going to inflict pain upon them. Not everybody, but some people. They think they're going to get like a really mean, like so as release kind of massage or something like that. And like I still sometimes do use those techniques, that's for sure. Or they think that they're going to have to do like lots of like glute bridges or like really difficult exercises. And then you go, I'm going to give you this very gentle thing that shouldn't hurt. Like, and if it hurts a bit, we're going to adjust it.
And they're like, what? Like that, that can be sometimes a big paradigm shift for people because they're expecting that it's actually going to be very hard and that it's possibly going to be painful. But I also really like that because I don't necessarily like conflicting pain upon people. And I am really glad that I can have an option that is not painful for people to do and that actually feels good for them. And I also think it teaches people to be more gentle with their bodies and with themselves overall. And I think that in itself is a very valuable thing to give to people and to allow people to do.
A: do. Absolutely. Yeah. It's been hugely transformative for me to learn how to be gentle with myself and how to be tender with myself. And when I'm when I'm in pain, instead of being like, instead of that, like, how can I, how can I go? Oh, sweetie, what's the matter? Can I help you? You need some water? You're tired? Oh, let's go to bed, you know, instead of how I used to be with myself, you know, which was a different kind of nervous system response that I was having, right? It was a different kind of conditioning. And so there's a whole repatterning that we get to go through with this work that is, you know, just it goes beyond, you know, pain relief on a physical level. You know, and it's interesting because I remember when you were in the program and you're starting to use these these methods with your clients, you were giving us some really fascinating anecdotes and telling some stories.
And there was a particular one, I don't know if you're comfortable sharing it, it was really interesting about a about a woman who said that this exercise you gave her gave her a nightmare.
B: That's right. That's right. I'm laughing about it because it was such an interesting conversation, but it was just actually the most simple gentle exercise ever, just a little arch and curfew's fine. And when she came in and she said to me that the exercise gave her a nightmare, it gave her a nightmare about something that had happened to her, which was many years ago, which was one of the first times that she injured her back, where she was cleaning a gas oven and it exploded and it threw her into a refrigerator and her back hit a refrigerator handle, and she actually injured her back.
And she was, you know, she came in and she was like, oh, you know, I don't like this, like this exercise, you know, it gave me this nightmare. And I was just like, isn't that amazing that by doing this small movement, you remembered this thing that had happened to your body. And you've now reacquainted yourself with this sort of initial trauma that it happened that you had so forgotten about that we didn't even talk about in terms of your back pain, it didn't even come up even though it asked you about injuries and all the rest of that sort of thing, like isn't that fascinating. And she actually, we came around to it and she was sort of, you know, it ended up being a really productive thing, you know, for her that she'd had this but basically, she had unlocked this bit of tension that had been there for so long in her body, that it allowed her to access this memory of this significant trauma that she had sustained many, many years ago, at what was really the origin of her long term chronic back pain. I just found that to be so fascinating. And I saw it when she first started talking about, she's going to, you know, I thought, oh, no, I've lost her now, like she's going to be like, I'm never doing the exercises again. But she wasn't, she was like, is there a way that I can do that exercise on my side? Is there a way that I can do this differently? And I was like, they're absolutely is fantastic. And she's kept doing them really interesting. She like, I thought, oh, no, like, oh, no, I made you have a nightmare. And now you're going to be like, I never do these again, but actually not at all, not at all. She actually saw the value in doing them. And we figured out ways that we can modify them so she could do it. But it was just this really fascinating result. This is very simple tiny exercise.
A: Yeah, yeah. Well, you're kind of you're unlocking something that was locked up from experience, not just that experience, but there were layers of experience. But that sounds like a pretty extreme, pretty intense one. That was part of that, you know, back pain that she was experiencing. And when you let that go, there's going to be, you know, for some people, it might be memories or emotions, or, you know, they might even realize or have a completely new perspective on a time. And they're like, they're like, they're like, they're like, they're like, they're like, they're their lives and what was really going on then, because it's just been sitting in their body kind of dormant kind of clenched up, you know, like, like our nervous system and our brain is very smart. And it's just like, oh, there's too much going on and we can't deal with all of this. We're just going to put it down here. We're just going to sort in that cupboard over there in my right hip, you know, and we'll get to that eventually someday. Right. And then the cupboard just keeps getting more and more full of stuff until, you know, you're weighed down by that right hip. And it's like, you know, heavy with all of the contractions and everything that happened that you kept putting there in that cupboard. Right. And so then with, with panesematics, we start taking that stuff out. And that's where that lightness comes in.
That's where that feeling of like being light on your feet, you know, waking up and you feel refreshed instead of like you've been running a marathon all night long.
B: Yeah. Yeah. And that's such a, it's a, it's a, it's a way in and it's another opportunity to talk about these things that affect human beings and affect your physical body without being like, tell me about your stress, you know, because, because these things are always a factor, because we are complete beings, you know, because we like these things are not separate. We are always sort of living emotional and intellectual and spiritual lives, all of these things are part of us and they're all going to impact upon every aspect of our lives. And when people do have these revelations or, you know, they do find that there's another person that I cheated who did realize she was in a just like a normal simple interaction with a member of her family. And she felt the tension creeping up and she was like, Oh, and she realized what it was related to in terms of her relationship with this person and how she always had this very intense physical response to an interaction with them and where it came from and stuff.
And it opens it up and it doesn't mean that I'm going to go beyond my scope and start going into psychology or whatever, but it opens up to just have these conversations with people about where they realize where this stuff has come from and how that has manifested in their bodies and then they can just like over, you know, and it doesn't need to be, it doesn't need to be this big thing they realize it. Oh, it's there. Oh, that's okay. They get it. I can let go of that. And like, you know, that can be a part of treatment as well without having to having to steer anything in that direction. It just comes up naturally because people are starting to have these revelations about about the tension that they hold in their body and the way that they hold stress in their body and the, and as you say the layers of that sort of stress in their body.
A: Ah, no, I love that. I love that, you know, I get to hold space for whatever someone brings up as a result of this work, but it doesn't require me to be a therapist or have any answers. You know, they're the ones with the answers, they're the ones who are coming with the, I just realized this thing and I get to receive and be present for that. And I get to listen to them as they, you know, process and realize this connection and just be there to affirm them. And that, you know, that was a big part of my training because my, my, my mentor Eleanor Crisval Hannah, she is a licensed psychotherapist and she would get, you know, every single training she would talk about scope of practice and she would talk about, you don't have to have answers for people you don't have to be a therapist unless you're actually a therapist and you want to do that as you do your hand of semantics. You can do your hand of sematic, you know, education with people and just be human, you can just be a human and do it with them without having to add these other aspects of feeling like an authority on mental health or something right or on how they should be processing this.
B: That's right. And, and as I said to you before, this is part of that experiential learning, you know, with people like what happens is they experience with themselves, they have the revelations themselves. They suddenly make the connections themselves and you would just merely there, allowing that to happen, like co creating the space with them for that to happen, and then allowing that to happen for them to have those revelations. And all you need to do is just be with it, you know, and acknowledge it. That then that's it. And so like I never feel like I'm in danger of going outside of my scope, I'm out of my depth because you're just relating to them as a human being, but they are having all of those, those revelations and those sort of understandings of themselves that are happening. And it was kind of there for which I think is really is really cool. Yeah, yeah, it's really special. I definitely enjoy it. I'm so pleased.
A: I mean, we haven't really caught up for a while. So this podcast is almost like a catch enough to see like how far you've come and I mean I already know, like how brilliant and smart you are and so I love that you're just utilizing this tool in, you know, I'm going to know the principles of somatics so deeply because you practice it so much in the program, you know, and you experience a daily or near daily practice, right, people who go through the program that you become in a way a natural somatic educator, because when you come across a person in your life who is having a little pain or having some involuntary contraction in their leg or their back, you want to say something you're like hey try this. Hey, this could help you and you just show them because you know it in your body. And that's what I really think that this work was ultimately intended for, you know, as far as I understood from the training that I went through is not that this is a commodity or, you know, a trademark style of something that's like specific. This is actually just educating people about a natural functioning of their nervous system that they just didn't know was there. Yes.
B: And yes, I think that's exactly right. And I think what I also like about it is that as well as, you know, knowing and sort of having absorbed the movements into my body. If you have an understanding of the body and of anatomy, there are many options in terms of the movements if you understand the principles, you understand how it works and what you're trying to do. I've come up, you know, with individualized movements for people to target areas that I think they need to target and so, you know, it's, it's inherently very flexible and adaptable. As we were talking about way at the beginning, it's very able to be individualized. It's not a script, like because it is actually it's, it's, it's just an understanding of basically how, how your body works in a fundamental way. And so, because of that, you can apply it to anyone and to any particular muscle, tightness or, you know, a problem, whatever. And so it's inherently very versatile, rather than just being like, okay, you have to, there's a prescription and you do this particular movement and you do it, you know, this many times and you only ever do this and you do this together and you do that, whatever. You're doing it wrong. You're doing it wrong. And that's not right. You know, like, whatever. And so that there's so and also to be able to go, okay, for this person, they actually need to do this a little bit differently. They need a pillar here. They need this set there. They need to do a smaller movement.
They need to like change themselves in a little bit of position. So it's very responsive. And I think also to as a practitioner, it also helps you to be able to be responsive in that way. And they go, okay, this isn't quite doing what we want it to do. How do we modify it? How are we going to make this so it's effective for you so that you can feel and understand how it's working and that it is working, you know, so rather than just trying the same movement over and over again and not really getting anywhere. But I think that's what I like about it because in that sense, like, you can avoid those traps of being dogmatic, you can avoid those traps of being like, you know, this is the one way there is only this one way to do it and you just keep prescribing this my same way because you go once you understand the fundamental idea that's at the heart of panisomatic education, you can then apply it to anyone in any way based upon where they are in that moment in time. And then six months down the track, or a year down the track, you can do different things with them again, you know what I mean. And I find that and also to what I find is that, you know, there are some people for whom I've had a whole suite of exercises, the program that I've given them.
Sometimes they will do that whole suite of exercises every day. Sometimes we'll do that, you know, for a period of time and then we go okay, so if this problem starts happening again, you know that you do this one you know that you have this tool. If you know if your hip is getting tired again, if your neck is getting tired again, these are the ones that they that they know that you're all this is happening I know that I can then apply this one so they have them as tools that they can then use and they can mix and match. They can do one quick one if they just need to you know they can do the full thing if they need to do it, because they feel like everything is mounting up again so you have then this whole repertoire of things that people can do and tools they can do and if they, if you don't need probably, they understand, and they can pick and choose, and they can do it. But then I've also can be like, you know, down where I am.
And lots of people who are dairy farmers and laborers and stuff like that to do very intense physical jobs and are up at three o'clock in the morning because they're going to go milk cows and stuff and they do not have the time to do a daily practice that is you know like 30 minutes song or even 15 minutes on that. But if you can go. Here's one thing that I can give you to do. And you can just do it three times, and it will be enough to take away the pain and attention, and then you can go back out milk cows and do all of your work on the property. That's amazing they will take that and they will do that, you know, like so that's what I like the versatility of it, the fact that you can individualize it can be responsive to people in the moment and over time like I think that's like what's quite unique and what's really wonderful about Hannah some education is at all.
A; Awesome. Yes. And, you know, part of what's wonderful about that like curiosity versus judgment or, you know, having this deterministic view about the body or our bodies right is that when somebody is doing a movement like sale instructive movement and they do something totally different they do something else. I've started going, Oh, wow, that muscle that did that movement must be the one that we need to work with. That was your interpretation, you know, of the movement, you that that's the muscle that really was ready to do this that was actually so I like to tell people I'm like there isn't a wrong way to do this.
There's just, you know, looking at what muscle needs to be addressed first, you know, and with Hannah somatics we always work with the tightest muscle first, because you unravel that one and then all the other muscles are going to be able to move a little bit easier. You know, I just I love how deeply you've absorbed this and, you know, I tell that to people sometimes when they're asking about the program and they're asking about is it a certification, and I let them know you know I'm not really at the place right now that I'm ready to create a certification program to certify people in this work because it's extensive. And I don't want to give anybody something that subpar to tell someone they can become a Hannah somatic educator full blown in the way that I was trained in six months is not true.
You know, it's a three year program that I went through and it's, you know, nine day learning modules twice a year and then you do a bunch of clinical work in between those six month periods. You know, and so for me to create that is a is a feat. And I mean, I'm up to it.
I'm working on it. It's going to happen over time that, you know, my father and I will create something like that. But in the meantime, what I'm offering and what you've received very obviously is that if you do this with your own body for an extended period of time, you will know this in such a way as you can share it with others naturally. You know, whether you are a yoga teacher, whether you're a physical therapist, whether you're a mental health counselor or you know, a psychotherapist.
This has a lot of applications. And when you know it deeply in your own body. It's, it's better than having a paper that says you learned it at some point to be completely frank. I did not have a daily practice and I did really not even know what was possible for my own body in this work while I was in the training. While I was in the training, I was still struggling with that. I was still struggling with my ego. I was still struggling with wanting to identify myself as a yoga teacher and not some other thing. And I didn't get it until about a year after I had graduated from my training that I finally got myself into a daily practice and was like, Holy crap. This does particularly special that I didn't even really know, you know, and how many times you do that they go to yoga training and they deep dive into the yoga for, you know, a couple of days or a month and a half, you know, but they don't take it on for like half a year daily in their own body. This has a lot of applications. And when you know it deeply in your own body. It's, it's better than having a paper that says you learned it at some point to be completely frank. I did not have a daily practice and I did really not even know what was possible for my own body in this work while I was in the training. While I was in the training, I was still struggling with that. I was still struggling with my ego. I was still struggling with wanting to identify myself as a yoga teacher and not some other thing. And I didn't get it until about a year after I had graduated from my training that I finally got myself into a daily practice and was like, Holy crap. This does particularly special that I didn't even really know, you know, and how many times you do that they go to yoga training and they deep dive into the yoga for, you know, a couple of days or a month and a half, you know, but they don't take it on for like half a year daily in their own body.
But then they're transmitting it, they're teaching it to other people when they still are in a process of just in a process of discovery within themselves and there's nothing wrong with being in that process of discovery, but it's a lot different than having a foundation. Yes. Yes, I think that's true.
B: And like, yeah, you can. I think and again that comes back to the experiential learning aspect of it doesn't know, you know, because it when you fully absorb something like that and when you. It actually becomes a part like of who you are in some fundamental way. You were just going to, I think, transmit that a lot better to people is going to become this sort of natural thing that does. This is something I have to say that I also really like about the Hino semantics in the sense that and I like I would consider doing this. I'm going down the track. I, you know, I do a lot of professional development and that'd be that'd be down the track. I consider doing it more because of my curiosity than anything else like that. If you and your dad did one, I would totally do it. And if he came and did some hands on stuff, you know, somewhere down in the Southern Hemisphere, like I would be very interested to learn about the hands on techniques. So, like, I think that that would all be really useful. But what I really like about it was that, like, there wasn't this sense of like ownership about it, and you weren't like, no, you can't go forth and be doing this. Like, you know, like there's the generosity. There's a sense of like, yes, this is for everybody. Like everybody should be able to use it. Of course, you can start using it with your patients straight away. Like, of course, you should be like sharing this with people who do it. You know, like, I think that's actually a really valuable thing.
And I think that's another way that you avoid the guru trap and the dogma trap, you know, by going, this is this is just like an understanding of how your body works. It's a gift for everybody. Like it's everybody's birthright, you know, like, just go forth and share it with the world rather than being like, no, this is like, you know, Amy Takaya trademark. Like, you cannot be printed on my copyright. This sort of, this sort of like, you know, miserly kind of like petty view.
A: Of course, and there's this fine balance to have like, because I'm naturally a very generous person. And, you know, I can even liken that to my hyper mobility. Like I have been so empathic or whatever in the past that I don't know. And you know, we could totally talk about that in terms of like what, you know, certain kinds of trauma due to our nervous systems and then suddenly we don't have boundaries between like ourselves and others and if that stuff goes on early in childhood, like that's a whole another podcast, right. But I've definitely had to discover like boundaries within myself because I would just give and give and give. And so even though I'm not being proprietary or like miserly about the hand of semantics, I've had to learn through this process in the last 18 months, two years of doing this work that like, oh, with my own personal energy, and like the time and the energy that I spend on creating this on teaching on, you know, investing in the people that hire me. Like I do need to have some kind of like, you know, monetary and energetic boundary with that stuff, while also feeling free to share this technique far and wide, and let people know that it's there. You know, so it's been this really interesting balance of learning from me of how to have those appropriate boundaries, and still let myself be just as generous as I feel my heart wants to be, you know, let everybody know about it. I think and I think I think that's a really important point. I think there are a couple of things.
B: Strive me about that. So first of all, to like if you do not have adequate proprioception into reception, you don't have a sense of where your body is in space and you don't have a sense of boundaries. Like even before, you know, talking about trauma and stuff like that, you just you just sort of don't. And so part of actually developing better body awareness and better mind, emotional spirit, body connection, part of becoming more integrated is being able to have more of a sense of boundaries and having a better sense of in yourself when those boundaries are being infringed upon not that anybody's doing, you know, anything to live with. But when when enough is enough when you actually do need to draw some boundaries when you do need to take time to rest when you do need to pull back from it, you know, all that sort of stuff I think that's part of actually the practices that it gives you a better awareness of when you are being stretched too far, you know, literally and figuratively when you're being stretched too far when you actually need to that and I think that's that's actually really important as well too. And I think that that's been part of that's been important for me because I do, I see a lot of patients, you know, and it's a lot of people energy, which I love, but I also actually, I now much better at going. No, I need quiet time, like, you know, like, I, you know, like, when I get to the weekend and, you know, say for this weekend, this has been a fairly people heavy weekend but then this afternoon, I'm just going to completely relax I'm going to do the recording from yesterday, you know, like, I'm just going to have some restorative time, because I'm better able at being able to go.
I, I love all that stuff and I love that people energy I love going and teaching the teacher trainees like I love my job and the people, but that I also need time to recharge and I'm not going not going able to able that. I'm not going to be able be able be I'm not going to going to to do to do not going not going not going do that. I'm not going to going to going do that. do not going to be able to do that. do not going to be able to do that. do not going to be able be do that. do not going not going not to do that. I'm not going to be to to do that.
I'm not going not going not to do that. in terms of what you create and the time and energy you put into that, we live in a world where unfortunately, life energy is often measured in dollars. You need to make money in order to survive. This is a true thing. You need to be able to do that. That is important. You need to actually be able to value yourself appropriately and value your expertise appropriately and value what you're providing for people appropriately. That's really challenging. I'm in a good position because I don't have to make any of those decisions. I work for a practice and they decide how much to be charged and I do my job. I do not have to be confronted by any of that, which is a relief for me because I find that very challenging.
It is very challenging because especially if you're driven to do this because you want to help people. That's the basis of it. You want to share that with people. It can be very hard sometimes to put a monetary value upon that, but you actually have to.
A: It is very challenging because especially if you're driven to do this because you want to help people. That's the basis of it. You want to share that with people. It can be very hard sometimes to put a monetary value upon that, but you actually have to. Then I was teaching at a yoga studio, a somatic class once a week. My dad passed off to me because he was like, oh, they don't pay me enough. I don't want to teach it. I was like, I'll teach it for like $20 an hour and pay a babysitter $25 and not make any money. I was just feeling so generous with myself that I didn't realize, oh, this is actually kind of not smart. It was also just like wanting to share this work. People would come. I would have like two people in class because they didn't really know what it was. It wasn't a workout. Then I was teaching at a yoga studio, a somatic class once a week. My dad passed off to me because he was like, oh, they don't pay me enough. I don't want to teach it. I was like, I'll teach it for like $20 an hour and pay a babysitter $25 and not make any money. I was just feeling so generous with myself that I didn't realize, oh, this is actually kind of not smart. It was also just like wanting to share this work. People would come. I would have like two people in class because they didn't really know what it was. It wasn't a workout. Then I was teaching at a yoga studio, a somatic class once a week. My dad passed off to me because he was like, oh, they don't pay me enough. I don't want to teach it. I was like, I'll teach it for like $20 an hour and pay a babysitter $25 and not make any money. I was just feeling so generous with myself that I didn't realize, oh, this is actually kind of not smart. It was also just like wanting to share this work. People would come. I would have like two people in class because they didn't really know what it was. It wasn't a workout. I don't know because it didn't seem to be working that well when it was free. People were sort of not noticing this.
B: The thing that reminds me of is the story of when Vikram first started teaching yoga in LA and he did it for free. Have you heard this story?
You surely have. When Vikram first started teaching yoga, he just did it for free because that's what he knew. That's what his guru did. That's what he did. You share yoga with the world and you just teach and teach and teach and teach many classes and you give it away for free. Whether this is apocryphal or not, who can say? But the story that I've heard multiple times is that Shirley McClain, the actress, started doing the yoga and she came to me and she said, Vikram, you can't give it away for free. People will not value it. You have to give people an opportunity to pay for it and to value it in the way that our society knows how, which is through money, essentially. Then he started teaching yoga and people started to come over and really change it. That immediately just makes me think of that. Way back when Vikram was still young and green and new to it, that his impulse was to give this wonderful thing that he had away. But then he realized that he had to charge for it. That is important as well too in terms of valuing your expertise and your time and what you're actually providing and giving to people. One of the predominant ways that we show that we value something in our society, how it works, is by paying people for it. Because you need to be able to survive and to live. You can't just give your life away energy for free. You need to actually be able to be rewarded and to have something back for it.
There needs to be an exchange as well too in terms of that.
A: That's the investment that I realized because it took me such a great amount of time and pain and struggle to develop a daily practice, which is what ultimately changed my body on a very deep level. It's not to say that all the times that I was practicing before and all the sessions that I did during my training and stuff like that, they all had an impact, but the turning point was doing it every day for 15 or 20 minutes. That was what really started to shift things for me in a major way really deeply.
There needs to be an exchange as well too in terms of that. That's the investment that I realized because it took me such a great amount of time and pain and struggle to develop a daily practice, which is what ultimately changed my body on a very deep level. It's not to say that all the times that I was practicing before and all the sessions that I did during my training and stuff like that, they all had an impact, but the turning point was doing it every day for 15 or 20 minutes. That was what really started to shift things for me in a major way really deeply. Because then at that point things were just like a cavalcade of change just came because I'd been primed this way this whole time. But I asked myself that question, how do I get someone to do that? How do I get someone to commit to making a new habit in their body? Because we all have good intentions to create a new habit, but if somebody is financially invested in it, perhaps that will be the thing that encourages them to get the most out of it.
B: It's true. It's also in the same way that you buy gym membership. Well, lots of people leave their gym membership lapse, but if it's coming out every month, but I think it's the combination of the financial commitment, but also the accountability for having a regular meeting with someone who is actually there for them with you. It's true. It's also in the same way that you buy gym membership. Well, lots of people leave their gym membership lapse, but if it's coming out every month, but I think it's the combination of the financial commitment, but also the accountability for having a regular meeting with someone who is actually there for them with you. It's true. It's also in the same way that you buy gym membership. Well, lots of people leave their gym membership lapse, but if it's coming out every month, but I think it's the combination of the financial commitment, but also the accountability for having a regular meeting with someone who is actually there for them with you. It's a relationship as well as a financial commitment that makes it work. Does that make sense?
A: Oh yeah, because I've been thinking and I'm actually in process of creating like a self-paced course, not of the Radiance program particularly, but for the Cap Stretch series or for the basic fundamental and anti-semitic movements that can kind of get somebody going with the principles, you know, and offer it at a lower price point. But I don't want to just like do that and be done with it. I want to do that and then have an add-on of allowing them to join like a live six-week course twice a year. That's the idea I have right now at least, that they can buy this thing and they can try going through it and they can start getting the benefits from it. They can start experimenting with it. But then they also have this option for again at a reasonable price point to join a six-week live version of the course so that they can get feedback, so that they can answer questions, so that they can have group energy, so that they can get guidance, because there's so many things that they're not necessarily going to get just by going through some videos, even with, you know, the best way that I could possibly explain something. Someone's going to, you know, have a different experience than what maybe is intended, right?
B: That's right. And I also, as much as this is, you know, it's an internal practice and it's this sort of individual practice, but also part of the way that we understand ourselves and the world is through relationship. And I think that that is also what was really valuable about the Radiance Programme, was having the regular meetings and chances to opportunities to talk to you and also to the other people who were going through the programme, who were processing what was happening to them, and then being able to process what was happening within you in relationship to what they were saying as well too. I think that's an integral part of it, because we're not islands, you know, we're not like just like solitary little creatures, you know. So I think that is also an important part of it too, is that while a lot of the practice itself is this sort of solo internal thing, but there's an important part of the experience that is about being able to share that and being able to contextualise it through discussing it with other people and through doing it with other people and through hearing about other people's revelations and what they go through as well too.
And I think that that sense of community or that sense of growth through these little relationships with people is also important too. And I think in the same way that, you know, this would happen with yoga is that people, you know, teach yoga and far beyond just the physical changes that occur with people, people come and they'll say, you know, like, oh, my husband sent me to yoga today because he knew that if I didn't go to yoga, you know, like I was just, you know, I was going to be a crazy person, whatever it was. But also to that people would find that they had better relationships with their kids and with their partners, people would find that they would leave relationships that weren't saving them anymore.
And I think that that sense of community or that sense of growth through these little relationships with people is also important too. And I think in the same way that, you know, this would happen with yoga is that people, you know, teach yoga and far beyond just the physical changes that occur with people, people come and they'll say, you know, like, oh, my husband sent me to yoga today because he knew that if I didn't go to yoga, you know, like I was just, you know, I was going to be a crazy person, whatever it was. But also to that people would find that they had better relationships with their kids and with their partners, people would find that they would leave relationships that weren't saving them anymore.\
A: Right, right. We get more in touch with what's true. We get more in touch with ourselves. And then we start operating from that place instead of a place of being externalised and not really focused on what we're experiencing and what's going on inside of our bodies. Absolutely. You know, I would love, you know, as we're wrapping up here, if you would share a little bit about, you know, where you started with your neck with your back with your shoulders, when we were beginning the program, you know, what was partially motivating you was the pain relief, right, from the tension you were carrying. And then how does that look now? How does it look now to have this tool and how do you use it? Yeah, so I mean, when we first said that I had,
B: I had had lots of chronic sort of neck pain and back pain for a long time. And some of that is because, because I am hyper mobile and so hyper mobile people have a tendency towards having high paternity of movement muscles because the smaller stabilising muscles don't work so well. So I had a lot of just built up, high paternity of my neck muscles over time. But I'd also had, you know, significant trauma a few years ago when I broke my hip and that had set off a cascade of sort of muscle tightness in response to that that I could not get rid of. Like I could not get rid of it with yoga. I couldn't exercise it away. I knew that it was there. And I could feel that it was there and I could feel this sort of groin pain that I knew was not joint pain. I knew that it was hip flexor muscle related pain. But I just, I couldn't find anything that would actually get would actually get rid of it, which was immensely frustrating. And so, you know, one of the things that happened to me very early on was that I realised that I could modify that which had been bothering me for about five years. So I could actually get rid of that groin in kind of hip pain. And I could get and I could actually get rid of my habitual neck pain. And so from that I started to just be able to feel that I could walk more freely and I could move more freely. I knew that it was hip flexor muscle related pain. But I just, I couldn't find anything that would actually get would actually get rid of it, which was immensely frustrating. And so, you know, one of the things that happened to me very early on was that I realised that I could modify that which had been bothering me for about five years. So I could actually get rid of that groin in kind of hip pain. And I could get and I could actually get rid of my habitual neck pain. And so from that I started to just be able to feel that I could walk more freely and I could move more freely. This is done. And so, and then I will do my practice in bed before I go to sleep because I'll be like, Oh, okay, like it is like it's now it's sort of reached that point again where I can feel like it's building is going to be a problem. So for some of it, like for some of the pain, I feel like I've mostly cleared that and doesn't come back very much for some of it.
I haven't fully released that pattern like that pattern is just going to keep coming back. And so I need to keep like putting out spot fires until like I can recommit again to doing a daily practice that I know will like fundamentally change it over time. But the other thing is that I can now I can be forgiving with myself about that because because we're not perfect. You know, like, it would be nice if I could say, Oh, Amy, since I last spoke to you like I practice every day and I've complete but I just I just have it.
A: That's part of the learning that really is and that's what I try to like let people understand to you know is that this is a skill that you gather that you learn and you're never going to be starting at square one again. I haven't fully released that pattern like that pattern is just going to keep coming back. And so I need to keep like putting out spot fires until like I can recommit again to doing a daily practice that I know will like fundamentally change it over time. But the other thing is that I can now I can be forgiving with myself about that because because we're not perfect. You know, like, it would be nice if I could say, Oh, Amy, since I last spoke to you like I practice every day and I've complete but I just I just have it. That's part of the learning that really is and that's what I try to like let people understand to you know is that this is a skill that you gather that you learn and you're never going to be starting at square one again.
I haven't fully released that pattern like that pattern is just going to keep coming back. And so I need to keep like putting out spot fires until like I can recommit again to doing a daily practice that I know will like fundamentally change it over time. But the other thing is that I can now I can be forgiving with myself about that because because we're not perfect. You know, like, it would be nice if I could say, Oh, Amy, since I last spoke to you like I practice every day and I've complete but I just I just have it. That's part of the learning that really is and that's what I try to like let people understand to you know is that this is a skill that you gather that you learn and you're never going to be starting at square one again. Like your body has learned how to do this. And so anytime that you come back to the practice, even if it's been a few days, even if it's been a couple of weeks since you did like a deep longer practice for yourself. When you go into it, you're going to come into it with all the experience of doing this in the program. Like your body has learned how to do this. And so anytime that you come back to the practice, even if it's been a few days, even if it's been a couple of weeks since you did like a deep longer practice for yourself. When you go into it, you're going to come into it with all the experience of doing this in the program. pathways. And yeah, okay, if you don't use it, you lose it but you know your body is going to let you know that it wants this it's going to let you know, you know,
B: pathways. And yeah, okay, if you don't use it, you lose it but you know your body is going to let you know that it wants this it's going to let you know, you know,
A: So yeah, yeah. The patterns that you created when you you're going to get the strengthening without getting hyper tonic muscles that are, you know, still doing squats after you're done squatting.
B: That's right and it means that I don't get the dogs in the same way I don't get the day it on set muscle so like I you know it's actually really interesting how that works in terms of like, you do the strengthening and you get the strengthening effects but I actually don't get that sort of like gym related pain later on from doing it. But it's another way that it is just sort of woven into my life in a way that makes sense for me, rather than being like, oh I've got to do it at 6am every day like it's actually just not feasible for me to do it because I've got a shifting schedule and doesn't always work. But if I sort of go, I know that I'm going to be going to the gym three times a week I'm definitely going to be doing this, and then I'm going to be doing my little bits and pieces at work when I realize, oh I'm getting tense through my shoulders because I'm doing all this manual therapy. So like it's, it's, I'm able to weave it into my life in a way that is actually effective for me and allows me to be consistent without necessarily being perfect.
But still, consistency of it. And I think that's important but I think that's also like what's so great about it being so versatile is that you can be like, oh, I'm going to do like my 30 seconds let's sort my neck out, or I'm going to do 20 minutes, or I'm going to redo the the recording of a class that we've done at some other time and actually do like a full 90 minute sort of practice because I have the time and I feel like I need it. So, you know, like that, I really like that aspect of it and compared to say something like, you know, again, love Bikramirga, but compared to Bikramirga where I'd have to drive, you know, 20 minutes and be in a 90 minute class and then shower and then get out like so where I'd have to do like three hours, you know, essentially to do that practice. Like I can just be like, okay, 30 seconds here, 10 minutes there, need to do like an hour later, like there's just so much more versatility to it and I think that makes it so much more achievable. And so much more effective over the longer term, because you've got this versatility of ways that you can do the practice.
A: I love to, you know, I mean, we've done that, you know, in every iteration of the Radiance program, we do not as much of this as we do the lying down stuff because there's something about just letting your body be totally relaxed on the floor that's so therapeutic. But we do sitting movements, we do standing movements for you to feel into the way that this can be done in any position at any moment in time, so that exactly what happened, it can be integrated into your daily experience in your body, so that your body remembers to let go instead of what most people are experiencing is that their bodies are continuing to clench tighter and tighter as time goes on. Instead, your nervous system is initiated in the releasing of tension and the letting go process. And what I've discovered, I mean, on an experiential level, I knew this, but I recently put this into words, and it's an interesting thing, you know, to like think about on a neurophysiological level. If we do any movement, and this is more seen when you're like having someone lay on the floor, right, and say you have them do a so as release where they lift their straight leg and inch or so and then they super slowly bring it down. Their entire body actually works to do that. And some people will tell me, oh, my jaw clenched when I lifted my leg, you know, or my face kind of contracted when I lifted my leg, you know, or I felt my butt engage on that. Am I supposed to feel that? And I'll always tell them, yes, your entire body is doing this movement. Your entire body is involved in these movements. And that's really cool, because it means that the more and the more that you practice this, your entire body relaxes more and more and more. And that's actually one of the kind of secrets to this method in terms of how it is so effective for pain relief is that you just keep initiating release, release, release. And it always is releasing the whole body, even if those tight spaces are not quite ready to release yet. Over time with consistency, they start to release.
And that's what I experienced in a daily practice when I finally committed to that was that these stubborn areas that just weren't going away, you know, through the other ways that I was practicing just started melting away and being gone and not showing up everyone.
B: Yeah. And that's I think what's powerful about it is that you have a global effect as well as a local fact. You know, you work on the entire system because you're working with your nervous system. And so you can lower your overall kind of like nervous tone, essentially resting tone, as well as the sort of individual muscle groups in the areas like that's what's so profound about it. And I think to the concerns of like neurological rehab when we talk about neurological rehab, as well as having sort of specific, you know, intentional high repetition practice, you also need incidental practice throughout the day. Like that's also like a fundamental part of new rehab training. And that's where that thing of like, you know, and I think it's a people who have neck pain and whatever and work in offices is giving them chair exercises and things that they can just do throughout the day so that they have the combination of a dedicated practice time that is specific that, you know, is targeted that's repetitive but they also have this incidental practice throughout the day because that's actually how you change the pathways that's actually how you change the brain and nervous system over time is a combination of the two. Not just you go to a space dedicated to this and you do this practice but that it's interwoven through your life.
A: And that's what I experienced in a daily practice when I finally committed to that was that these stubborn areas that just weren't going away, you know, through the other ways that I was practicing just started melting away and being gone and not showing up everyone.
B: Yeah. And that's I think what's powerful about it is that you have a global effect as well as a local fact. You know, you work on the entire system because you're working with your nervous system. And so you can lower your overall kind of like nervous tone, essentially resting tone, as well as the sort of individual muscle groups in the areas like that's what's so profound about it. And I think to the concerns of like neurological rehab when we talk about neurological rehab, as well as having sort of specific, you know, intentional high repetition practice, you also need incidental practice throughout the day. Like that's also like a fundamental part of new rehab training. And that's where that thing of like, you know, and I think it's a people who have neck pain and whatever and work in offices is giving them chair exercises and things that they can just do throughout the day so that they have the combination of a dedicated practice time that is specific that, you know, is targeted that's repetitive but they also have this incidental practice throughout the day because that's actually how you change the pathways that's actually how you change the brain and nervous system over time is a combination of the two. Not just you go to a space dedicated to this and you do this practice but that it's interwoven through your life.
A: Yeah, absolutely. And I'm just so happy right now listening to you talk about this that like, I have like achieved that I have achieved that through the creation of this program because honestly, in the beginning it was all intuitive I was just like, I was going to be six months and I guess it's going to cost this much and I guess I'm going to do that. And then as I was running the first few rounds I'm like, Well, this is different than how I was doing it last time I'm going to just go with this, you know, and it's been an intuitive process but hearing, you know, this kind of feedback from you and listening to, you know, you talk about it I'm like, Oh, okay, like, there is like an intelligence to how this ended up being in this particular way.
And it's obviously linked to, you know, my own practice of panesomatics and how it's shown up in my body and how it's, you know, been intended by the people that trained me to be shared, you know, that showed up intuitively in my creation of this without, you know, specifically planning it. So, I'm happy about that. I'm very happy about that. Wonderful. Well, you know, it's been absolutely such a pleasure to catch up with you to talk to you to hear about some of the experiences that you've been having with this work. I'm so excited for how you'll continue to integrate this. I cannot wait to do a hands on session with you someday, because you'll get so much out of that and you'll add that to your repertoire of skills, because it's a beautiful thing. In so many words, we're basically with the hands on work, we're just increasing the bio feedback of what's actually happening, which I think I've explained to you before and what you've experienced a little bit with the jaw work, right, but there's a whole kind of like handling with it that is is very unique and special. So, something to look forward to everybody in the world who might be interested in that, getting rarer and rarer. There's not as many people out there doing the hands on work. So I'll definitely be considering Bali perhaps because that's close to you. Just come to the Southern Hemisphere.
B: That's right. You make it down, down south, I will come to you. Yeah, you don't want to do a California tour again and be the Aussie and you did that once upon a time. It's a good reason to go back to California. That's true. That's true. I would consider that as well. But yeah, definitely I and I'm really interested and excited to see what you continue to do as you build on what you've already achieved with teaching this and with bringing this to people. So, it's an exciting time for you and I'm, as I said before, I'm really proud of what you've been able to do and excited for you in terms of what you've been able to do.
A: Thank you. Thank you and thanks for coming. Like on the podcast sharing all of your knowledge and expertise. I've always enjoyed learning from you and I respect you so much as a yoga teacher and as a human and now also as a physical therapist and a, you know, purveyor of somatic education. And yeah, we'll definitely be in touch and if anybody wants to reach out to you if they have any questions or, you know, want to learn more about what you do, how could they reach you?
B: Probably the best thing to do is through my email address. I'm just trying to think about what's the best way for people to get in touch with me. Yeah, which I guess we can put in the show notes. Yeah.
A: Okay, wonderful. Well, thank you so much again and yeah, see you soon. Thanks Amy. Hello everyone. Thank you for listening to the Free Your Soma podcast. If you enjoyed this interview with Amanda and feel inspired to learn more about the Radiance program, please go to www.freeyoursoma .com. The next round starts November 4th. Podcast listeners will receive $500 off of the six month program. I'm so excited to see you blossom and shine as the soma of the being that you truly are. So much love to you.
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