Keeping a Beginner's Mind

When I started my training in Bodywork, my teacher Dave said, “In the expert mind the possibilities are limited, in the beginner's mind the possibilities are endless. Keep a beginners mind!”

At the time, I thought to myself, “What do you mean? I want to know it all already! Take my beginner mind and download all your expert wisdom!” But as time went by, I started realizing what he meant.

When people keep a beginner’s mind, they will remain open to new opportunities, continue to evolve and always strive to get better. We all have things that we are interested in, and knowledgeable about, but there is always more to learn.

Most life practices are LIFE practices, and should be mastered and evolve through time and other experiences. People that “know it all” will not grow, and having that type of mentality is a turn-off to others. Let yourself accept new information from all directions. In Hebrew, we say, “a wise man learns from every men,” it stimulates the mind and helps build a more complete heart and well-rounded person. Whether you want to learn about ways to combat shoulder pain, arthritis or underwater basket weaving – keep a beginner’s mind.

Going back to my training, one of the most inspiring students I met at school was an 83 years old lady, and she had just started 1000 hours of HHP training. Lifetime learners are the most educated, knowledgeable and personable types of personalities. They are always striving to get better, remain busy and stimulated with new projects and information. Challenging the mind that way is the best strategy to remain young even when your body ages. Your mind is just like anything else, if you don’t use it, you lose it.

If people keep a beginner’s mind, they will remain open to new opportunities, continue to evolve and always strive to get better. We all have things that we are interested in, and knowledgeable about, but there is always more to learn.

Watsu: Part 2

The experience of Watsu can be very powerful and liberating, the practicioners roll is to support and facilitate the moves, but not to control or to “intervene” with the need, the rhythm and the tempo of the clients body. Being in this neutral environment allows the nervous system to let go and “magic” begins.

The “magic” I talk about is what I feel both in the practicioner side and as a receiver. Its when the body is in flow with breath, the water suggests in motherly manner that we can let go of the knee or shoulder and the body and it allows soft shifts to happen. In some other aquatic styles we get in the water in a beautiful dance of breath patterns and movement through the water, once again, the experience of breath exploration is very expensive and freeing.

If anyone is interested in Watsu, your local Ocean Beach Massage Center, That’s Your Body offers these sessions. Just ask Gal for more information and when you can get a session scheduled.

Watsu: Part 1

The quickest and most relaxing checkout I’ve ever experienced. Watsu is a combination of body work, trigger points and therapy – but it’s in the water. It’s great for back pain san diego, neck pain san diego or any chronic pain. The body is in a completely neutral environment, you are not affected by gravity, the water is body temperature so you are not cold or hot, but perfect. The water is serenated with a light salt complex, and you are guided through the water by a Watsu practicioner.

Regardless of what body type you have, everything is evened out in the water. Since gravity is not an issue, the body can stretch and lengthen as it is being dragged through the water. And once you are into the session and relaxed, part of your head and ears fall below the water so noise reduction becomes another factor in the relaxation.

All along the way, your senses are distorted. You don’t hear anything since your ears are under the water. As you inhale and exhale, your body sinks and rises, which in a way, brings you back into touch with your body. The entire process and experience can feel disorienting, but that feeling soon turns into RE-ORIENTING. It re-orients you back to where life started – in the womb. Between the warmth of the water, lack of gravity and noise, and the nurturing nature of being held in someone’s arms – you get taken back to the part of your life spent in the womb.

Herbs: The Everything Solution

Natural herbs are really the “Everything solution.” If something requires soothing, is infectious, soars, or anything that would require anything that needs to be clean. This mix of lavender, garlic and mint is my cure-all. Sage, Rosemary and many other herbs have so many healing properties in them, and they have been used for 1000s of years to treat all sorts of illnesses and wounds.

There is also a way to test what herbs can work for your specific body. By holding herbs in your hand and paying attention to the reaction from your body will let you know if that herb is optimized for you or not. This test is used by nutritionists, acupuncturists,  alternative healing professionals, etc.

Nutrition: Part 3

Eating healthier doesn’t mean that you can’t eat the things you want, but in general, eating out is not good for you. Eliminate eating out, and when you do, you will notice that there is a different kind of energy and attitude that gets into the food when you eat at a restaurant. When you eat food prepared from a cook that is being paid by the hour and hates his job, it tastes different than food being prepared by someone that cares about you, enjoys cooking and does it for free.

For the most part, all of the spices, herbs and seasoning are healthy for you. Growing your own herbs can change everything about your diet and your intentions with food. Herbs taste good in food and are important for healing the body.

Eating healthy is important for you, but it is also important for pets and animals you are responsible for. Not only eating healthy, but using natural herbs and roots to heal pets when they get sick or injured. Lavender, for example, can heal all sorts of things. A couple of years ago, my dog had a fox hair stuck in her rib cage. I took her to the vet, and he checked her out. At this point, it was swollen and infected. After an examination, the Vet decided they needed to put the dog to sleep with anesthesia, and require surgery to get it out. On top of that risky suggestion, it will cost $400. After shaking my head in surprise, I said, "I’ll think about."

After that, I went home, went out to my garden and picked some Lavender. I mixed it with some garlic in a teapot, and when boiled, Lavender can act as a healing pad. I put the pad on my dog’s stomach, 3x a day, for 3 days. By the end of the third day, the dog was completely healed. No pain whatsoever. And this is after a veterinarian told me that my dog had no choice but surgery. There was absolutely no way that her healing process would have been that easy with a surgery. They would have cut her open, she would have taken months to heal and adjust to the cuts, and that is assuming she would be able to get up from the surgery – there was a chance that she wouldn’t get up. 

Natural herbs are great for all of us – humans, dogs and pets of all kind.

Nutrition: Part 2

When thinking about nutrition, preparation and choice of ingredients is also important. That's a good reason to prepare your own food, doing so will give you control and clarity on what you put in your body. When I cook, I can modify ingredients to healthier ones, I can add herbs and spices that adds lots of flavor to the food and promote health in the body (will be discussed in future posts) and I can add the most important part, my love and intention to nourish my body and the bodies of my family and friends! You wont get that from your average line cook (no offense guys...). Everything that we eat was alive at one point, so for the most part, we should treat it with respect.

There are so many diets and schools of thought when thinking about nutrition. And all of them are right in their own ways. On top of that, there are so many ways to market food and types of diets – based on body type, based on eating habits, based on health goals, etc. Everything changes depending upon your specific body type and metabolism.

Regardless of what type of cleanse, diet or nutritional goals you are considering, being realistic about your body and its health is the most important part. Keeping track of how much you eat, what you eat, and how it makes you feel will help you determine what food works for you as an individual. Consider everything, and be open to successful strategies, but don’t get caught in ideas about “the right way to do it” LISTEN TO YOUR BODY!

Nutrition: Part 1

Keeping track of your food and having awareness to what we put in our body is essential for our health. Logging your food intake, even for 3-4 weeks, is one easy way to keep track of what you are feeding your body, and understand the motivations behind eating. You would be surprised at how many times you go to eat out of boredom, stress, emotional state or just habit. But are you really hungry?

We prioritize eating for so many things that are unnecessary – social events, celebrations, and more. There are so many habits around food, especially here in the United States – it’s such a cultural thing. When people talk about doing cleanses and prioritizing food, they also talk about up-coming holidays like Thanksgiving, Christmas, summer BBQs, etc. They have to schedule their nutritional efforts around pre-existing commitments.

Furthermore, the more natural and unprocessed the food is, the better. Everything that has been on this planet and not transformed into fried chips and put into a plastic bag – if your food has been handled, processed, bleached, painted, dehydrated, packed and bagged, you probably don’t want to eat too much of it. Generally, the closer the food is to its original form, the higher the nutritional value. And when things are natural, they are usually already in their natural serving sizes. We as Americans just like to Super Size our meals, and don’t think about proportions at all.

Swimming

Swimming is one of the best exercises for the body. It is very meditative, zero-impact on the body, all of the joints are being supported with long, lengthening strokes and it allows you to optimize your breath.

Swimmers have very long, lean muscles, because swimming is a very congruent way to strengthen the body. And swimming is a great method to speed up your metabolism, swimmers burn off everything they eat.

The quality that the water brings to your body is unmatched. Being in the water makes people comfortable. It allows people to go back to where they are from, all the way back in the womb, and because our bodies are 75-80% water, it is a natural environment for us. As a massage therapist in ocean beach, I always enjoy working with swimmers!

Finding your Breathe: It means more than just Massage

Breathing is something that we do all the time, every day, and we do it without even thinking about it. Most the time our breath is shallow and just enough to keep us alive. When the brain and our body does not get enough oxygen, a signal of stress is send through the body, our most essential need is lacking. This will create anxious feeling in the body and will take us out of our “center”.

Even as an Ocean Beach Massage Therapist that is a trained expert in body psychology, sometimes I catch myself cought in the moment and my breath pattern is shallow and restrained. Even though I tell my clients to do it all of the time, it is easy to get distracted.

So, when you get stressed and feel like you are beginning to become overwhelmed, stop and take couple of minutes to focus on finding your breathe, let it climb slowly up and down your spine and regain your composure. It will help calm the situation, and making it a habit will help your quality of life in the long run.

 

One day to not worry about anything

We are wired to make decisions every day. Some decisions are small and don’t make a difference in anyone’s life but our own. Other decisions are for business or our jobs, effect many people and come with a lot of stress.

One assignment I like to recommend to my clients, is to take a day a month when you give away the “keys.” Allow other people in your life to make the decisions for that day. Everything is out of your responsibility, not only out of your responsibility, it is forbidden to you for this one day. When we realize that we don’t have to be in charge, and that the sun will keep shining without us, the birds will keep chirping, and everything goes-on without us.

This is a great exercise that forces us to relax, worry less, reduce stress and go-with-the-flow. When things come up throughout the day, notice your instinctual reaction to try to take over or make a decision, and resist that urge. Just by doing this once a month on a day where you don’t have to worry about work, running errands, providing for other people, you will increase your quality of life.

Our mind is a decision making machine. We are constantly being introduced with options, stimulation and dilemmas to our nervous system (our mind is the collective knowledge that our nervous system holds) and as those being presented, the respond in the tissue is contraction (tension in the body).

Being a Massage Therapist and Owning your own Business

As we are wrapping up 2011, it is still a very interesting time to be a business owner. The economy is still fairly unpredictable in most industries, the unemployment rate is as high as it has ever been, and millions of people are just trying to “hold on” and “survive.”

As a Massage Therapist in Ocean Beach that owns a Massage center and work with other massage therapists, I know first-hand that business comes in waves, and managing your business right and being prepared for those slow days/weeks is very important to small business owners. Following the pattern of your practice and preparing yourself with promotions and specials for those days will help stay busy. Also those times allow self care and rest that are very crucial in our high stress modern life.

Massage is a very demanding career to have, both physically and mentally, so working 9-10 hours a day, 5 days a week is not realistic. And if you want to be in this industry for the long-run, you have to setup boundaries early and take care of yourself as well. Support work (Yoga, Thai chi, meditation and other exercises) is very simple way to keep your body healthy grounded and open. Healthy body mechanics is a key for maintaining the body healthy through the work. LOTS of bodywork and massages are also big part of it.

Couples Yoga

A very interesting yet less recognizable form of Yoga is Couples Yoga. Even people that have been doing Yoga on a regular basis for many years have never tried couples yoga. It is a very eye-opening experience, and there are many exercises throughout the 2-hour practice that are difficult. One is to stare directly into the eyes of your partner for 10 minutes and not talk, touch, or try to communicate anything to them. Just stare blankly at each other, become completely vulnerable and “be in the moment.”

Another exercise is to sit across from your partner, and be brutally honest with yourself and tell them three things that you are afraid of. Whether it be physical fear, something that may or may not happen in the future, or something that you have never told anyone before. This can be a very daunting task for some, but it also promotes self-realization and increased self-awareness.

At That’s Your Body, we encourage all activities that promote self-realization and increased awareness. We want you to be in-tune with your body, and understand what it’s needs are. Are you listening to your body? Make an appointment at Ocean Beach massage and let Gal put you in-touch.

That’s Your Body’s massage therapist helps a local Rehab Center

I work at a local rehab center twice a week, and I really enjoy being one of the favorite things that people look forward to in the program. After working with people for a short time, it is easy to discover the enormous progress people can make simply from removing them from a toxic environment.

When you add all of the other factors, like counseling, personal training, yoga, nutritional advice, psychological sessions, self-discovery sessions and finally MASSAGE - it is very humbling to see the way that people grow. It is extremely rewarding.

I have worked with many people going through withdrawals and de-toxing their bodies. And even though the healing process, like any other, involves occasional relapse and some people have to start the process all over again. And while it can be frustrating to go start all over, they are ALWAYS happy to get a massage and relax for an hour with me. And even though they are not happy to return to rehab and start over with their program, they are ALWAYS happy to get a massage and relax for an hour. That’s how a small Massage center in Ocean Beach can make a big difference in an individual’s life.

Physical Therapy + Massage

That’s Your Body, a local Ocean Beach massage center, is currently working with a client that recently had ACL/Miniscus surgery, and he is now doing physical therapy 3x a week along with 1.5 hour massages once a week. That’s Your Body’s ocean beach massage therapist helps stretch out the muscles that are trying to re-build, while taking a lot of the pressure that is being put on his other leg to compensate.

Ocean Beach Massage by itself is extremely effective, but when it is combined with physical therapy, personal training, yoga or acupuncture, it can save your body down the line. Like massage, physical therapy after ACL surgery is a slow and steady process, but it helps teach patience, determination and focus. 

The client also realized the need for bodywork on his upper body through the injury to his lower body. In addition to his good leg taking a lot of the brunt of the load, his upper body is also compensating for his lower body that is protecting itself. By walking on crutches, using rails while walking up and down stairs and limiting his exercise to his upper body has significantly overstressed his shoulders, neck, arms and chest.

 

Water

 Our body is made of water, 75-80% of it is water. Most of this water is basically in your muscles, and we use this water throughout the day to function and get around. People don’t drink as much as they should, even though the body requires a lot of water to function properly. We are basically all walking around every day with completely dehydrated bodies.

When we are dehydrated, the quality of the muscles is lowered, and they become “crispy or crunchy.” Usually, as a rule of thumb, we need to drink 1 liter of water for every 50lbs. of body weight. So a 200lb. man needs to drink 4 liters of water every day to be appropriately hydrated.

Stress is also an issue that requires us to drink more water. The more stressed people are, the more junk food people eat, and the more active they are in general, the more our bodies respectively require even more water than other people. More water means better circulation, more fluid that will spread appropriately throughout the body, and finally more oxygen in your body to optimize our breathe. Generally speaking, our breath is short and shallow, so hydrating the body energizes us, creates more clarity in the brain and increases our lung capacity.

Water cleanses the body, and after an ocean beach massage, it’s important to drink a lot of water because all of the toxins are loose and floating around. Hydrating the body in general and even more after a massage helps water soluble toxins to be excreted naturally. It helps flush you out. Water is a necessary medicine provide to us by nature, so DRINK MORE OF IT. EVERY DAY.