Massage therapy can help you find movement patterns in your body that are creating painful or uncomfortable symptoms. When you get a headache, do you often reach for an over-the-counter pain killer? When your shoulders and neck are tight from work, do you attempt to stretch them out or even schedule a massage for yourself? If you are like the majority of Americans, you might experience these among many other uncomfortable symptoms, but never really address the cause of the issue. The pain symptom is a lagging sign. By the time you experience pain or discomfort, you have missed warning signs that have been trying to get your attention. Imagine taking a road trip across the country and being astonished that you have driven several days in the wrong direction before realizing you need to redirect course! Taking a pain killer for a headache can be likened to taking a nap at the wheel while still driving in the wrong direction. In other words, the pain is telling you that movement systems are not functioning well way back when, but instead of addressing the movements that are creating the pain, many people seem to be unaware of their own ability to resolve these symptoms.
I have several massage therapists in rotation. Since my job depends so heavily on my own body’s precision and its ability to endure, I’m often getting it checked out on a massage table, rearranging things under my hood for a more optimal road experience. Recently, I was introduced to a particular technique by a massage therapist named Brave Legend. Yes, Brave Legend is his name, and Brave Legend (I just like to say it) has left a great impression on me by using a modality called Neurokinetic Therapy.
The journey into body awareness is a life-long path. Fit people are still learning. Indeed, I am still learning. On Brave’s table, he performed Neurokinetic Therapy on me to find areas in my motor unit recruitment that are lacking and being inhibited by other areas that dominate. In other words, he uses a series of muscle tests that reveal patterns that are not optimal for human movement. These revealed patterns are culprits in creating the nagging shoulder pain that I get sometimes in my right shoulder and neck. After revealing the patterns, he does an intensive release on the trigger points that are overactive, and by the end of the session, full motor unit recruitment had been restored in the areas that were inactive.
Think of motor unit recruitment as an orchestra. When you move in any kind of way, whether jumping, sprinting, or even sitting and typing, you are using various patterns of electrical signals. Imagine an orchestra in which the cellos are trying to play the parts of the violins, the string bass is assuming the role of the flutes, and the trumpets are taking over the bass drum’s percussive strikes. There would be a mess. That’s essentially what is happening when you move in predictable patterns over and over again on a daily basis. There are a series of impulses directed by the brain that tell each little area of your body how to move, in what order, and to what range of motion. When you stay out of balance, your movements become a mess on the inside. As a result, you feel a symptom, a tight neck, a headache, a dull ache in the shoulder, a low back that won’t let you relax in any position. The worst part about the dysfunctional movement is that it is largely invisible to most people. On the outside you might look like you are stabilizing your spine or moving correctly, but inside you are using the wrong order of command. You need a director to straighten out the signals and reassign roles. Neurokinetic Therapy takes the role of this director.
After Brave helped me find an area in my back that was inactive, I could understand more about how I actually created the symptoms I was feeling before seeing him. After the session, I was given some assignments to work on to restore motor function in weak areas. Brave also uses a variety of other massage techniques and is a wonderful resource to integrate into your wellness practice. Check out his website and book an appointment. I highly recommend him!
http://bravelegend.com
