NCBTMB approved for 24.5 CEs
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CLASS 1 OF EMBODYING MUSCLES PART 1 IS FREE!
BONNIE'S 2022 WINTER AND SPRING SERIES
There is so much more to muscles than resistive exercises and stretching! Muscles have their own inner world and interrelationships that, when explored, open up another way of knowing and experiencing movement.
In this series of classes, we will learn to gently engage muscles from a feltsense of their inherent integrity, intelligence, and coordination. Bonnie’s perspective through all her work is that the embodiment of local tissues plays a foundational role in the emergence and expression of touch, movement, and consciousness. This series of classes will continue with this perspective as applied to muscles.
The body, movement, and consciousness are explored from the direct experience and action of the muscles themselves, not just from the brain telling the muscles what to do.
When muscles are engaged in this way, movement is automatic, spontaneous, and specific and body tone becomes more balanced. This approach gives rise to vitality, strength, flexibility, flow, and ease, and informs and engages a whole-body response through the fascial matrix.
Exploring the body at this level gives us a path to directly connect with the ‘mind’ of muscles and provides a dynamic foundation for brain-oriented, consciously-directed movement.
“A whole new way of understanding and sensing muscle and movements! It has expanded my horizons in ways I never would have imagined. And it has changed the way I now approach movement. It feels revolutionary."
— Anonymous
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This series of classes is for you if you would like to learn how to:
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Increase vitality, strength, flexibility, flow, and ease through muscles
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Improve comfort in muscles
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Relieve excessive tension, tightness, strain, weakness, and/or exhaustion in muscles
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Move more naturally with greater ease and skill
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Dialogue with muscles and establish a direct relationship with them
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Embody and understand from inner experience how muscles engage in both stillness and action
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Expand awareness through the inherent consciousness of muscles
It will help you:
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understand how muscles function in embodied integrated movement
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change the way you think about and engage with muscles
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maintain a stable, balanced posture
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transmit a local force throughout the body via the fascial matrix
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coordinate the muscle line of force with the spatial integrity of the bones, joints, ligaments, and fascia
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calibrate peripherally the force needed to move against a given resistance
“I gained a much deeper understanding of the detail of muscle initiation, form and function that more fully informs my own movement and helps me help my students and clients. The concept of currenting in the muscles and how this works is a fresh perspective on energetic flow in the body that really opens up my relationship with my own movement and subsequently the movement of my students and clients."
— Melitta |
As we journey through the world of muscles, you will discover how:
- muscles on both sides of a joint need to be active in balanced postural tone and movement
- primaries (agonists) partner with complements (antagonists)in the execution of integrated movement
- shortening (concentric) contractions and lengthening (eccentric) contractions vary in the presence of gravity and spatial intent
- isometric contractions relate to postural tone and stillness
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sense organs (proprioceptors) in muscles and tendons can self-calibrate and play a role in the initiation of movement and establishment of postural tone
- muscle complexes can be sequenced through a process of muscle currenting
- small muscles passing over one joint coordinate with larger muscles passing over more than one joint for ease, full range of motion, strength, and coordination
- sense of position (proprioception) relates to the sense of movement (kinesthesia) as dynamic proprioception
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paired A-muscles and B-muscles engage the fascia into a whole-body movement with spatial intent
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sequencing of A-muscles and B-muscles integrates movements in opposite directions into a single action and increases the range of motion in both directions (4 stages of a muscle action)
- in efficient movement, every muscle has the potential of serving eight different roles or functions, regardless of their specific action (8 functions of a muscle)
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physically engaging 3-dimensional space integrates the muscle/fascial matrix (spatial aspects of movement)
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proprioceptors: intrafusal muscle fibers (nuclear bags and nuclear chains) and Golgi tendon organs calibrate and guide the strength, length, and quality of a muscle contraction and integrate with the fascial matrix
- embodying the embryological development of muscles and tendons illuminates how tendons direct the action of muscles
These principles can be applied to any muscle in the body. This series of classes focuses on the iliopsoas complex and muscles of the upper and lower limbs.
Join Bonnie for this exciting, continuing journey into embodying muscles and discovering movement that is easy, fluid, flexible, powerful, and fun!
“I appreciate what Bonnie said – it's not strength through muscle strength, but it's strength through finding the flow of postural tone. I love that this work is rooted in deep anatomy and physiology as it gives me a clearer pathway to enter into a movement experience but it also gives me concrete information to share with clients.”
— Viseuth
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CLASSES
Bonnie may return to the same material in some classes and present it again from different perspectives. The specific principles explored in each class can be very helpful, even life changing. Underneath the principles, Bonnie offers a way to learn a way to access the body and mind, a way to relate to yourself and others that emerges from the deeply rooted knowing of one's own cells.
This way of learning is not a one-time exposure to a piece of information – it is a practice in a way of perceiving through which learning is from each person's own cellular experience. Exploring the material outside of classes is an important way to continue your practice and deepen your embodiment and understanding.
Bonnie shares insights and principles drawn from her 50 years of pioneering work in an embodied approach to anatomy, developmental movement, embryological development, and psychophysical integration. In each class, cellular consciousness guides the explorations.
The material presented in this series can be applied to any practices involving touch and/or movement. There are no prerequisites for taking these classes.
Participants should have some experience with movement practices (dance, yoga, Pilates, martial arts, etc.), somatic approaches, bodywork, and/or psychophysical disciplines. No previous experience with Body-Mind Centering® is necessary.
Join Bonnie with a sense of curiosity and inquiry about the body, movement, and consciousness.
REGISTRATION INCLUDES
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12 class recordings (87 - 117 minutes each)
- 1 supplementary class recording (123 minutes)
- 35 downloadable documents and illustrations
A list of the material Bonnie presented in each class can be found on Embodying Muscles Part 1 and 2 Class Index.
“I have become aware of a depth within my muscles that was previously hidden.”
— Wendy |
