Everything is connected, and everything effects everything else, including Zoga

Everything is connected, and everything effects everything else.

As much as I love doing hands-on, in-person, work with my clients, I also love doing movement work with clients and students.

When I work with clients/students, I encourage them to become more familiar with and aware of their Inner Landscapes - what they are feeling/sensing, when something might feel better or worse or "different", and what might make it feel better or worse or "different".

We do this by bringing our awareness to certain areas/sensations, and through mostly small, slow, repetitive movements/ daily activities.

This helps people to become more comfortable in their bodies, and reminds them that they have the ability to make positive changes for themselves.

I encourage my clients/students to bring this awareness into their everyday lives. We are not one thing when we are receiving a therapeutic bodywork session or taking a movement class, and then something else entirely when we are not: We are the same marvelously designed being, no matter what situation we are in.

Over the past 9 months, I have shifted my practice and teaching from hands-on, in-person, work to distance and online sessions/classes.

I have also been studying Advanced Myofascial techniques and Zoga (see below).

I have been excited and pleased with how well both the Advanced Myofascial and Zoga work mesh with the work I have already been doing, and how well they adapt to both the distance and online formats.

Zoga is a movement therapy, or "movement intervention" system, developed by Wojciech Kaczcowksi (also spelled Cacowksi). It is based upon Advanced Myofascial techniques of Structural Integration, and Yoga. It is designed both for a therapist to do during a hands-on, in-person, session with a client, and for a client to do on their own.

During Zoga classes we practice these "interventions" on our own bodies, so we can experience what they feel like, and how we might want to "tweak" them when we work with clients, etc., and so we can feel better :)

The focus in the classes since spring has included how we can work remotely - ie, via Zoom - with clients, teaching/guiding them how to do these "interventions" on their own.

Clients who do not want to participate in their session, who would rather come in and lay on a treatment table and receive a session while they "zone out", may not find this format appealing. (Although, they may find it more appealing now, 9 months into COVID restrictions......)

During these movement intervention sessions, the client needs to bring their awareness to what they are feeling/noticing/experiencing.

If you have done movement work with me before, this will be familiar to you.

I will guide the client verbally, instructing them to place their hands in certain places/their bodies in certain positions and move in certain ways.

These movements are generally small, and can include moving the gaze of one's eyes - if you have done any of the Vagus Nerve with eye focus work with me, this concept of moving your gaze will be familiar to you.

I will be watching the client and asking for verbal feedback as we work.

Yesterday I took the 2nd in a 3 part Zoga "Headaches" class.

After the first Zoga "Headaches" class, I noticed a near total improvement in an eye issue I have had, and tried to resolve, for many years.

After yesterday's class, I noticed improvements in a number of areas in my body, including my head, neck, upper and mid-back, pelvic area, hamstrings, feet; and a shoulder/scapula issue I have had, and tried to resolve, for over 10 years, seems to be gone.

Other people who took the class also reported that issues in various areas- shoulders, sinuses, eyes, arms, some nerve issues into arm and shoulders - reduced or resolved:

From a "Headaches" class.

Everything is connected, and everything effects everything else, including Zoga.