10/18/2023
This is something I just shared on MFR Insight which is a page for John Barnes myofascial release therapists and clients.
Hi, Tribe,
I’ve just returned from Healing Seminar in beautiful Sedona with my new husband and send all of you MFR3s and John F Barnes and staff my love!❤️❤️
I’m so happy and grateful that John is healing, getting stronger, and is continuing to teach and touch so many lives in a profound way!
I highly recommend taking Healing Seminar with your loved ones, spouse, or send your clients. The class not only teaches the principles and foundational techniques of John Barnes myofascial release, but you get the added bonus of John’s humor, wisdom, presence, music, and self healing techniques!
It’s also a great class to connect with your significant other on a deeper level.
There are many lay people who have no idea what “Channel 3” is or “how to get there” including my husband. He told me that he was uncomfortable with “unwinding” in the group setting and the noise was distracting. Yes, it is a bit weird and something we learn to accept as a natural part of authentic healing. I think we become more comfortable with it as we have more exposure to it. I told him to focus internally and to give himself permission to let his body take its brakes off and to feel whatever emotions may come up. It’s safe, learn to trust the body’s wisdom as it will never harm, and we must feel to heal.
One of the “Channel 5” lay people in the class brought up thinking about and connecting with his puppy on an emotional level which allowed him to have his first”unwinding”. This took me back to my first MFR 1 class in 2009. I was definitely Type A Channel 5 PT person with thoughts constantly going through my head. How does one RELAX and NOT THINK ABOUT ANYTHING? I thought maybe you go to your “Happy Place” like I would tell my patients as I was cranking on them and causing pain!😆
So I imagined my “Happy Place” on a tropical island drinking a rum drink out of a coconut shell, lying in a hammock listening to live Jimmy Buffet music….ahh, relaxing. Then I was swimming with the dolphins off shore and was joyous and feeling love. The dolphins swam away and I was sad and at this point shed a few tears(which I hardly ever did). Wow, I thought, I had my first ”emotional release”. The next day I talked to John about it and he told me that Channel 3 wasn’t about going to your “Happy Place.” It was about becoming very calm without any thoughts. I learned that I had to practice to get there. Once I felt that feeling of becoming very calm, I could get there much more quickly. John describes it as the prehypnagogic state. We’re almost asleep, relaxed, aware of what may be going on around us, but don’t care. It’s characterized by rapid eye movements like the dream state. Eventually I could get even more calm and go deeper. That’s where the profound happens… connecting with the Universal Energy which I perceive as God’s Love, our Essence, and sometimes our Power Animal.
During my second MFR class which was Fascial Pelvis, (I recommend that class to all therapists who work with anyone with back, sacrum, hip, or pelvic pain) I learned the techniques and received treatment to align the low back and sacrum. I had been experiencing low back, SI, and leg pain from an injury for two and a half years and told all of my practitioners (PT, Chiro, LMT) that my sacrum was torsioned and I couldn’t fix it myself. I couldn’t sit for more than a half hr. I was in constant pain and couldn’t run or bike. My low back and sacrum finally got back in alignment from the techniques of that course and my pain significantly improved and I even ran a half mile without increased pain. I started experimenting with allowing my body to take its brakes off (unwinding) and what that felt like. I became my own self-treatment Guinea pig as there weren’t other MFR practitioners in Iowa where I lived at that time.
For all of you therapists on the fence about taking Unwinding, do it! I was very scared about taking that class because I knew that people would be making noise, screaming, moving about wildly, and it was not in my Comfort Zone as a PT. I also didn’t know what would happen to me as a patient. It turned out that was one of the most profound classes I’ve attended on both a therapist and a patient level. What I witnessed as a therapist having the honor to assist my classmates through their healing process was amazing and I wouldn’t have believed it had I not been a part of it. It connects humans on a very deep level and I have the privilege of having some fantastic friends through this work! For me as patient, I quickly found out what ”therapeutic pain” was. I was lying on the table, feeling very hot, and it felt like someone was jabbing a hot knife in my back and twisting it. It was the same pain I experienced acutely with my injury. My rational brain thought..”there’s no one actually stabbing you in the back right now. That’s interesting. It sure feels real. Hmm.. it must be the subconscious bringing this pain to the Conscious Mind’s Awareness. This is what the body has been guarding and protecting against for the past two and a half years.” I found that as I breathed into the pain, the body softened and the pain went away. I had no pain when I got off the treatment table. I found that there are deeper layers and other traumas that may come up in subsequent sessions, but I never experienced that severe, sharp pain again. I also found that unwinding can be joyful, and laughing is also a form of release. The psyche wants balance. I’ve found that if you have no expectations about your sessions as a client, trust your body’s Innate Wisdom in knowing what you need and are capable of handling at this moment, feel your fear and emotions that may come up, trust your Practitioner, allow yourself to take off your brakes, and do self-treatment daily, you’ll become your Authentic Self and can assist your client’s journey to go deeper as well. I became a much different person through this work and got my active life back. I did a sprint triathlon about two years after starting John’s classes and hiked Grand Canyon Rim to Rim with a backpack the day before Healing Seminar. Enjoy and be grateful for life in the moment! Let your love shine!
As a therapist, do the above, learn how to become centered, take John’s classes, and treat your client with neutrality. As you practice, your palpation skills improve to be able to feel beyond your hands. You learn how to communicate with the client’s Inner Wisdom and follow their body. You learn the power of dialogue.
I am so grateful to John, his amazing therapists who give of themselves during our classes, and my fellow classmates for this authentic, healing work! Much love to you all!❤️❤️
Sue Bransky (now Austin), Reformed PT
All classes except Equine, repeats, former TA, grateful student
Healing Physical Therapy and Wellness
Brevard, NC and Horse Shoe, NC
