Metaphors for Healing

Many years ago, I had the opportunity to visit the National Zoo in Washington, DC.  While there, I made sure to visit the Great Ape House exhibit which houses a large variety of ape species from the very small (lemurs and gibbons) to the incredibly massive (orangutans and gorillas).  Much to my eventual dismay, the sign indicating the “Do’s and Don’ts” within the Great Ape House was hidden from view behind some very large tropical plants.

Coming around one corner, I was met with the largest ape I had ever seen in my life – Baraka, the four-hundred-pound silverback gorilla – who was busy munching on a piece of what looked to be bamboo.  I stared in fascination at this massive creature, completely in awe at the gentleness he was exhibiting.  Baraka would periodically look over at me before going back to his bamboo.  This is where the sign for the “Do’s and Don’ts” would have come in quite handy.  Not even thinking about it, I had been staring at this giant silverback for a good five minutes which, any sensible person would tell you, is a sign of aggression.

I watched as Baraka put down his treat, slowly raised himself up and stalked towards the thick transparent front to his enclosure.  I immediately felt a tightness in my chest, a primal fear that most of us in our civilized world have forgotten, the fear of the hunted.  As he approached, I felt frozen in place, unable to retreat, nearly unable to breathe.  He balled his fist and THUMP! He punched the window, showing his strength and reminding me of proper primate etiquette. Baraka then quietly returned to his snack.

This story is important to illustrate the power that Baraka, the four hundred-pound silverback gorilla, possessed.  And it is that level of power that leads us to our newest Metaphor for Healing.

Imagine you were having a tug-of-war game with Baraka. Better yet, imagine that Baraka was letting you have a tug-of-war game with him! There’s no way that you could overpower the great ape, we’re just not built for that. Thankfully, Baraka has only been holding steady, he has yet to exert his full force, yet you remain stuck. Now imagine if you gave some slack to the rope. You could imagine Baraka possibly getting bored with the game and going off to look for something else to do, like finding a snack.

I liken this to the tug of war between your conscious and subconscious mind. This tug of war game is what is keeping you stuck in pain and dysfunction. In an effort to protect you following injury, your subconscious mind begins to cordon off the traumatized regions, which leads to a tightening of the soft tissues in the area and altering how we move. These subconscious “bracing” or “holding” patterns can keep us stuck in our injury, constantly fighting against Baraka, the four hundred-pound silverback.

John Barnes, the Father of Myofascial Release, speaks often about the “800-pound gorilla,” meaning our mind, specifically the subconscious mind. In this article from Massage Magazine (https://www.massagemag.com/therapeutic-insight-the-john-f-barnes-myofascial-release-perspectivetraumatic-imprints-part-1-11998/), John explains the reason that so many therapies, while well-intentioned and logical, ultimately fail due to the lack of understanding of this deep and reflexive protective mechanism.

The gentle pressures and stretches utilized in MFR assist in decreasing this subconscious protection by not pushing past the barriers set by the mind, much like giving in to Baraka in the tug of war game. When the mind can begin to soften its protective hold on the physical body, reducing these bracing/holding patterns, the structural changes imparted by MFR and the increased flexibility and strength built through your exercise program can finally work the way they were intended to, leading you closer to the pain-free and active lifestyle you hope for.

All you have to do is let Baraka win!

One of the main roads leading to The Center in Langhorne was closed this past week.  As I drove in each day to the office, I was surprised by how little it seemed to affect the traffic patterns.  While there were some more cars in certain areas, traffic still moved at a consistent pace – very little interruption or delay.

This got me thinking, as most things seem to do, about the human body.  We can look at how detours affect traffic to gain a new perspective. A perspective on how the continual process over time of injury and compensation within our bodies leads to the pain and dysfunction that is currently plaguing us.

Imagine one main road being closed in a town. For the most part, traffic will still move along at a good pace – very little interruption or delay.  Now imagine another road being closed and the detour route now having to be detoured around.  At this point, traffic would begin to back up more. More delays, more frustration. Finally, a third road is closed, and traffic is stopped dead – gridlock.  There are only so many roads for cars to drive upon.

This is the state that most of you find yourselves when you first come to Inner Circle.

For decades, your body has endured injury: big injuries, small injuries, bumps, bruises, stresses, too many activities, not enough activity – the insults and injuries of a lifetime.  Life injures us, plain and simple.  Ideally, the body can heal and self-correct a great many of these injuries and return us to a state of balance.  In practice, the body is often attempting to detour around the traumatized region.

This detouring sets up a compensation – some type of movement pattern or holding pattern that alters how the body moves. Then another injury or insult, another stress, another week of overtime work – the body begins to detour and detour and detour until, eventually, gridlock.  There is nowhere else the body can hide these cumulative effects from you.

This is precisely why the process of physical therapy at Inner Circle is a process.  We are neverdealing with a single injury or even a single traumatic event.  You walk through these doors carrying your whole life, every day and year written into your tissue – a living autobiography.

By utilizing the hands-on approach of Barnes Myofascial Release, we are able to begin the process of removing these detours within the body.  As these detours are removed, the process of relearning can begin to occur. We achieve this by beginning to increase flexibility and strength that your body has been lacking for a long time – returning you to a state of balance where the body’s own inherent self-correction can begin to take over.

Just as roadwork will be completed, so too will you heal.  There are no guarantees in this life, but we can be assured of one thing: if you work at something, it will improve.  Who knows how far or how fast these changes will happen but, change is inevitable – the only constant that we can rely on.  Don’t worry, we’ll be with you each step of the way.

Life is full of teachable moments if we only pause for a while to reflect on the lessons.  In this way, as we prepare for the annual rite of “Spring Cleaning”, let’s all dive a bit deeper with our continuing series, Metaphors for Healing and the Tale of the Junk Closet.

Imagine that you have a party planned for the weekend, but you haven’t had a chance to properly clean the house and prepare it for your friends’ arrival.  What to do? Many of us might rely on our “junk closet” – get all that mess pushed into the closet and worry about it after the party.

The party is, thankfully, a great success and you have every intention, as you head off to bed, to clean up the next day.  However, the busyness of our lives doesn’t always concern itself with our intentions and schedule, does it?  So, while you may get the party leftovers cleaned up, the “junk closet” will just have to wait.  And wait. And wait.

Then another party, another quick shoving of everything into the closet until it is full to bursting. At some point, you can’t escape it any longer and you set about to cleaning it out.  As suspected, there is SO MUCH STUFF!  As soon as you open the door, the first wave falls on top of you… this is going to take some time.  The good news?  You can clean it out and reorder your house, but it will be a process.

The process of physical therapy is no different.  The constant cycle of injury, stress, repetitive movements, compensatory patterns and the resultant restrictions and weakness within the myofascial system is akin to shoving everything into your body’s “junk closet”.  In a very real way, the restrictions within the myofascial system are like a closet; the body, in an effort to protect the traumatized area as well as provide support and stability, solidifies itself into a restriction.

At some point, when the symptoms become bad enough, when the pain and loss of motion interfere with our work and play enough– we must finally get to cleaning out the closet.  And just like the metaphorical “junk closet”, our own closet of restrictions and patterns will take time to clean out.  Continuing with the analogy, once we set about to dealing with all of these patterns and restrictions, we are often met with times of increased pain, sensation and discomfort; what MFR practitioners refer to as therapeutic painand the healing crisis.  Just as the stuff fell on you when you finally opened the “junk closet”, so too will we often feel the things that we’ve placed inside the body’s “junk closet” – what made us tighten around the area in the first place: pain, discomfort, memories and emotions, the milieu of trauma.

However, the good news remains the same.  You can clean out your house, you can reclaim your life.  All you have to do is take that first step.  And then the one after that.  And the one after that.  Don’t worry, we’ll be with on every step of the journey.

Happy Spring Cleaning!