Myofascial Release

Myofascial Release and other forms of good massage, body work, and energy techniques can elicit tissue memory.  Tissue memory is considered to be a “flashback experience”, reversible amnesia, or Deja Vu experience.  The following are excerpts on the scientific rationale of these healing opportunities from my book, “Myofascial Release: The Search for Excellence.” (www.myofascialrelease.com)

• Mind-Body Awareness are two sides of the same coin, different aspects of the same spectrum, immutably, inseparable, connected, influencing, and communicating constantly.  Myofascial Release techniques and myofascial unwinding allow for the complete communication necessary for healing and true growth.  I believe that the body remembers everything that ever happened to it. 
• The link between mind-body awareness and healing is the concept of state-dependent memory, learning, and behavior (also called deja vu).  We have all experienced this, for example, when a certain smell, or the sound of a particular piece of music creates a flashback phenomenon, producing a visual, sensorimotor replay of a past event or important episode in our lives with a vividness as if it were happening at the moment.  I would like to expand this theory to include position-dependent memory, learning, and behavior with the structural position being the missing component in the state-dependent theory. 
• Studies have shown that during periods of trauma people make indelible imprints of experiences that have high levels of emotional content.  The body can hold information below the conscious level, as a protective mechanism, so that the memories tend to become dissociated or amnesic.  This is called memory dissociation, or reversible amnesia.  The memories are state or position dependent and can therefore be retrieved when the person is in a particular state or position.  This information is not available in the normal conscious state, and the body’s protective mechanism keep us away from the positions that our mind-body awareness construes as painful or traumatic.
• It has been demonstrated consistently that when a myofascial release technique takes the tissue to a significant position, or when myofascial unwinding allows a body part to assume a significant position three-dimensionally in space, the tissue not only changes and improves, but also memories, associated emotional states, and belief systems rise to the conscious level.  This awareness through the positional reproduction of a past event or trauma allows the individual to grasp the previously hidden information that may be creating or maintaining symptoms or behavior that deter improvement.  With the information now at the conscious level, the individual is in a position to learn what holding or bracing patterns have been impeding progress. This release of tissue, emotions, and hidden information creates an environment for change that is both consistent and effective.
• Memory and learning of all higher organisms fall into two classes on internal responses: 1. There is a memory trace on the molecular-cellular-synaptic level. 2. An involvement of the amygdala and hippocampus of the limbic-hypothalamic system in processing and encoding, and recall of the specific memory trace may be located elsewhere in the brain.
• The limbic-hypothalamic system is the central core to Selye’s general adaptation syndrome, the three stages of which, the alarm reaction, the stage of resistance, and the stage of exhaustion, take on a profound significance. 
• With myofascial unwinding, the therapist eliminates gravity from the system.  This unloading of the structure allows the body’s righting reflexes and protective responses to temporarily suspend their influence.  The body then can move into positions that allow these state or position-dependent physiologic or flashback phenomena to reoccur.  As this happens within the safe environment of a treatment session, the client can facilitate the body’s inherent self correcting mechanism to obtain improvement. 

The following are comments from the Deja Vu blog:

Rich Staudt, MOT, OTR/L, LMT // Aug 25th 2008 at 8:45 pm

I can attest to the “flashback” feeling on a personal basis. During my attendance of one of John’s MFR seminars I was the role of client for a lower extremity technique. My partner simply held my leg in a relaxed flexed position with very mild compression when I was taken back to my knee injury I had experienced in high school. Perspiration and accelerated breathing with all my fears and tears of ending my dreams of playing football flowed over me. My knee hated to be in that “uncomfortable” position. I could smell the grass on the field and feel the helplessness of the present-past. With encouragement my partner with an instructor helped me process through the position of injury. That was such a powerful experience. After that initial and further MFR treatments, I have been able to participate in challenging sports such as martial arts and softball with more confidence and strength in my knees. Thank you John and those who have treated me for allowing the recapture of my power for living.

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 Mary Ryan NCTMB, CMT, NJ // Sep 2nd 2008 at 10:15 pm

John,
As always, your massage mag. blog, books, articles, seminars; a multitude of diverse conversation for all to learn and dwell upon. In the concept of karma and tissue memory, what are your thoughts. A single example: a client is unwinding within a repetitive patterning without any break through towards a full release for a number of sessions. Doesn’t ‘know’ where,why or how this unwinding is coming from but feels something…deep. Frustrating for the client. As if it is way beyond or rather way far back to reconcile with. Client feels a need to reconcile with something in order to let go, deeper. Would or could this possibly clarify as perhaps a karmic reason, based in tissue memory or the mind-body disassociation from something within the client’s own psyche. Though both could be involved. Your comments, thoughts on this relationship of the two or maybe no relationship. Thank you, John.

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