De-Stress for the Holidays and Give a Gift of Good Health

Here's my answer to Cyber Monday:

Give the gift of good health and lowered stress

1. I'm offering personalized gift certificates for your friends and family this week (11/26-12/3) at a 15% savings for individual certificates and a 25% savings for purchases of 4 or more. kevin@kevinminney.com, 510-333-4324

2. The good folks at HeartMath Institute have developed a Holiday De-Stress program that they're letting me offer to my clients, their friends and family for free.

Pick it up here : www.heartmath.org/destresskit
De-Stress Kit for the Changing Times

from Doc Childre

Founder of HeartMath®

14700 West Park Ave.

Boulder Creek, California 95006

© Copyright 2008 by Doc Childre. HeartMath is a registered trademark of the Institute of HeartMath,

14700 West Park Ave., Boulder Creek, Calif. 95006 • www.heartmath.org

Institute of HeartMath is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit research and education organization.

HeartMath tools for stress relief and emotional management are being used

by companies, government, the military, hospitals, clinics and schools.

Doc Childre is the co-author of the following books: The HeartMath Solution, From

Chaos to Coherence, Transforming Stress, Transforming Anxiety, Transforming Anger,

Transforming Depression and The HeartMath Approach to Managing Hypertension.

Got the World on Your Shoulders? Does it just feel like it?

   Shoulder pain from impingement (meaning the pressing on the soft tissue of tendon, muscle, or nerve by bone), sometimes called “frozen shoulder” is a common problem. It occurs frequently in the first quarter of the year. Why? Because of New Year’s resolutions for being fitter, stronger, etc. Starting too hard or too fast in upper body workouts can bring on shoulder problems very quickly.

Why does this happen and what can we do about it?

   Shoulder impingement can happen with great frequency in modern society because of a combination of factors, some anatomical, others arising from posture, exercise, and overuse. The pain involved in shoulder issues can range from mildly uncomfortable to completely debilitating. Complications can include pain, numbness and tingling in the elbow, wrist and hand and affect the thoracic outlet for the nerve trunk and artery for the entire arm.

   There are several anatomical reasons for shoulder impingements. In order to have its range-of-motion the shoulder joint has it uses muscles and bones to provide stability. It has to be stable throughout wide ranges of motion in different directions so it cannot use a ball-in-socket joint like the hip.  Fifteen muscles cross the shoulder and provide for its movement capacity. They work in concert like a small orchestra, supporting and giving way to each other in a finely tuned manner. If imbalanced, the entire assembly will be affected. Even a small imbalance can eventually have a profound effect. 

    Another anatomical issue is the small amount of clearance between the bones of the collarbone and ribcage. The nerve trunk, artery for the arm and a tendon pass through a space less an inch across. The space can shrink from poor form in exercise, bad ergonomics (a forward leaning posture or too much extension of the arms at the keyboard) or overusing a set of muscles in comparison with their balancing set in the “orchestra”.  Decreasing the space inch can result in pain, blockage of blood and nerve impulse flow. Like a car’s valves, operating without sufficient clearance produces overheating (inflammation) and potential damage. Once pain and loss of function begins, further muscle contraction and “guarding” of the painful arm progresses to more and more pain.

    Classic “frozen shoulder” or adhesive capsulitis comes from tissues within the joint capsule of the shoulder that “glue” together, resulting in complete immobilization of the joint. This is not the case in most painful shoulders, especially if addressed early. If inflammation and tissue damage is kept at a minimum, functional recovery can proceed quickly.

    Restoring the balance of range-of-motion to the muscles that provide stability and motion for the shoulder can relieve impingement very quickly and easily, when Bowenwork restores the perfect pattern memory for the area the body has stored. Often in less than 3 Bowenwork sessions pain relief is followed by movement recovery, then exercise and postural correction for long-term stability. 

Own Your Niche: A review of a powerful book

I've finished reading and recommending to friends and colleagues a book by Stephanie Chandler called as you might guess, Own Your Niche. The author of several books on publishing and marketing, Own Your Niche is her latest.

   As a complementary health practitioner I have had to try many ways to achieve visibility for myself and my work. The internet offers a variety of solutions but can be very intimidating. There are methods of establishing expert status, but they can also seem overwhelming. It may be procrastination, but it has been hard for me to get traction for myself in these areas. I find Own Your Niche a terrific primer on which ways to be most effective.

  I find that Stephanie Chandler's book has solid simple-to-follow suggestions, clear explanations and lots of support material.The book is organized in an incremental way to help consolidate and increase our efficiency as professionals, building a step-by-step plan for success. 

   For those who are looking for a guide to developing their credibility and visibility in their profession with the end result being profitability, I heartily recommend Stephanie Chandler's book.

8 Ways to Make Your Resolutions Work for a Great 2012

    Each year we begin with the best of intentions, wanting to improve ourselves. Towards a healthy body and mind, better relations, more wealth in our lives, we make resolutions to improve. Unfortunately, we often overestimate what we can do and underestimate the time needed to make the changes for our healthy body. Making demands on a body that it isn’t ready for can show up quickly as pain problems. Also, we can be continuing our old pattern of over committing ourselves to activities and under serving ourselves in taking care of our bodies.

   A physical therapist with multiple clinics told me the first quarter of the year had guaranteed income from rehab from all the people trying to complete their yearly resolutions in the first 2 weeks. Sometimes we may need to reduce our activity level or seek care so that we can start off with a clean slate, injury- and restriction-free.

1.      If we remember that our new year’s resolutions are for the year and not for the first week or two, we’ll have a good chance of avoiding injury and pain problems. We’ll have a better chance of completing our resolutions instead of discarding them in the first month.

2.      Give yourself a clear reason why you want-to achieve your resolution, make sure you know why you might-not-want-to and see how the two measure against each other. Too much might-not outweighs too little want-to.

3.      Make sure you ask your friends to help, to give you positive feedback as well as constructive criticism. If you can have someone to be your accountability partner, so much the better for you.  

  

4.      Make sure you have a plan and even ask the experts in the field to help with it. You’ll set yourself up to succeed with these ideas if you believe in yourself and them.

5.      Please give yourself a schedule that uses steps of improvement, for incremental or step-sized change is change that lasts. Starting slow and working up is no crime. No matter if you want to walk/run farther, lift more, swim faster, taking it in bite-sized chunks can be a big factor in your success. If you worry you won’t make enough progress, remember that increasing just 10 percent per week means you’ll be doing more than 500 percent more at the end of the year. Not so bad, eh?

6.      You may be reading this article after you’ve begun overdoing your activity resolutions and have already begun experiencing pain and disappointment. Don’t worry and don’t try to push through the pain.

 

7.      Go see your local Bowenwork practitioner or other wellness practitioner for a tune-up and recovery session to get you back on the road to success.

8.      Be sure about your healthy start and take advantage of my bonus packages available on my website to support your new year’s investment in yourself.