NT stands for Neuromuscular Therapy. Kim & I learned our neuromuscular therapy from Paul St. John who created and popularized what is now called the St John Method of Neuromuscular Massage Therapy.

We met Paul in 1989 at a spiritual retreat. At that time I had been practicing the Art of Kiatsu as taught by B.J. Carlisle of Encinitas, California. Kiatsu is a blend of the Japanese art of Shiatsu blended with the study of "Ki" and the Hawaiian Kahuna arts which B.J. learned from his Hawaiian family. B.J. was a direct descendant of King Kamehameha III who unified the Hawaiian islands, his mother was a royal princess and his uncles Kahuna's.

B.J. and I met in 1978 and I became his student shortly thereafter. We spent 5 of 6 years together as student and teacher and also best friends. It was a great time of my life, we worked together in the healing arts, and I was his assistant instructor in a martial arts school, the "Dojo of the Four Winds" we created this school together and taught Aikido there.

While B.J.'s art was effective it was very specialized and I didn't see myself being able to actually practice this field of healing as a profession. When I met Paul St. John it was a different paradigm altogether. NT, neuromuscular therapy is a very systematic and practical approach to healing many of the ill's, injuries, conditions and diseases the plague humankind.

There are five principles to Neuromuscular Therapy.

1. Postural Distortion
2. Dysfunctional Bio-Mechanics
3. Ischemia
4. Trigger Points
5. Nerve Compression / Nerve Entrapment

Two supporting factors.

6. Nutrition
7. NLP, Neural Linguistic Programming

Postural Distortion means movement of the body off the coronal or mid-sagittal planes. These are the planes or dividing lines that separate the body into two halves one looking from the front or rear view of a person, the other looking from the side. It is actually pretty self explanatory, if you were to look at a person from the front rear or side and draw straight line from floor to ceiling that divided their body into two equal parts, you examine those parts and see if they are actually equal.

In other words, are both sides equal, or is there more or less of a persons body on either side of the line? We also look to see if one shoulder or hip is higher or lower than the other side of the body.

The point of doing this is to see how efficiently the patient is opposing gravity. We all know that gravity is pushing down on us with a pressure of 33 lbs. per square inch. If we are opposing gravity efficiently our structure bears that weight quite easily. But when we lose efficient posture our musculature has to take over the job of our skeleton. When this happens the effects are disastrous to the body. Muscles that previously provided movement and balance, are now drafted to support the structure. The result is pain, stiffness, decreased range of motion, organ problems, etc... When we understand the implications of correct posture on the human body, we have a reason to incorporate these patterns into our daily life. Paul St. John taught us, "The healing process, is also an educational process."

This first step is all about understanding our body and it's relationship to our planet and gravity.

Dysfunctional Bio-mechanics is the study of correct and incorrect movement patterns. It follows behind postural distortion because it is usually secondary to it. In other words if we have inefficient posture then usually our body's movement patterns will be faulty. When we move incorrectly it affects not only the movement of that particular joint, but also affects the musculature and tissue over the joint, which in turn has a negative domino effect on the rest of the body.

When we have correct movement patterns, our joints and musculature move easily assisting our structure in maintaining efficient posture. Correct posture & functional bio-mechanics are two key factors in maintaining optimal health.

Faulty movement patterns create tightness in the joints and musculature which lead to our third principle.

Ischemia literally means, lack of or loss of blood. Blood not only provides nutrition and oxygen to the body, but carries away waste products. I compare our blood to the perfect delivery man, one who brings us all of our groceries and takes our trash away at the same time.

When our musculature becomes either short, hypertrophied or taught, the passage of the veins, arteries and capillaries to such tissues becomes restricted. This is ischemia. The flow of blood has become less. Two things happen, nutrition & oxygen are no longer being delivered, and waste products are not being taken away.

Our cells are us in miniature, they eat and excrete. They need constant nutrition and they also need to have their waste products cleared away. This cellular excretion is called metabolic waste. While it is not toxic by nature, ischemic areas become toxic as these metabolic wastes begin to accumulate. Ischemic tissue is the breeding grounds for trigger points.

Trigger Points A trigger point is an area of low neurological activity which when stressed or stimulated transitions into an area of high neurological activity with referred sensations to other parts of the body.
What does this mean? In laymen's language. A trigger point is an area of the body that normally feels fine, but if there is an injury or irritation of some kind, it will often become painful there, but even more so, can refer pain, numbness, tightness, etc.. to another part of the body, sometimes well away from the location of the trigger point. For example, a trigger point in the shoulder area may refer pain to the wrist, hand or fingers. A trigger point in the low back or hip may refer pain to the thigh, knee, lower leg or foot.

Trigger points are always ischemic, but not all ischemic tissue harbors trigger points. Besides referring pain to another area, trigger points refer tightness, this tightness creates ischemia, which in it's turn may breed more trigger points in the referred tissues.

Nerve Compression / Nerve Entrapment N. compression, means pressure on a nerve by bone or cartilage. N. entrapment means pressure on a nerve by soft tissues.

First of all we should know the function of nerves. There are two types of nerves in the body, sensory and motor. Sensory nerves tell us what is happening to us an our world. We hear, see, touch, taste, feel and smell with them. When we experience with our sensory nerves, we then have a response to those sensations with the motor nerves.

For example: You walk outside, it's cold. That's a sensory nerve. You go back inside and get a sweater. That is the motor nerve responding to sensory input and telling you what actions are appropriate for maintaining proper health.

When a nerve feels pressure it translates that signal into pain. Pain is a good thing, without it we would destroy our bodies rapidly. Pain lets us know when things are too hot, too cold, too bitter, too hard, too soft, too much, too little. Pain teaches us not to smoke, or drink, it teaches us not to stuff ourselves with food. It teaches us to exercise moderately, avoid running into hard or sharp objects. In other words without pain we would have no way of keeping healthy. Pain is our watchdog and we should use it carefully and pay attention when it warns of approaching dangers.

When our nerves are compressed or entrapped they cry out in pain. This pain is a signal that the nerve monitoring such tissues or joints have been compromised. Our job as neuromuscular therapists is to locate the affected nerves and treat the tissues to relieve the pressure on such nerves.

Nutrition is everything. If a person without nutrition has no foundation. In fact, nutrition is more than the foundation, nutrition is your health, your wealth, your very life. You are what you eat, so eat the healthiest food you can get, and in moderation.

We recommend the vegetarian diet comprised of organic foods. The most important food in a healthy persons diet are organic fruits and vegetables. These foods have more vitamins, minerals, trace elements, enzymes, co-enzymes, anti-oxidants, fiber, etc.. than any other foods. They should form the heart and soul of your diet. While we are not raw food proponents as such, we recommend a minimum of 50% raw food for maintaining optimal health. Eat healthy, fresh, organic food. Drink lots of water. Avoid at all costs coffee, alcohol, drugs of all types - prescription and non-prescription, sodas, junk food, denatured foods such as white flour and white sugar, preservatives, additives, any dead or stale food. If you must eat meat, make sure it is organic, if you must eat fish, get those fish from unpolluted waters, if you must eat eggs, organic free range chickens only.

Eat live healthy organic foods and you will be alive and healthy!

Neural Linguistic Programming is the way we talk to ourselves and other about ourselves. In order to get healthy, we must think healthy. We must be positive about our ability to become healed. To heal, means to become whole. If our attitude stinks, we stink. It's simple. We need to learn a new way of programming ourselves for success in every field of our life. To do this, we must always think, speak and act in a positive way.

We must believe in our ability to become whole. This is my job as a therapist, to teach you how to utilize every tool to get out of pain. When a person comes to me, I must look at their total package, I must be able to reach the parts of them that they aren't even aware of. Generally these are the key factors which made them unwell in the first place.

Would you like to hear some good NLP? Here it is. "I can help you to get healthier, stronger, more flexible, happier and more educated about yourself and your relationship to this planet from your very first visit here. How do I know this? Because I see it happen every day in my practice."