Rockville Chiropractor, Rockville Maryland: Yoga

BALANCE ACTIVATION YOGA

Advanced Spine & Wellness Center uses a unique form of yoga we like to call Balance Activation Yoga. Based on the works of the late Roger Eischens and newer works of Jon Hinds, with Monkey Bar Gym, Balance Activation Yoga focuses on alignment, stability and strength. Applied in our office as yoga therapy, our professionals utilize the newest concepts in spine and posture improvement with the timeless discipline of yoga.

Helping injured people move beyond pain and leading them back to health

In a typical class or one-on-one session, students are led through a series of yoga poses designed to energize and balance the body. We use props to create alignment in the poses and to stimulate internal activations (wake up parts of the body that are “asleep” or underactivated). This style of yoga creates core strength and many people experience a lightness of body and spirit.

This style works for people with different body types, including the ‘too tight’ and ‘too loose’ bodies. A person with tight muscles, without much flexibility, can come to this practice and gain freedom of movement. We work to balance the body and the body’s energy flow and this creates balance and a sense of ease (as opposed to forced effort).

Preventing future injuries by creating more balance in the body

Our therapists partner up with each student to serve as a mirror in a pose and also to give proprioceptive feedback, using the principle of “where I push, you resist.” For example, in a standing pose, we will exert light pressure on the student’s shin so that she can resist her shin into the teacher’s hand, into the applied pressure. This creates an internal activation or “waking up” a part of the body (in this case the lower leg, foot and ankle) that is otherwise not fully energized and engaged.

Profound and complete core strength

Whether you are a weekend warrior professional athlete, core strength is tantamount to producing athletic performance results. Balance Activation Yoga creates core strength that is profound and complete. Balance Activation Yoga uses a movement sequence that creates multiplanar core strength. Core strength and freedom of movement are essential for any sports endeavors. This style of yoga has helped improve students’ golf games, swimming strokes, lacrosse shots and many more. The applications to sports endeavors are endless.

Athletes often have the attitude, “how much pain do you endure because you think it’s part of the package?” Muscle soreness is not a given if you are an athlete. Muscle soreness isn’t a necessary part of life. Practice of just a few simple yoga poses can create relief in the body. Balance Activation Yoga has phenomenal restorative and regenerative qualities that help athletes recover and prepare them for more movement.

Creating unbelievable levels of fitness through progressions of movement

Daily normal life can be exhausting and rigorous. How much coffee do we drink? How much sugar do we need to stimulate ourselves just to get through the day? Can you find that energy another way? Can you find this energy without external, artificial stimulants? An underlying part of Balance Activation Yoga is that it balances your energy systems. When the energetic system is balanced and allowed to flow freely, there is less strain. If muscles are tight, our energy can’t flow freely, it is blocked. Once blockage exists, normal daily movements make you tired, which makes you need coffee, which makes you need sugar. You don’t need to go in deprivation mode. But, just try it…if you step back from this negative cycle and get the energy flowing, you may not need that stuff anymore.

Physical and Mental Well Being

People are led to the classes for a variety of reasons. People come first for the physical and stay for the other benefits. Many people come for relief of muscle soreness, for which it works great! Some folks come for relief from chronic pain or to rehabilitate from an injury. As well as the purely physical benefits, most people come back for the sense of relaxation that is a result of a class. They often experience an increase in energy, as well as relaxation. The longer I do this, the more regular students I see coming back and having them embody it as well. They’ll tell me great anecdotes like, “I feel lighter”, “I walk/run/bike with more ease” or “My kids tell me to go to yoga because I’m a kinder, gentler person”. It’s more than when you just come to yoga class. You start to take it outside with you.

Balance Activation Yoga is effective as a warm-up:

It activates and increases blood flow to every area of the body
Prepares an athlete for dynamic activity by aligning muscles and bones

Why people practice Balance Activation Yoga:

To strengthen weak or underactivated areas of the body
To maintain or restore full range of motion and movement which helps prevent injury
To have better posture, which makes every activity easier
To ease pain related to stiff and tight muscles
To decrease soreness related to overworking certain areas of the body