Bowenwork Refreshed

Refreshed

• strengthened, energized, invigorated, fortified, sustained, reinforced, made powerful, potent . . .
• remembered, recollected, retained, reviewed, renewed, reminded, recognized, retrospective . . .
• restored, re-established, revived, re-instated, regained, recovered, recruited . . .

All of that and more went on at a Bowenwork training last weekend. We offer Bowen to the body. The body responds as it is able. 

Bowenwork

I have been doing Bowen bodywork since 1997, when I learned it while still in Naturopathic Medical school. It has become a mainstay of my practice, and I have taken many advanced courses to round out the fundamental basic work. This last weekend, I returned to my roots and took a Bowen refresher course in Prescott. I got to appreciate again the simple elegant power of the basic Bowenwork. 

Alexia Monroe, senior instructor with the Bowen Academy, led us through the fundamental Bowen moves.

We talked about many successes we have had and what moves we chose. It reminded me that just a few well-chosen moves can have a profound effect, even when there is not enough time for a full session. Tom Bowen himself was a master of discernment, and could see when just a few moves would do the trick.

Let’s say that you were traveling, and pulled a muscle lifting a heavy suitcase. After a few moments, you  might say that you feel OK, and not notice much. Then the next morning, you feel the full force of it, it hurts and your back is really tight in that one spot. What happened is during the night, while in the rest and repair mode during sleep, the body registered the injury and went into the protective mode of tightening up around the injured spot. It brought inflammatory mediators to repair the pulled muscle, and for the short term created swelling and heat. This is all in response to the nervous system detecting a change in the length of the muscle. It is all the body’s natural healing process.

So, what Bowenwork does is to reset the nervous system to hold the muscle at its original blueprint of its ideal length. Actually, the first two Bowen moves tell the body that the emergency is over, so it can drop into the parasympathetic accelerated healing state. Then the body responds as it is able.

If Bowen moves are done before the night’s sleep, the nervous system receptors can be reset to their ideal length. Healing is very accelerated – if Bowenwork is done before the injury has a chance to be registered during sleep, the injury never gets a chance to take hold. 

Bowen can also break the compensation patterns of old injuries and unhealthy postural habits. These compensation patterns form over time and get locked in as new patterns.

Bowen bodywork is a soft tissue release approach that specifically targets the nervous system to stimulate a feedback loop so the body resets itself. The resting tissue tension is reset so spasms relax and lax tissues tonify. This creates a whole body balance from the inside out.

The body’s natural wisdom for healing is activated, and it will prioritize what to heal. If an area still hurts after a day or two, know that the body is still in a protective mode. If it feels odd or strange or there is a different discomfort, the Bowen is still working and the body is adjusting to the new reset pattern. We only reassess your body after the Bowen has had a week to work on you. 

Drinking plenty of water will help the body process the Bowenwork. This is especially important right after the Bowen session.

I was reminded of the importance of the exercises to do at home after certain Bowen procedures. These exercises stabilize the area, so the reset tissues stay and mobility is re-established. For example, after getting the shoulder procedure, it is important to daily rotate the arm in circles within the range of movement in order to break up the soft tissue adhesions and calcifications. This is a lot of what is done at a physical therapist visit, and you can do it for yourself at home. Of course, it is more powerful after the Bowen move has reset the soft tissues so that there is a bigger range of movement.

The Bowenwork practitioners in the class have a lot of enthusiasm. Here we are on the back porch of the class location.

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