Our concept of a class which combines health and fitness with self defence and holistic therapy may seem odd at a first glance, but these things blend together to help you not just in an attack situation but in all aspects of your life. We are retraining your body, mind and responses so that you can live life with more confidence, easier movement and less stress / conflict.
Our classes began this week, with breath and walking exercises, many of you may be thinking but breathing is automatic and we learned to walk when we were 2! As we go on in life, restrictions, adaptations and bad habits affect these fundamental elements which makes us less efficient and leads to further restrictions. By going back to basics, slowing down and focusing on our breath and posture as we walk can help to unwind those habits and make us aware of physical restrictions that we had become used to, allowing us to address these and move more freely. As the walking exercises continued, we added in how respond to someone walking at us in a way that is smooth, confident and non confrontational.
Our 4 pillars will always be present in our class in some form or other, these are 4 basic exercises that will be very familiar to everyone, but our approach is different. We don’t do them in a fast, pumping way which can often be intimidating and offer more risk of injury…We do them in a relaxed and slow way, working on the deeper muscles at out core to build inner strength. The 4 pillars are simply a press up, a sit up, a leg raise and a squat. To begin with we recommend 3 of each every day, this may not seem like much, but this “micro dose” of strengthening exercises, done slowly will have a huge impact on your life.
We ended the session with some simple massage techniques, which at the same time challenged our balance, using our feet to loosen the legs and lower back and then to create pressure to release tension (working with the breath at the same time for further relaxation). The techniques we use are a combination of warrior massage and Thai massage, working to reduce tension, aid in muscle recovery and rebalancing the body structure. After being worked on, we then checked in with our posture one more time and all felt taller and more aligned than at the beginning of class.
I’m going to take a moment here to say, for those who enjoyed the simple massage techniques at the end of the class and feel that they would benefit from more of this, I am available in Bannow, offering Thai Massage as well as body massage, and acupuncture.
We feel that our sessions are off to a great start, the class was effective and fun, and we are looking forward to continuing the journey of health and wellness with you all. If the class interests you, come join us next Thursday, we would love to see you there.
Not sure if its for you? Give us a call for a chat, Chris can be reached on 0894735910 and Kerry can be reached on 0852618853.
The Barefoot therapist 