This blog is about ALL-THINGS related to Human Bodywork as a fundamental form of healthcare maintenance and medical intervention.
The blog is designed to primarily post "bite-sized" chunks of information--in the form of single-page summary-synopses--about the principles and practices of Bodywork, and the principles and processes by which the human body works--that are easy to digest and assimilate into your understanding for future reference.
Since most of my clients either work in the information technology industry, or work at a desk job employing digital technologies to accomplish much of their work, it seemed an appropriate play on words to name the site "BODYWORK BYTES".
Also--and far more importantly--the blog's title is intended to serve as a recurring reminder that by choosing a profession that requires the perpetual unnatural use of one's body, anyone who desires to take a proactive, preventative approach to their personal healthcare must employ the necessary counter-measures to assist them in their ongoing efforts to keep their body in balance.
Along with routine stretching and exercise, receiving regular Bodywork is essential to maintaining balance in your body--in both form and function. This blog is designed to help you better understand exactly WHY.
Within the coming blogs--that will follow at least monthly (and hopefully weekly)--you will find fascinating information about how the human body works
Here you will find "byte-sized" blogs about the basic principles, practices and benefits of Therapeutic Massage & Bodywork.
This blog is designed specifically for the benefit of my Therapeutic Massage & Related Human Bodywork clients. The blog's relating to the following practices should redirect to this central blog:
- Perfect Touch Massage Therapy
- Morrison's Medical Massage
- Morrison's Healing Imagery
- Scott's Signature Spascapes
MISSION STATEMENT:
This blogsite's mission is to enhance everyone's education about what exactly "Bodywork" is, and what it can do to optimize the way you feel & function. The blogs on this site will review the basic principles and processes by which the human body works, and then discuss how bodywork--the manual manipulation of the "soft tissues" of the body--influences its physical structure and physiological processes.
It is my underlying mission, to gradually shift the once-prevailing paradigm of massage/bodywork as a superficial pseudo-scientific form of personal pampering and a lifestyle luxury; to the ever-increasing, scientifically-grounded paradigm that demonstrates massage/bodywork to be among the most potent preventative and restorative healthcare interventions available to the general public. Therapeutic Massage & Bodywork are considered FUNDAMENTAL FORMS of Modern Medicine--and this blog is intended to demonstrate why.
BYTE-SIZED BLOGS & MEGABYTE-SIZED BLOGS:
Out of respect for everyone's time and varying levels of interest/need, the site is organized as follows:
BYTE-SIZED BLOGS will be the core-content found on the home page. BYTE-SIZED BLOGS are intended to be kept "short & sweet" by being limited to the equivalent of Single-page Summary Synopses of each topic covered. These are the "Byte-sized Blogs" referred to in this site's subtitle. BYTE-SIZED BLOGS will contain links to other pages with this site, as well as to other sites, where more comprehensive information can be found on the topic.
MEGABYTE-SIZED BLOGS will contain the more comprehensive information referred to in BYTE-SIZED BLOGS. On these blogs I will include links to additional blogs that provide even more information, as well as links to external web-sources such as additional references, reading, and best places to buy products I may recommend.
Throughout the site I will be: defining technical terminology defining professional policies & procedures providing tips, tricks & techniques for enhancing your therapeutic experience providing clear & concise descriptions of the myriad "modalities" of massage increasing understanding of the various therapeutic tools & techniques of the trade sharing strategies for implementing a variety of health & wellness solutions sharing nutritional products & supplements that can potentially help you get and stay in the "Zone" of optimal performance, along with links to e-stores where you can purchase these for the lowest available price
BELLY-BUSTING BYTES & BELLY-BUSTING BIG-BYTES:
There are A LOT of things we can do to optimize the way we feel & function in the world. Laughing regularly is one of them. There are entire health clinics created around facilitating laughter. As a reward for your reading my writing and research, I will try to end each blog with a BELLY-BUSTING BYTE.
BELLY-BUSTING BYTES will consist of humorous pictures, stories or jokes. Sometimes a simple BELLY-BUSTING BYTE will have multiple variations in one form or another, so I have created a separate page called: BELLY-BUSTING BIG-BYTES to accommodate these.
BEGINNING WITH THE END IN MIND:
My BEGINNING BLOG is dedicated to the wisdom of the late, great, Dr. Stephen R. Covey.
In his book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, following Habit #1: Be Proactive (or Preventative-minded in terms of healthcare) he says Habit #2 should be: Begin With the End in Mind. What is the "end" we seek in relation to health & wellness? In clinical terms: Homeostasis; in casual terms: Balance.
Leonardo
DaVinci's “Vitruvian Man” holds a place in world history as the
supreme
symbol
of what DaVinci's First Century B.C. inspiration--the Roman architect Marcus Vitruvius Pollio—called: “Proportion”; or what Massage Therapists and
Bodyworkers today refer as: “Structural Symmetry.”
Few
people know what is written in the peripheral margins of this
venerable piece of artwork. This is perhaps primarily due to the
fact that it is written in DaVinci's somewhat cryptic
“mirror-writing” style. It is written in cursive--but
backwards... and in Italian.
In Volume 3, Chapter 1, Vitruvius explains:
1 The planning of temples depends upon symmetry: and the method of this architects must diligently apprehend. It arises from proportion (which in Greek is called analogia). Proportion consists in taking a fixed module, in each case, both for the parts of a building and for the whole, by which the method of symmetry is put to practice. For without symmetry and p roportion no temple can have a regular plan; that is, it must have an exact proportion worked out after the fashion of the members of a finely-shaped human body.
2 For Nature has so planned the human body that the face from the chin to the top of the forehead and the roots of the hair is a tenth part; also the palm of the hand from the wrist to the top of the middle finger is as much; the head from the chin to the crown, an eighth part; from the top of the breast with the bottom of the neck to the roots of the hair, a sixth part; from the middle of the breast to the crown, a fourth part; a third part of the height of the face is from the bottom of the chin to the bottom of the nostrils; the nose from the bottom of the nostrils to the line between the brows, as much; from that line to the roots of the hair, the forehead is given as the third part. The foot is a sixth of the height of the body; the cubit a quarter, the breast also a quarter. The other limbs also have their own proportionate measurements. And by using these, ancient painters and famous sculptors have attained great and unbounded distinction.
3 In like fashion the members of temples ought to have dimensions of their several parts answering suitably to the general sum of their whole magnitude. Now the navel is naturally the exact centre of the body. For if a man lies on his back with hands and feet outspread, and the centre of a circle is placed on his navel, his figure and toes will be touched by the circumference. Also a square will be found described within the figure, in the same way as a round figure is produced. For if we measure from the sole of the foot to the top of the head, and apply the measure to the outstretched hands, the breadth will be found equal to the height, just like sites which are squared by rule.
4 Therefore if Nature has planned the human body so that the members correspond in their proportions to its complete configuration, the ancients seem to have had reason in determining that in the execution of their works they should observe an exact adjustment of the several members to the general pattern of the plan. Therefore, since in all their works they handed down orders, they did so especially in building temples, the excellences and the faults of which usually endure for ages.
