Why do our students stay with us? Not about fighting :-)

People come to class to learn self defence skills. This is what the sign on the door says, this is why they come. But why do they stay? I asked, and was not surprised at the answer.

The main reason people continue to train with us is that they always feel better after a class, than before, whatever horrible things their modern life threw at them. Why is that?

The way we stand, move, talk and interact with our world is a pretty good indication of our emotional state, general health, history, and stress levels. If we work with the symptoms, can we affect the cause? Yes. Because the symptoms and the cause in this case share one thing: they are part of YOU.

How can Systema methods help?

Once we acknowledge the problem, we can start working on a holistic solution. Trendy word, I know… It simply means that we do not treat the physical separately from the mental or psychological conditions. Unfortunately, many brilliant therapists work with only one aspect, and work on it with the minimum involvement from the person who’s trying to get better.

Here is what we do:

Level 1: demonstrate the connection between tension, relaxation and breathing. The easiest and the shortest part of the programme, and the foundation of everything else. It only takes a few minutes. Awareness is switched on.

Level 2: breathing combined with movement and increased self awareness starts the healing process, and allows for independent work, without the therapist present. Eventually, the repair and rejuvenation process work all the time, through movement and active interaction with other parts of our world, human and not.

Level 3: manual therapy, with active participation from the client. Remaining in constant communication with the client, and timing our movements with her/his rhythm, we start working out the tension from the soft tissues, and from the tissues that are not so soft. Implements can be used to speed up the process. We often see things like a whip, sticks, sword, axe, water, or eggs (!) used in the process. This is all explained in detail to those who are interested in receiving the treatment, or learning how to deliver it.

Level 4: energy work. The energy centers and channels are identified ( we work with 12, not 7), cleared and handed over to the client for regular maintenance. They are his, after all! This is where we learn how full our fuel tank is, if the pump or the fuel lines are functioning correctly, and where to get more fuel. If we do it right (and we believe that healing usually do), the client accumulates a surplus of energy that unblocks some of the stagnant pipes.

We cover the first level in almost every class we run in London.

Want to learn more? Please drop David a note to register your interest, and we will let you know when the next healing workshop is. Alternatively, if you want a treatment, send an SMS 🙂