Patrick Lerouge here from Evolve Restorative Therapy. You can find me at livepainfreeprocess.com. I have a pain-free concierge services that teach people how to heal their bodies based on their life experience, based on what’s happening in their mind as well as in their body. Last two weeks we’ve been talking about the concept of healing through mind-body balance, what I want to show you is that it’s easy, that it just takes you waiting a minute. We’re going to become mindful using foam rolling.

Foam rolling is another big topic that a lot of people do. It works with fascia, works with connective tissue inside of our muscular system. Many people do it all wrong. Moving fast or use the grid roller to speed up things. It’s multitasking in our head, but our body doesn’t handle this type of multitasking very well. It will just lock up. If you do not have my foam rolling video series, I suggest you get that, because I’m not going to be talking about how to foam roll so much here but what to do to hone the mind-body balance after you foam roll.

Before you even start, I want you to try out something, test something. Come into a deep squat and see what it’s like to have your ankles on the ground, your heels on the ground. Or, if you’re on your tippy toes, what it feels like to be on your tippy toes, and how well your ankle balances out. How well does your body roll through putting the heels down, picking the heels up if you can’t do it, if you’re bent over, and you’re stuck here, see where you’re at? You need a starting point to see if something worked. Now that’s key for you have to understand anything. If you’re going to progress in anything using the mind-body balance to heal, to run faster, to lift more weights, to be more present, to be more kind to yourself, you need a number system, something that’s going to make it real that shows you where you started.

               Are you able to drop your heels to the floor in a deep squat? Can you even get in this position?

Then, take our foam roller, place it underneath our calf, and we’re just going to sit down for a second. Now foam rolling is just the object or the tool of choice that I’m doing today. You could do this through trigger point work. You can do this through stretching, yoga, Pilates, chiropractic, meditation, boxing, walking, playing with the dog, playing with the cat, playing with the kid. Just about anything does this tool.

Let us relax for a second. After you’re done doing what you’re doing, you stop. You stop moving, and you breathe. You have to see now what did I do to my body to make it better, to make it feel better. Did I do it too fast, did I do it too slow, is not the point here. It’s what did I do. I foam rolled. Foam rolling is supposed to help fascial system. It’s supposed to allow things to move through smoothly. I want you to just to freeze now, move that area. See how much better that area slides within itself because we used foam rolling and there’s not much of a glitch.

Then you get up, and you go back to your test. How much better?

You wait, and you see what’s happening inside your body. How well does that leg circulate? How well does that area feel better? If you went through a yoga class, how well is your body connecting? Then, how does this translate into you walking? I now had my ankle rearrange itself so it should translate to walking differently. It should move better. It should flow better. It should have more range of motion, so on and so forth. That’s only stepping one. Remember, foam rolling is not what did it. It’s what I’m doing after that makes it work and makes it stick, that makes it better. That’s your mind-body connection. Because now you’re saying it’s so much easier. Now I have to use it in that way. Allow it to go through.

A Common problem I see

I see with clients. I’ll get them off the table, everything is moving, everything’s working, and they go back into their old way of walking because they’re not being present to what’s happening now. They go into this walk and say, “Oh, I feel great.” They’re walking in this sturdy way, and they’re saying, “Oh my God, I can’t believe the way I’m feeling,” but it doesn’t translate to moving properly now. It’s humorous to me to watch.

Now to explore, play with it, do something and then comment down below. If it’s foam rolling, foam roll. If you have not gotten into the program yet about foam rolling for self-care and getting to do it properly so you can do it, I teach you how to become more mind-body balanced throughout the whole training. It’s really easy, really simple. I’ll put the link down below. Do that.

Comment below. Tell me what you did: foam roll, trigger point, and stretch. I did jumping jacks. I meditated for a minute. I watched this video and just sitting here I could feel this, this, this. I need to workout my glutes. I have to do something. Then write below how it changed, how you thought differently about how your body’s moving. It could go the opposite way. If you’re sitting all day and you’re like, “Oh man, I feel horrible,” how does that translate to how you move in your life? Comment down below. Next week we’re going to be talking about trigger point work, and we’re going to show you exactly what you need to do to get more hang strength, some more thumb mobility. It’s all based on the mind-body connection. Until next time, later.