“We can only touch in so many ways. But it’s the choices we make with the findings of our touch that makes the difference.”

A while back I wrote a blog titled “Jiro Dreams of Sushi” (The original article can be viewed here). The blog references the movie by the same title, which follows a 85 year old Japanese restauranteur through over a period of time. Jiro makes sushi. He has done the same thing for decades. The sushi is not complex; in fact it consists only of rice with raw fish draped over the top. But it is Jiro’s process and preparation that gives his 10 seat sushi bar Michelin’s highest rating of 3 stars.  He has formed the rice and prepared the fish over and over, thousands of times, each time moving closer to what he feels is perfection, though never fully expecting to be perfect. Jiro’s customers book a seat at his table up to a year in advance and are willing to pay what he charges for his product, knowing its value. Jiro essentially does the same thing over and over, much like we manual therapists.

I’ve frequently been asked why I teach such a small variety of continuing education seminars. Why don’t I have an entire “line” of classes? First off, I do not think our work (myofascial release or other manual therapies) need be made complex or expensive to learn. This runs counter to many in the CE field (Read Paul Ingraham’s article on Modality Empires for a better understanding). Understand anatomy, physiology, kinesiology, and neuroscience and you are nearly there. Many of you may have mortgaged the ranch on your training and I in no means wish to disparage you or your choices. The mortgage on my myofascial release training has finally been paid off, so I know of what I speak. I received a very thorough education in manual therapy through my MFR, CST, and other modality trainings, but I realize that much was redundant and unnecessary. When we touch someone, we can only do a certain amount of different “things”. We call it hundreds of different titles, but essentially our hands can only do so much when we touch a patient. This is the nature of my version of MFR and the reason for this article. Refining our touch is what MFR is about, at least to me. Coming into full contact and communication with my patient’s and their symptoms/pain is what I try to do with every interaction. If my patient is ever laying on my table wondering why I am doing what I am doing, I am not doing my job properly. They should always be connected to their symptom in same fashion during treatment.

Think about this for a moment; have you ever received treatment and wondered why your therapist was doing what they were doing? Have you felt that they were wasting your time/money, even while they tried to convince you that the area they were working was important? Did they ever try to convince you by using a saying like, “find the pain, look elsewhere for the cause”, trying to convince you why they were treating an area of your body which you had no apparent pain/issues? Don’t feel alone, I’ve been there and I used to treat in this fashion. There are times when the apparent “cause” is distant to where the pain is noted, but this is the exception, not the rule. (I placed the word “cause” in quotation marks as we are seldom ever really able to determine the true cause of an issue. W may think that we know, but what we feel to be the cause tends to be more a product of our training and beliefs than true, anatomical/physiological cause.) Now, I have simplified my approach. It is my job to locate an area of the body that, when engaged, creates a positive connection to the patient’s pain or dysfunction, a connection that they validate as “familiar”. Determining a technique is simple, as you already created the technique in the process of engaging the pain. I have covered this “feedback loop” in previous posts (here, here, and here), as well as in-depth in my seminars. It is my job to assure that each patient I treat is at all times engaged with their pain/problem during treatment. I also do not believe it to be true that “if we do not take care of this now, it will be a problem in the future”. There is little evidence that this statement is true. If I they cannot relate to what I have palpated and intend on treating, then I am not doing my job properly.

Our work is simple, but this does not make it easy. Simplicity and mastery can go hand-in-hand. I see us like Jiro in that we have only so many options when it comes to engagement. We can only touch in so many ways. But it is the choices we make with the findings of our touch that makes the difference. It is the refinement of our touch that makes us effective. It is the shift toward perfecting our touch that makes our work effective.

 “Put your heart, mind, intellect and soul even to your smallest acts. This is the secret of success.”
– Swami Sivananda

For Now,

Walt Fritz, PT

Foundations in Myofascial Release Seminars

Author: Walt Fritz