The following is a collection of the tutorial videos that I have posted to YouTube over the last few years that teach some of the self-care routines that I suggest to my Manual Therapy clients.
I have categorized these and presented them in a way that you should get a good idea of which videos might be helpful for what you are currently working with.
Daily Practice
First, let's get into the bare minimum practice that I recommend for daily maintenance. There are two main things, breathing exercise, and meridian stretching. The breathing you could do anytime, anywhere, really, and the Meridian Stretching takes less than 10 minutes once you learn it. Building a habit is almost as important as what you are doing, so focus on building this into a daily routine, and then adding on some more specific exercises for a longer session a couple of times per week. Here is the Breathing Exercise tutorial video:
The Meridian Stretches are an excellent routine that stretches the whole body in a short amount of time. I always feel worse if I miss a day of this routine, and it's so brief that it's hard to make an excuse for missing it:
If you want to do a little more, try following along with this general mobility routine:
Structural Alignment
Sotai therapeutic exercise is a gentle Japanese method of restoring balance to your body. By moving in ways that feel good and natural, it helps relieve pain, tension, and stiffness, allowing your body to reset and heal itself. By synchronizing these movements with our breathing, we can retrain the nervous system into releasing unnatural patterns of tension. Try each of these exercises and try and get a sense of which one resonates most with you, then consider doing it a couple of times per week:
Self-Shiatsu
Shiatsu is a Japanese healing art that uses gentle pressure, stretches, and focused touch to relieve tension, improve energy flow, and restore balance in the body. It’s like acupuncture, but without needles, helping with stress, pain, and overall well-being in a natural and relaxing way. It can be done from one person to another as a treatment, but we can also give ourselves Shiatsu. These videos work through various parts of the body with a brief Shiatsu routine. If you have any issues in these parts of the body, you might benefit from following the techniques in the relevant video every day or a few times per week:
Joint Mobilization Exercises
Try the tutorial videos in the following section that seem most relevant to what you want to work on. Take note if any of them feel particularly good for your pattern of tension. If you find an exercise that really lights you up, try taking it into your daily routine for a few weeks and see if your sensitivity changes.
Hip & Lower Back Mobilization Exercises
Aside from the Meridian Stretches (which will go a long way), here are a few joint mobility exercises that benefit the hips and lower back:
Knee & Ankle Mobilization Exercises
If you have any pain, tension, a feeling of instability, or previous injuries in your knee, ankle or feet, try some of these exercises:
Shoulder & Neck Mobilization Exercises
I struggled for years with shoulder problems from multiple training injuries. These are the exercises that work best for me, along with some of the exercises that have worked really well for my clients. Hanging is a must, in my opinion, for long-term lasting improvement:
Hanging can be too much for some people. This video offers an accessible variation if you are limited in such a way:
Here is a great routine for neck tension and for unwinding headache tension (along with the self-shiatsu for eyes and face routine previously mentioned) :
Though hanging is a vital and irreplaceable staple for most effective shoulder mobility routines, in my opinion, there are some other really effective shoulder mobility exercises worth mentioning:
Whole-Body Ground Movement Mobility Drills:
These routines are focused on reaching and moving between crawling positions. It challenges the stability of the core, whole-body flexibility and range of motion, hips, shoulder, and spine mobility. It also feels so good and there are a few interesting movement puzzles to explore in there. Enjoy:
I will continue to add to this article as I release more relevant YouTube videos, so be sure to bookmark this page and keep coming back for updates.
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