Your Mind – Body Relationship Can Become Your Greatest Ally.

Here is a Transformational 4 Step to live life on the vital side.

1. Become more aware of your body.

Body awareness is not a given. There are many parts, places, areas and relationships within your physical self that may lack awareness, so there is no conscious feedback loop to work from.

2. Become aware of a mind-set related to a posture, or to the way you move.

If you pay a little attention to your body you may notice that adjustments in your posture and physical organisation relate to changes in perception. They relate to the way you may be subconsciously thinking about a situation. Wouldn’t it be a good idea to become aware of how you are viewing something via awareness of your posturing / gesturing???

3. Change the Loop.

Posture is mind set, and mind set is posture. One can reinforce the other, and most certainly does at times. Create change in the patterns by re-organising the relationships within your physical body. The fibers of your body need the opportunity to open and align around a new sense of your self. This is what Body Harmony® does. Make a little adjustment to your way you hold your head while in conversation and see what happens. Or locate your feet more directly underneath you or STAND ON BOTH FEET evenly.

4. Go Along Your Merry Way.

Options, – this is all about creating behavioral options for yourself. Imagine opening the doorway to a new stream of responses, – a liberation from the obligation to respond as you always may have. The door is open, and as many people are experiencing, this kind of change becomes positively reinforcing because it feels so right.

A Most Outstanding Opportunity Is Almost Upon Us

Spring is here and so is the 10th One Month Body Harmony Retreat. It’s held in our seminar room on our 42 acre property in the Noosa hinterland, Alaya Verde. We are just over 15 minutes from Noosa. And once again we are pleased and inspired to have who we consider to be THE greatest manual therapy magician of our time, Dr Don McFarland. Don is not only a remarkable practitioner, – his teaching skills are quite exceptional. Thousands of individuals and practitioners from around the world have been the beneficiaries of new life and bodywork skills as a result of his teaching. And Don – the founder of Body Harmony®- is joined by 3 of the most experienced Body Harmony teachers in the world, Linda Haxby-McFarland, Gina Carruthers and Duncan Hogg.

Participation Options Are Flexible

You can now choose from 2 days of class right through to the full month program. New participants are required to commence from the beginning. To see what is available take a look below.

October 15 & 16 – Saturday & Sunday – An Introduction to Body Harmony® with the founder, Dr Don McFarland. Start here and you can continue on with other parts of the class for people new to Body Harmony®.

October 15 – 20 – Saturday through Thursday – Towards A Healthier Physiology – Learning the art of Body Harmony® – bodywork applied consciously. AUD$1350.00

October 22 – 26 – Saturday through Wednesday – Block 1 of an 11 Session Sequence covering the entire body. AUD$3125.00 for 15 days or pro-rata for 5 day segment*

October 28 – Nov 1 – Friday through Tuesday – Block 2 of an 11 Session Sequence covering the entire body.

Nov 5 – 9 – Saturday through Wednesday – Block 3 of an 11 Session Sequence covering the entire body.

Nov 11 – 13 – Friday through Sunday – This 3 day class specifically presents the information to help you reorient your perception towards the wondrous, and the miraculous. Learn to use your relationship to your body to ‘see the cup half full’.

Camping On-Site Is An Option

If you would like to enhance your experience and minimise your costs, camping at Alaya Verde is an option. Previous campers would drive to the beach for a swim before class! Camping costs: $25/night.

Why Participate In This Class

1. You want to learn about bodywork and develop a hands-on aspect to your skills.
2. You are interested in healing.
3. You need a break and don’t realise that this is an outstanding opportunity to revitalise.
4. Your body is tired and carrying excess stress detrimental to your health.
5. You’ve always been interested in psychology and are wondering how it relates to your body.
6. You’ve recognised behaviors that do not appear to support your goals, desires and intentions and would like to change them.
7. You’re a previous participant and remember how valuable the class is.

Pay Your Deposit by October 5 and receive a 5% discount.

Connect with the Body Harmony One Month Retreat on Facebook.

Email Duncan to discuss your participation.

* 5 day segments for new participants must be undertaken sequentially ie you have to start at the beginning.

As many of you are aware,  Dr Don McFarland – the author of ‘Body Secrets‘ and the founder of Body Harmony®- is coming to Australia this October to present the One Month Bodywork Retreat at our venue in the Noosa Hinterland.

Don McFarland is widely considered to be one of the most remarkable practitioners of our time – with 60 years of experience – he has dedicated a lifetime to practicing, teaching and developing the ‘hands-on’ transformational arts. He is again a presenter at the World Massage Conference this year and will be in Australia to teach the latest developments in Body Harmony®. Anybody interested in massage, bodywork, manual therapy or healing can benefit from the skills Don McFarland has refined over the many years his career has spanned. The One Month Retreat is divided into 3 different sections which can be taken as a whole, or separately. We welcome your inquiry today.

To download the full brochure click this link 2011 One Month Program

Listen to this short excerpt from ‘The Body Harmony Experience”‘ CD featuring Dr Don McFarland. bh-experience-sample1

Oct 15 – 20     Towards A Healthier Physiology

These first 6 days build a foundation for learning and practicing the work. The fundamentals of any successful bodywork interaction are explored through giving, receiving and coaching. Experiential exercises, demonstrations and relevant case histories are all utilised to enhance the quality of each treatment. Movement therapeutics, up-to-date physics and science, understandings of perception, posture, physiology and much more are woven together to allow you to appreciate more of the Body Harmony® experience.

EARLY REGISTRATION $1195.00 / REGULAR TUITION $1350.00

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2011 One Month Retreat Noosa, Australia

October 15 – November 13

This is the 10th consecutive year of the One Month Body Harmony® Retreat. The dates have changed slightly, we are running from mid October to mid November this year. Recent developments in the practice of Body Harmony® from our international event in New Orleans produced some wonderful outcomes. ‘Ease, Efficiency & Enjoyment’ – these qualities applied to our bodywork practices lead to easier ways of achieving better results. This is a unique opportunity – 150 years of bodywork experience shared between Don, Linda, Duncan & Gina – a wealth of support to assist your learning and realization.

The 2011 program is an opportunity that we think appeals equally in merit to the practitioner (or would be practitioner) and to the individual seeking growth and personal realization. As in past years, our program is available in smaller segments and these options can be viewed in the e-brochure. If you would to benefit from participation in some or all of this event, email Duncan duncan@healthinperspective.org to express your interest. To download the pdf brochure for this event, – follow this link to our downloads page.

Some helpful suggestions – from Gina Carruthers

Getting to know your physical self is subtle but really very simple and one of the greatest things to focus on to bring ease, health and joy. Here are a few suggestions and their benefits:

1) Quiet yourself Down – Get on the ground, in constructive rest, and just be quiet. The benefits include: calming the nervous system, aligning with gravity, synchronizing internal harmony, and releasing your core to something greater than itself – the earth beneath you. Emptying yourself allows for new thoughts and behaviors to take hold.

>2) Centering your Pelvis – Sit, Stand and Sleep with a centered pelvis. The benefits include: calming the nervous system, aligning with gravity, eliminating muscular compensations, and being more aware of what takes you away from ease in your life.

3) Hydrate your Spine – Keep your spine hydrated through micro movements in every direction including curling, arching, and lateral fish movements. The benefits include: efficient nervous system, supportive bones, eliminating tension, and a juicy experience of yourself and life.

4) Support your body with adequate water and minerals. The benefits include having muscles that CAN relax, and reducing the amount of time your body has to revert to a ‘survival response’ leading to physical compensations that reduce your overall efficiency.

Your Basal What?

Have you heard about your ‘basal ganglia’? Most likely not. It happens to be the name for the place in your brain where embedded behaviors are organised, – these are behaviors you don’t have to think about to engage in. Examples include writing perhaps, or walking, or typing, or driving – and also things like how you approach a problem, a relationship, a new possibility.

Imagine, all those things learned and embodied, – your behavioral repertoire ready to engage given the right stimulus. Sometimes that automated response is perfectly matched to the circumstances, and sometimes it is not. At times a behavioral tendency can itself become a burden, a form of self-sabotage, – an unwelcome input. Here is one area where Body Harmony® can be very useful to you.

This is our area of expertise. Body Harmony® is a set of transformational tools to help you make the corrections when a behavior no longer matches your intentions. Body Harmony® is a form of body processing that helps to make a possibility more probable by making the process of becoming aware much easier. The hands-on element of the work brings fluidity to the rigidity of over-used behaviors, that take the form of your physical grievances. Body Harmony helps you to make a self directed change, – the change of your choosing. A life supportive change. Sometimes you have to change your Body to change your Mind.

Finding Realization In The Body…

A newly released book we came across, ‘Touching Enlightenment, Finding Realization in The Body‘ by Reginald Ray, suggests that ‘to abandon discursive thinking – disembodiment – as our primary way of orienting ourselves…. and more than that, that a wave of alternatives to engage where we are living out of the full, unique embodiment that is possible for us all are now becoming more compelling to counter our dissociation.’ We tend to agree. In his 1967 book, ‘Betrayal of the Body‘ Alexander Lowan MD writes that, “To know who one is, an individual must be aware of what he feels. He should know the expression on his face, how he holds himself, and the way he moves. Without this awareness of bodily feeling and attitude, a person becomes split into a disembodied spirit and a disenchanted body.” Becoming acquainted with your first order experience provides you with direct and very useful information. All of the principles expressed through our work aim at realigning your mind and consciousness within bodily sensation and immediate experience. This can be very useful indeed.

And finally a few updates

We would like to thank Sydney based photographer Andre Martin for his assistance in photographing our retreat/B&B.

Check out ‘Your Brain at Work’ by David Rock. Available as an audio download from Audible.com.

For those of you who don’t know our son Kim is continuing to expand his education in all aspects of natural health and healing (check out Kimmana.com for info). As of September 2012 we intend to add cleansing and detox programs to what we offer at Alaya Verde. Also, Alaya Verde is on Facebook. We would be pleased if you ‘Like’ our page…

The next Body Harmony International Conference is anticipated to be held in June of 2012. Granada, Spain is shaping up as the destination and we are currently deciding on venues to host the event. Many thanks to Andrea and Esperanza for helping with the research.

Congratulations to Robyn Barraclough for producing an excellent website for the Canberra Body Harmony School. Click the link to see the site.

Also, Body Harmony® is on Facebook. Click this link and get the updates by choosing to ‘Like’ the Body Harmony® page.

La Niña In Queensland

Just a little update for those who have checked in with us about the weather lately. Where we live we had approximately 650 mm of rain in December and 750 mm of rain in January. That’s a total of 1400 mm or 56 inches. Our ducks liked it. The devastation this caused in other parts of south east Queensland was massive and experiences like these are traumatic for all involved. It does bring out the best in people though. Friends of ours – Jon & Judy Durand from Beech Mountain Pottery – filled their van with the water purifiers they make, drove to the worst affected valley and started handing them out to people. Awesome. Now cyclone Yasi is bearing down on northern Queensland – a catagory 4 cyclone (5 is the highest) and the system is HUGE. Wind gusts are anticipated to be up to 240 klm or 150 miles an hour. Preparations are underway. It is well north of us on its current trajectory.

So this month’s Body Harmony® update has four items:

1. A reminder about New Orleans in May. People are enrolling now to receive the discount applicable to registrations prior to February 5. Call me if you are interested, +61 (0)7 5485 3099 and check out the post at http://healthinperspective.org/general/neworleans2011/

2. Body Harmony  – the Gold Coast Feb 15 – late afternoon/evening information session and private sessions with Duncan Hogg. Contact Scott Quilliam for details.

3. Bringing the principals of Body Harmony to your area, office, group etc If you are interested in hosting an educational event contact Duncan to discuss the options.

4. A short article of interest. I recently watched a very interesting program on SBS Mind Over Money that looked at emotional factors affecting financial decision-making. (more…)

This Conference Will Rock!

In and out of the conference this event will change your life! First Time in the USA. Join us in New Orleans and discover more about yourself  in a city that knows how to celebrate living. New Orleans has soul, depth, and is the birthplace of jazz and the blues. The magic of Body Harmony® meets the magic of New Orleans. They call New Orleans ‘The Big Easy’ for a reason. Taste it, feel it, live it – Body Harmony® and New Orleans are coming together in May 2011. To download the brochure click here to our ‘Downloads’ page and then click the ‘New Orleans – 2011 Body Harmony International Conference’ link. (more…)

Greetings Friends

I have some thoughts and suggestions about getting your decade off to a great start! I notice that as we become proficient in bodywork, we come to expect certain results based on our past successes.

This can be satisfying but it can also become a sabotage. Because Body Harmony brings something more to the table. Every session can, and should, at least touch upon some unfamiliar wonderments, and help create new standards of reference.

It’s important to see your clientele as they are.. but when you also see them as they can be, you make an excursion into some unexplored abilities. You add even more value to the process when you see yourself as you are….and as you can be.

Keep in mind that the sum total of human 
knowledge these days, doubles in months, (some say weeks) rather than 
years. Your ability to apply this knowledge is the key to your personal prosperity.

Intention works! But how well do you trust your Intention Quotient?

Do you suspect that some old familiar thought patterns might limit you? (more…)