Tom Myers – Science of Stretch: Anatomy Training for Stability and Resilience

Tom Myers – Science of Stretch: Anatomy Training for Stability and Resilience

The word “flexibility” is often associated with yoga. But what does it mean to be flexible? In this four-week online course, Anatomy Trains founder Tom Myers walks you through the latest science on stretching, including the roles that fascia and your nervous system play, as well as common yoga injuries and postural patterns associated with both stiffness and hypermobility. You’ll learn how to work with both in your practice, or with your yoga students. This course fulfills Yoga Alliance’s anatomy requirements.

We all have either experienced injury, instability, or tightness; or we have had students who have come to us for solutions for them. This course will help you understand the basics of stretch—what anatomical systems are in play. But most importantly, body reading and postural clinics within the course will help you start to identify postural patterns in yourself and your students and adjust what you are teaching in ways that will lead to integrated wellness.

Here’s what you’ll learn:

• The anatomy of stretch
• New science on stretch
• The relationship between fascial systems and stretch
• The relationship between your nervous system and stretch
• How to identify postural patterns
• How to apply these principles to asana

Each week you’ll receive:

• Lectures that help you understand anatomical systems in the context of stretch
• Body reading clinics and asana practices that help embody what you’ve learned
• Homework to prepare you for the next week

Plus…

• A webinar recording in which Tom presents bonus lessons and answers learner questions
• A private Facebook community where you can connect with other course participants and Anatomy Trains instructors

Continuing Education:

This course qualifies for 20 non-contact continuing education hours with Yoga Alliance and meets the organization’s requirements for online anatomy training.

SECTION 1 | The Anatomy of Stretch

• Welcome
• Overview
• Where stretch happens
• Types of stretch
• Systems that inform stretch
• Homework

SECTION 2 | Focus on Fascia

• Fascial basics
• Fascial genetics
• Stretching Fascia
• Stretch injuries, overuse, and underuse
• Homework

SECTION 3 | The Neurology of Stretching

• The neurology of stretching
• Fascial neurology
• Neuromuscular stretching
• Homework

SECTION 4 | Special Cases and Body Reading

Thomas Myers is the author of Anatomy Trains (used around the world in yoga teacher trainings) and the co-author of Fascial Release for Structural Balance. He has also produced over 35 DVDs and numerous webinars on visual assessment, Fascial Release Technique, and the applications of fascial research. Myers has practiced integrative manual therapy for 40 years and is a member of the International Association of Structural Integrators (IASI) and the Health Advisory Board for Equinox. Based in Maine, Myers and his faculty provide continuing education in Anatomy Trains and holistic myofascial strategies for a variety of movement and manual therapy professionals worldwide, as well as professional certification in Structural Integration based on the Anatomy Trains Myofascial Meridians. He studied directly with Drs. Ida Rolf, Moshe Feldenkrais, and Buckminster Fuller. He has also studied with movement teachers Judith Aston, Emilie Conrad, and in the martial arts. His Structural Integration program is influenced by cranial, visceral, and intrinsic movement studies with European schools of osteopathy.