CONTINUED from the GoFundMe website

The DSL Method of Yoga & Bodywork includes …

If you need more information, what follows is a more Comprehensive Description . . . (There is some redundancy, for those of you who scrolled on down before reading the Short Version.)

Again, this project is a combination of a Crowd Funding AND a Crowd Sourcing Campaign, in hopes that you will also collaborate with me in the finalizing of a series of my publications relevant to helping MANY people with their soft tissue injuries, as well as their other health care objectives, with yoga and/or bodywork.

For example, their are WAY too many Yoga Teachers and Massage / Bodywork Therapists with pain and dysfunction caused by soft tissue injuries. If we can help them (or YOU if you are one of them) heal themselves, or each other, then they’ll be much better able to help all their students and clients, too.

While Yoga Injuries are a big focus for me — mainly because so many people, including ME, used yoga to FIX their injuries — the VERY SAME principles apply to other activities, including doing massage & bodywork, fitness training, Pilates, ballet teaching, martial arts, and so on. Many of them do the same basic things that cause so many problems.

However to make the project go more smoothly and quickly, we’ll be making a big effort to start with yoga teachers, because there are so many of them out there, and they are well positioned to spread the word about what we are doing. And they can refer to massage & bodywork therapists who know the hands-on portion of this approach, as well.

Then we’ll expand our focus to contacting massage & bodywork therapists. (Although I am already making contact with some of them, too.)

The natural extension of that is many of the students & clients of those teachers and therapists have similar injuries of soft tissues, such as repetitive strain and carpal tunnel-like symptoms. These are among THE most widely reported injuries in America, and is very costly to people and society in many ways.

Yet many of those teachers & therapists do NOT realize how much they can help their students & clients with these problems and with, in some cases, only basic modifications of what they already know how to do with yoga and/or bodywork.

Unfortunately, although quite excellent at Emergency Medicine, the current, orthodox medical system, with their current “toolbox,” is NOT very good at solving such soft tissue problems as we’re discussing here. If there is no “damaged tissue,” their methods are far less effective. They often prescribe drugs or even surgery, often turning out to be ineffective or causing other, sometimes worse problems.

With PROPERLY prescribed drugs being the THIRD leading cause of death in America today, it’s becoming increasingly dangerous to use the orthodox methods in such cases, especially the type where there is no actual “damage” to the tissues.

Or they prescribe “strength training,” which in many cases only makes it worse.

Obviously, if a muscle is “too tight,” tensing it even more is unlikely to help much, or VERY likely to make it worse. It is true that strength training can, up to a point, resolve certain related issues. However I don’t think it’s because they are “getting stronger.” (There are several reasons for that but too technical to get into here.)

Lack of fundamental strength is in many cases NOT the main issue when it comes to less pain, range-of-motion, dysfunction, or posture & movement.

Yet even in the yoga and bodywork realms, there are many similar Myth-Conceptions masking what really needs to be done to help people. One of the things my various publications do is dispel MANY of those Myth-Conceptions.

“Tight Muscles” Cause Trouble …

Many injuries are the result of what I call C.E.M.&.N.T.S. or Chronic, Excess Muscle & Nerve Tension & Stress, loosely referred to as excessively “tight muscles.” Very often it’s so bad it prevents yoga teachers or body therapists from working with and helping their own Students & Clients. Or for those students & clients to do their jobs or live their lives, either.

To be clear, “tight muscles” are not necessarily “damaged” muscles. They are not necessarily  “pathological.” If they ARE pathological, proper medical treatment is recommended. Yet in many cases, the muscles have only taken their normal function of contracting & shortening a little, or a lot, too far.

One explanation for pain is that a “tight muscle” reduces blood flow into an area (ischemia), and reduced blood causes oxygen deprivation (hypoxia). But the tight muscle itself is not a “pathology.”

Therefore we are NOT treating medical conditions. We are helping people learn how to Feel & Relax their  “tight muscles.”

As well, many people do not realize that at its root, the very same process — chronic, excess muscle & nerve tension & stress — also contributes to the Premature Aging process. But that’s too much to get into here.


SO . . . here is what this Crowd Funding Project is all about . . .

This Crowd Funding + Crowd Sourcing Project is about YOU helping me finish the early stages of Creation & Promotion of a comprehensive Yoga / Bodywork Educator & Therapist’s training program, especially focused on helping heal many kinds of Soft Tissue Injuries that so many people are afflicted with.

Prevention is a Major Focus, as in yoga and bodywork injuries, but the very same principles are also applicable to maximizing a person’s musculoskeletal  functions and overall health. This includes a strong focus on activating the parasympathetic nerve system which controls the rest, repair, regeneration & immune functions of the body.

This means our Project can become a Preventive Health Care Process, not just a way to “fix problems.”

So this program should have a wide appeal to many people. Yet for more effective marketing, we need to focus in on one or a very few niches to start out.

The First Major Step will be completing my nearly finished series of infographics, e-books and “min-e-courses” to get the attention of those people who would be, initially, most interested in what we are offering.

We’ll be addressing yoga teachers, yoga therapists, massage & bodywork therapists, and other health care professionals wanting to use Conscious Stretching (yoga) and/or Hands-on Therapy (bodywork) in their work with students & clients. This might even be personal trainers / fitness coaches, Pilates instructors, and so on. We might even attract some physical and occupational therapists along the way.

However the focus will start with yoga teachers, and quickly expand to include massage & bodyworkers, who might start showing up anyway because I am putting the word out to some of them right now, and whom I know directly.

And of course, beyond receiving my initial publications in exchange for your donations, YOU might be one of those people who will either take some further training, or otherwise benefit from this knowledge.

These publications are infographics, min-e-courses and (depending on if I break one or two of them up into different e-books) about 6 to 8 e-books from 80 to 300 pages in length. They are all on topics such as Yoga Injury Prevention, Philosophy & Physiology of Therapeutic Yoga & Bodywork, how the Psoas Muscles & CORE of the body work,  how the body breaks down, and so on.

MOST of the “creative writing” is already done, or at very least 80% done, 95% on others. It is the editing & formatting, and updating / fact checking for new research, that needs the time consuming work.

Illustrated below (and subject to feedback from you and any editing, including even the title) is the Main Publication, my Mini-Magnum Opus on Yoga & Yoga Therapy, serving as an introductory yet detailed foundation for the Philosophy, Principles, Practices & Physiology of my approach to Yoga:

One problem is what does NOT appear on the cover is this book has a HUGE amount of science — the anatomy & physiology — of how the body works in yoga, stretching and exercise.  It’s those kind of things I need the feedback on from YOU.

Here’s a Testimonial from a VERY successful & highly skilled Chiropractor who was a successful Massage Therapist before he went to chiropractic school:

“I read David Scott Lynn’s e-book which I highly recommend for every Massage Therapist [and Yoga Teacher] and I was amazed at how intricately he delves into and emphasizes, over and over from various angles, how our [clinical] work mostly works to affect the Nervous System in a variety of ways. … He explains nervous system and myofascial relationships brilliantly!”
Doctor Michael Koplen
Chiropractor & Former Massage Therapist
Chiropractor of the Year in 1992
Capitola, California

To learn more about my e-Book:

Detailed Description of Simple Steps to Let-Go Yoga

Table of Contents: Simple Steps to Let-Go Yoga

The other e-books that will be available to you, and are VERY near completion, are:

• Yoga Injury Prevention
• 12 Principles for Maximum Results & Minimum Injury in Yoga
• Psoas Muscle & It’s Affects on the CORE
• The Edge of Physiology
• BodyMind Breakdowns
• Tendinitis & Repetitive Strain Injury (RSI)

(The last two are in need of the most work, and will be a while before they are available.)

Here are two more, already on their last edit before being ready to send to you, maybe a day or two of work on each:

The next one is on my 12 Principles for Maximizing Results While Minimizing injury in Yoga:

After the initial work of getting these publications circulating (some of which are FREE), to reach the most number of health care teachers, educators and therapists, most of the actual training programs will be delivered via On-Line e-Courses on one of my websites, at very low prices. There will be a Private, Members Only Forum where students can converse with me and each other about the e-Courses and other relevant topics, and I will answer questions as best I can.

You can see the Proposed Content, stuff I’ve taught many times in different venues over the years, and Proposed e-Courses, on this web page:

Proposed CONTENTS of e-Courses

To implement the e-Course phase of the project, I’ll be creating text, animations, videos and whatever else is necessary to get the information across, and MUCH has been done already over the last several years.

I will also produce a smaller series of e-Courses useful to the General Public. (These will be less technical versions of the professional e-courses, and less expensive, possibly only $7 per month in return for weekly lessons on a recurring subscription basis.)

My estimate is it will take me about THREE MONTHS, Full Time, to get everything complete and ready to begin building those e-Courses.

This is where the e-Courses will be located:

member.dslyoga.com
(It’s not up to speed yet, it needs some work.)

So Here Is The Plan:

When (and IF) this Crowd Funding Project reaches $1,000 … The following things will happen …

1. I will take all my dozen or so publications that are near completion, make some minor editing & formatting changes, and send them out to you via e-mail. Which publications you receive will depend on which level you choose to contribute on the Donation Page. That means they should all be delivered — in their NEAR Final Draft form — within ten days of reaching the $1,000 mark.

Assuming you are interested in this kind of material, I believe I’m giving you far more than the value of what you are donating and what I’m selling them for on my webpages, so you will receive what I hope you’ll consider to be Great Value in return for your Donation.

(For those of you at the Basic level, who get the Concicse Version of my e-book, the really technical material is removed.)

If you are not familiar with my writing, you can see a series of my articles here:

Articles on Yoga Injury Prevention

General List of Articles
[some articles are in process of being writen]

2. You will, hopefully, READ as much of those publications as possible, and send me HONEST FEEDBACK & SUGGESTIONS on what you think needs to change, or be added to, or even left out of, or made less complicated, or whatever, in the materials. For example, my Simple Steps to Let-Go Yoga e-book might really need to be broken down into two different books; one on the practice of postures, the other on the sciences behind how yoga works.

I will have final say on each change, but I want these publications to be as relevant & useful to as many people as possible. Considering on how well Crowd Sourcing (somewhat different than crowd funding) has worked for others, your feedback will be invaluable.

One Big Question will be, should the e-books be professionally edited? That costs A LOT of money, so I’m hoping we can do the job as a Crowd Sourcing project. Professional editing, however, would require this Crowd Funding Project to go well past its donation target.  (That would be called a “Stretch Goal” on some of the other crowd funding sites.) . . . So several things need to happen to make that happen. But maybe we won’t need to do that piece.

3. I will immediately begin writing DAILY articles for publications in many places, and networking with various websites, to get the word out about what we are doing. You will be informed via e-mail everytime I publish, and where to find it.

I will also be preparing the already existing website I mentioned above for the comprehensive, On-line e-Courses where I’ll be doing the professional level trainings for the yoga teachers and massage / bodywork therapists and others whom are interested. If we can make this project work, they will receive A LOT of in-depth training for a very low monthly fee, especially compared to going to live, in-person seminars.

There will be a less technical level of e-Courses for the General Public, as well.

4. As your feedback comes in, I will be integrating it into the publications, and also preparing to do a series of on-line seminars where we’ll discuss all these issues, and you will learn more about how my therapy system works, and how to apply it.

I’m projecting at least FIVE to SIX of these seminars, at least hour or more in duration, approximately two per week. (They will be recorded if you cannot be available for the live one.) I’m hoping to start these by the end of May or early June.

IF all goes well, at this point, we will be about 4 to 6 weeks into the project from the time we reach the initial $1,000 target. … I’m expecting this phase of the overall project to take about 12 weeks.

5. After the feedback comes in, and we do the on-line seminars, I will re-edit & re-format the publications per our collaborative efforts and your feedback. Those of you who contributed in exchange for the e-book licenses will soon receive the Final Versions for your use. We will also have inserted (after the cover page) two Custom Pages  for your personalized version of the e-book(s) you choose to give away or sell. (You can promote yourself, your business, or anything directly relevant to what we are doing, and tasteful, of course.)

For e-book licensees,  Your Worst Case Scenario is that the main e-book, Simple Steps to Let-Go Yoga, is already up to a high value, and you will have access to that at whatever point you want, including immediately after you donate. Or you can wait for the final edit. Even if this project does not “go,” you will still have your e-book licenses to sell.

So, if you buy 18 licenses for $100, and sell each book for $10, you made $80 profit on your donation to this project. It is already for sale on my own website for $27 and at Amazon Kindle. Or you can sell them at your cost or give them away as high-value bonuses to students, clients or prospects … whomever you want.

(Yes, we might, from the feedback process, choose to modify the e-book somewhat, but I have already gotten enough VERY positive feedback on The Simple Steps that I have no problem releasing it to the general public now, as is.)

6. I will continue the process of creating the materials for the e-Courses, and publishing daily articles to achieve our overall objectives. I will set up ad campaigns on Facebook to market the publications, and send out e-mail blasts via a company that has 100,000 e-mail addresses of yoga teachers and yoga schools nationwide for VERY reasonable prices. I will begin marketing the e-courses, as well.

7. I will attend the conference of the International Association of Yoga Therapists in June, and begin interacting with everyone who’s interested. I will have information packets with me to hand out to interested parties. … I will also determine what other conferences, such as massage therapy, I should attend.

8. At this point, probably in July, I’ll begin a nationwide tour to go to different cities to deliver the live, in-person seminars & workshops for those of you who donated at that level. Your donation covers my Tuition Charge, and you’ll be covering the expenses including my travel and lodging. Yet if you have a teaching facility we can present the trainings in, the costs should not be very high.

My prime focus will be on Injury Prevention for yoga teachers and massage / bodywork practitioners. Yet the very same principles will directly support maximizing other body mechanics and so forth in helping utilize their body better even when they’re not in pain or dysfunction.

For those who might want other content in the programs, here again is a summary of the kinds of stuff I teach:

SUBJECTS of the DSL Method of Yoga & Bodywork
[Scroll down a bit to get to the Subjects.]

And you can charge students whatever you want, or if you have many teachers or therapists working for you, you can offer it as a Bonus Training. Or just charge enough to cover your costs of the donation and expenses. Or whatever. We can discuss ways to make it work for you.

I’ve been learning a LOT about marketing, so we should be able to come up with a good strategy for you.

If the On-line e-Courses are successful, it is very possible these are the LAST TIME I’ll be doing in-person seminars for quite some time.

If I end up with several hundred on-line students, I will have a full time job working with those people for quite some time.

9. All along the way, I’ll keep you informed of what’s going on, or not, via e-mail and on-line seminars.

Physical / Mental & Postural Yoga (Conscious Stretching) focused on RELAXATION of excess tension & stress …

And for more Extreme Cases, we have Yoga-based, Hands-on Bodywork taking relaxation to a far deeper level than is usual, helping resolve more specfic issues.

And for knowing WHERE to work, and where NOT to work, we have BIO-Structural Balancing …

BIO =
B = Bioenergetic & Bio-Logical: the study of the transformation of energy in living organisms, the intelligence of the human body & mind.
I = Integral: having or containing all essential parts necessary to be whole or complete
O = Optimum & Organon: the most favorable conditions or level for growth, reproduction, or success. … Organon is a “means of reasoning or system of logic.”

Structural Analysis, which includes Postural Assessement, is how we determine where to work in the human body, which is more about knowing which muscles NOT to work. Sometimes, the pain & complaint of the client is on the opposite side of the body from where they feel it. For Example:

It is often the case that the cause of an issue is in the over-shortened muscles (dark gray, above), which are frequently on the oppsite side of the body, the over-lengthened muscles (red, above). Yet the over-lengthrned muscles are often working MUCH harder, are more stressed and “tight,” and are more painful.

WHY Hands-on Therapy?

While conscous stretching is very often enought to rebance the structure and decrease excess tension & stress,  with hands-on therapy, you can often produce more results in a few minutes or hours than you can in hours or days with yoga. Once musculo-fascial units get past a certain point or excess tension & trauma, they become MUCH more difficutl to relax with stretching alone, no matter HOW “conscious” your stretching is.

That’s why I introduced the hands-on work into my therapy practice, rathre than exclusivley yogic stretching.

The DSL Method of Yoga & Bodywork Therapeutics:

It is my 40 Year Experience as a Yoga / Bodywork therapist that many of these problems of the soft tissues are MUCH easier to resolve than many people realize. Working directly with the Psycho-Neuro-Musculo-Fascial System in specific ways can create major changes for the better.

And I have personal, First Hand & First Body experience in all this, because I had in 1982 suddenly developed severe back and hip pain lasting three and half years, and no one could help me with it. So I had to figure it out myself.

And I DID! … It took me almost four months, three hours per day of A-symmetrical yoga, but I did it mostly with yoga alone.

However I could NOT have done it without the system of structural analysis I had learned in 1982. Now at first, everytime I did yoga, it would nearly paralyze me, even though I had MUCH positive experience with yoga earlier in my life. But I was unable to structually evaluate myself until 1985 when I got a set of full body X-rays done. Then I was able to apply the postural analysis to my own body.

Once I saw the X-rays, I knew I had been stretching all the wrong muscles — the ones that felt good — and that’s why my yoga had been throwing me further out of balance and casuing even more pain. So I started stretching the specific muscles I now realized were “over-shortened,” but did not hurt much at all. This isn’t always the case, but in many people, it is.

Yes, doinog yoga 3 hours day, 6 days a week, for three or four months seems like a long time. But it was nothing compared to the pain I was in. And my pain started easing off almost immedialtey.

And THAT was the basis of my system of therapy.

I then developed, refined and taught my system of yoga / bodywork therapeutics for many years, but it was only to small groups scattered across America. (I’ve never been all that great of a salesman, but I’ve learned that learning to get the message out helps in getting your ideas, information & skills to the right people.)

Later on, I learned how to incorporate self-treatment via massage tools, which helped with the remaining “tight muscles” and pain. … We’ll be creating an e-Course on  that, too!

But as one Yoga Teacher said:

“While DSL’s concept and execution of body work is nothing short of amazing, it is his approach to yoga that has been life altering for me. The subtle yet profound changes have reinvented not only my own practice, but the way I teach yoga as well. Of all the yoga techniques I’ve studied in the past 30 years, not only are David’s methods what I’ve been searching for , but the feedback from my students is equally as positive. I’m excited about teaching yoga again.”
Nan Araneo, Rockport, MA
Yoga Teacher

Then there’s this one from a medical doctor who was a yoga teacher before he went to medical school:

“Having had experience with many different body workers, David’s technique is certainly unique. There are levels of healing he achieves I’ve never seen before. This is clearly a result of a vast knowledge of anatomy and physiology combined with decades of hands-on experience.”
Dr. John Bordiuk, Nutritional M.D.
Inner Balance Med, Wellesley, MA

Doctor Bordiuk was one of my biggest supporters when I lived in the Northeast.

And a chiropractor:

“I have worked with many soft tissue therapists over the years. David Scott Lynn is the only one educated and skilled enough to do what I want with full confidence that the job will be done. My patients definitely feel the difference.”
Gary Fujinami, Doctor of Chiropractic,
Prescott, Arizona

You can read a lot more Testimonials from doctors, yoga teachers, massage therapists, musicians, and other private clients here:

Testimonials on the DSL Method of Yoga & Bodywork

Now, I’m not the only therapist working successfully with these kinds of issues. There are really quite a few using different techniques. But there are too few therapists getting the word out to the general population about this sufficiently, and too few yoga and bodywork people realize how effective their techniques can be working with Soft Tissue Issues.

OVERVIEW of the DSL Method of Yoga & Bodywork

Healing The Healers:

Ironically, many World Class Yoga Teachers have developed signficant problems with injuries, some to the point that pain and limitations were so bad they had joint replacement surgeries! This was mostly hip, knee and lower back trouble, and some shoulder and wrist.

And these are some of THE most highly trained yoga teachers in the WORLD! And they supposedly teach THE most “alignment conscious” forms of yoga out there. And we are often told that “proper alignemnt” in the postures is what “keeps us safe.” Yet with all their incredible training and precision in postures, these world class teachers had things like hip replacements and knee surgeries!

QUESTION: If THEY could not get the “proper alignment” right, then what’s going on here? And how could us mere mortals ever get it right?

ANSWER: It is NOT primarily about the Proper Alignment. It is about joint compression from over-aggresive attempts to pull or push the body into proper alignment, or ever deeper and too intense stretches.

You can learn about much of what I have to say about that in a series of articles on my web site here:

My Articles on Yoga Injury Prevention

On another note, all too many Massage & Bodywork Therapists have left their profession due to trouble in their arms, wrists and hands, and somewhat less so in other parts of their body. One estimate is that about 5% of therapists will suffer debilitating issues within five years.

I’m often amazed at how often a massage therapist posts a question of Facebook asking if anyone knows how to fix painful wrists, fingers, forearms, and so on. I’ve met in-person with masssage therapists in the same boat. When I ask them if their massage school instructors could help them, they often say the school didn’t know how to help them!

THAT is shocking to me.

But unfortunatley, many massage school teachers are not very experienced in clinical pactice. So that might explain that.

Yet because of my 40 years experience working directly with these kinds of problems, including in my own body,  I am VERY confident that MANY — maybe even most — of these issues could have been prevented with basic TRS (tension reduction strategies) or low-invasive techniques such as targeted therapeutic stretching or hands-on therapy.

We’ll also be talking about self-treatment with massage tools, in our programs, as well.

I’ll talk more about why I think all this is doable down below, but for the moment, here is the Overall Plan:

PART ONE is training the Teachers & Therapists to solve their own problems with a very specific approach to Conscious Stretching (Physical & Mental Yoga from a VERY Western & Scientific point-of-view) and my Yoga-based, Hands-on, Structural Bodywork techniques (manual pressure on specific musculo-fascial units).

“Yoga-based, hands-on bodywork” refers to the fact that when I designed my hands-on techniques way back in 1982, I intentionally did so incorporating principles of Physical, Mental & Relational Yoga I learned from Joel Kramer and his partner, Diana Alstad, back in 1976 in a onemonth, residential intensive off the coast of British Columbia.

(Joel was one of THE leading edge developers of American Yoga, redefining hatha (physical) yoga as a far more meditative, introspective system, far more than was commonly being taught in India at the time.)

Relational Yoga refers, in this case, to how the therapist should conduct him or herself in the therapeutic relationship.

After the intensive with Joel & Diana, I was doing yoga FOUR HOURS per day, 5 or 6 days per week, for months on end. In the 1980s, there were periods I was doing 3 hours per day quite consitently. And THAT is where I learned what makes a muscle REALLY let go. It has to do with a meditative, introspective body-mind connection via the brain, nerves and musculo-fascial system.

Yet these processes are amazingly simple and easy to learn, if you take the time.

PART TWO of the Overall Plan is teaching & supporting the Teachers & Therapists in helping their Students & Clients with similar issues.

Yoga teachers might never want to actually do hands-on therapy work. However if they do any adjusting at all of students, or really want to understand what’s happening in a student’s body, or een their own body, having hands-on experience of muscle release techniques will greatly expand their insights & skill in working with the human body and yoga.

This is especially true if they want to do Postural Yoga Therapy.

Likewise, Masage Therapists might never teach a yoga class. But there are so many things they can learn through yoga it will pay for them to get more knowledgeable and experienced in it. And they might want to offer customized yoga series to their clients to reinforce the work done on the therapy table, as I do.

And sometimes, a series of yoga postures, sometimes only a few, is ALL the Client needs to make MAJOR improvements in their situation.

Ultimately, I am hoping to find groups of people who want to pursue my approach to a combined approach  of yoga, bodywork & whole health therapeutics as a integral system.

My Philosophical & Physiological Foundations for Yoga and Bodywork are the same, BTW. That is in part why the overall system is so “integral” in nature.

PART THREE of the Overall Project is about getting the word out about these practitioners to the General Public, that there is potential, non-invasive help for their soft tissue injuries without drugs or surgery. It’s about educating, marketing & public relations to the people whom will be the end users of the services.

THAT will of course take THE most work and time. But that’s usually true of any good E-volutions.

I’m estimating Part One will take about 3 months of my time, FULL time, to get the project underway. That’s getting the slighly updated material out to you for your review, getting your feedback, writing daily articles, holding a series of on-line seminars, final editing, formatting & illustrating the e-publications, and getting the e-Courses under way. It also includes the yoga conference.

To reiterate, I’m asking YOU to contribute to this cause, and in return receiving and reading my various publications. Then, I’m hoping a significant number of you will send me feedback on these publications so I can fine tune & perfect them. I need to make sure they are relevant and useful for the most number of people.

Although they are written primarily for therapists and teachers, I also wrote them with the general public in mind, so a seriously interested person could understand them. Several people read them and said I succeeded in that intention.

And some of the On-line e-Courses will be suitable for the General Public as well, so they can take advantage of the preventive meaures protecting them in their yoga or stretching classes, or other exercise and sports activities.

But even those who sit at a desk all day can beneift from the same information if they’ll apply it on a regular basis. So even if their pain is from Reptitive Strain Injury from sitting at a computer and typing all day, we can very possibly, maybe probably, help them.

And we can do this WITHOUT “diagnosing” or “prescribing.” We’ll leave that to the doctors. ALL we’re doing, surprisinlgy, is helping people find, feel and relax their “tight muscles.”

Then, I’ll work on getting all the information out to the right people. Part of that will be me writing articles every day for publication in various web sites.

We will start by publishing e-books and shorter materials for yoga teachers and massage / bodywork therapists to prevent and repair their own problems.

One of the sister publications to Simple Steps is The Edge of Physiology, which is exclusively about the philosophy and physiology  of stretching and hands-on bodywork, including some Case Studies. It does not include much actual techniques, but more on that later.
This is one of the e-books that’s about 80 % ready to go. But I need your help to get it fully up to speed!

And I have several other e-books and short “min-e-courses,” on related topics 70 tp 90% done. Some of them just need a few hours work to be ready to send to you. I’m projecting that once I reach $1,000 on this Crowd Funding Campaign, within ten days you’ll have all the primary, current publications in your e-mail box on your computer. They are, lised again here:

Infographics (delivered to you in PDF form)
• 10 Common Causes of Yoga Injury

Min-e-Courses (delivered to you in PDF, e-Book form)
• 9 Natural Laws of Yoga
• C.E.M.&.N.T.S. [Chronic, Excess Muscle & Nerve Tension & Stress] • Basic Let-Go Yoga Posture Series

e-Books (delivered to you in PDF, e-Book form)
• The Simple Steps to Let-Go Yoga: Get Control by Letting Go of Tension, Stress & Habit Patterns
• Yoga Injury Prevention
• 12 Principles for Maximum Results & Minimum Injury in Yoga
• Psoas Muscle & It’s Affects on the CORE
• The Edge of Physiology

Then you will — hopefully — read some of them and send me your feedback. Then the following month we’ll do the online seminars, of which I’m planning probably FIVE of them on various aspects of this project. And as I said, they will be recorded so you can listen at your convenience. The following month I will work on integrating your feedback and finalizing the publications.

If all goes well, I am planning on attending the International Association of Yoga Therapists conference in California in June. This will give me an opportunity to meet with and discuss these ideas with some of the most influential yoga therapists in the country. I will have proudced and printed up an information packet to hand out at the conference.

All the e-books are designed to help Yoga Teachers & Therapists and Massage/Bodywork Practitioners heal their own problems … then take their work to an entirley new level. This will expand their skills in working with their Clients & Students, Setting The Stage to fill a Huge Void in the health care world.

That VOID is *Soft Tissue Injury* caused by chronic, excess tension and stress in muscles and fascia and the irritated nerves controlling them. These tensions are what causes Joint Compression, a major problem in yoga, stretching and other exercise practices.

If you did not yet read the article on yoga injury prevention, this is one of them specifically on joint compression:

Articles on Joint Compression

The current orthodox medical system does not focus sufficiently on soft tissue issues and the kinds of structural dynas we do, and there is such a focus on “strengthening” muscle that they often INCREASE joint compression, rather than relieving it. Or, many people receive drugs and/or surgery for problems that very often could be resolved with the non-toxic therapies of therapeutic, Conscious Stretching (yoga), or hands-on massage and bodywork therapy.

This Crowd Funding Project is designed to start out by helping those many yoga teachers and massage therapists whom are unnecessarily suffering with often debilitating injuries to their musculo-skeletal system and soft tissues. And the better they get at helping themselves, the better they’ll be at helping their Students and Clients in the General Public.

And that’s really the Ultimate Objective: To help teachers & therapists become more effective at helping their students and clients with their soft tissue problems. And then we will help others in the public find these therapists.

The Overall Project brings together my extensive, 40 years experience in a wide range of Alternative & Whole Health Care modalities. Yet it all starts with a series of relatively of small, doable steps: Getting the word out initially with articles in a wide variety of on-line publications, then following up with my free min-e-courses and e-books.

Then, for the more committed people, my series of on-line e-Courses.

So WHY listen to Me? … Who the Heck am I?

I got into martial arts & meditation when I was 13 years old (way back in 1967!) and was using it on a daily basis in various aspects of my day-to-day life and work. That got me off to a great start in all of this. …

I started teaching yoga in 1976 and learning bodywork in 1977. I learned a LOT about bodywork working with Eugene Donaldson, later to be a co-founder of Educating Hands, the massage school in Miami, Florida, as well as with Bruce Simer, an orginal founder of the American School of Massage in Florida.

In the 1980s I developed a clinically succesful method of using yoga and hands-on bodywork to help people resolve many soft tissue issues not being adequately addressed by either orthodox NOR alternative practitioners. (That’s what I had to do to get out of my OWN pain and sometimes near, though mild, paralysis.)

One major component in all this is my work for a few years in the mid-1980s with several leading edge medical and osteopathic physicians who were “alternative” and nutritional in their primary focus. I even managed the clinic of one of them, and was taking over mangement of another when we found out his investors had ripped him off and we had to close the clinic!

But it was with these docotrs that I learned a LOT about the inner-workings of both orhodox and alternative medicine. I also developed a Doctor/Patient Interface Program where I literally orchestrated the relationships between my Private Clients and the Doctors I knew whom I thought could best help my Clients with specific health challenges.

In the late 1980s and early 1990s, my Clients and Students were presidents and executiv e board members of the American Massage Therapy Asssociation, as well as several major massage schools. They include Robert K. King, Jim Hackett (both now departed), Ralph Stevens, and several others.

Heran except from one of my testimoinal pages:

“In the fall of 1989, Bob & Roy, the new owners of Heartwood Institute near Garberville, California, were in need of a new Deep Tissue instructor for their intensive, 10-week, residential Deep Tissue Therapy Training. They called Robert K. King, then President of the American Massage Therapy Association (AMTA) and then co-founder of the Chicago School of Massage Therapy, asking his suggestions to fill that position. Mr. King’s first recommendation was David Scott Lynn.”

And here’s what Ralph said:

“David’s emphasis on viewing posture as dynamic with the focus on the individual has increased my results. I would recommend the course to anyone who is looking for an understanding of the structural functioning of the body.”
Ralph Stephens, L.M.T. , N.M.T.
Sports Massage Instructor, Iowa City, Iowa

Beginning in 1989 at Heartwood and into the 2000’s, I taught my style of work around the country, and had an excellent reputation for providing high quality trainings for Yoga & Bodywork Therapists. Many students valued my programs as the most important they had taken.  I spent a yar teaching at Heartwood Institute, a residential, intensivce program in northern California:

“The students in Heartwood’s approved Massage program felt that The DSL Method [now known as DSL EdgeWork] was the most valuable work in Heartwood’s massage curriculum. Many students felt that David’s work instilled a sense of competence in their ability to do massage & bodywork. It is an open ended system allowing and encouraging students to continually improve their work through active practitioner/client exchange. I have personally found that, based on feedback from clients, The DSL Method is on par with, if not superior to, the other major bodywork systems available today.”
Rex Dippre, Massage Therapist, Director of Admissions, Heartwood Institute, 1989-1992, Arcata, California

The primary focus is similar to neuromuscular & myofascial related therapeutics for musculo-skeletal problems such as pain, poor posture, dysfunction, tendinitis (actually tendinopathy), RSI, and other trauma & injury issues. I use what’s called Structural Balancing to determine which parts of the body and muscles to work with, often distant from the location of the client’s pain or dysfunction.

A relatively unique element, however, is always attempting to coach or facilitate a Private Client in learning how to bring a meditative mind into their stretching or hands-on bodywork process. We are helping clients learn to FEEL, Relax, Lengthen & Balance their psycho-neuro-musculo-fascial system. In the process, they are learning to bring their mind down, via their nerve pathways, into their muscles so they can create a deeper, more integrated connection and relaxation. This gives them more self-awareness and in-the-moment control of their nerves, muscles and joints, helping them prevent further injuries, and reducing their tension & stress (RELAXING) while slowing down their aging process.

A major key of the trainings is to teach the therapists about C.E.M.&.N.T.S. or Chronic, Excess Muscle & Nerve Tension & Stress. I believe this is a major factor accounting for many health, fitness & function problems many people experience on a day-to-day basis.

And I have several hundred info-packed web pages, some of them many pages long, that several therapists have told me transformed the way they do therapy JUST from reading my free web pages. So I am confident we can make a BIG difference with the on-line trainings.

There are also some versions of my work for the General Public, because they need much of this information too, though less technical. Learning how to do yoga in a therapeutic fashion, and how to prevent yoga injuries, is a major factor there.

And a more informed Client or Student always gets more value out of the work teachers or therapists do with them. This will be important as therapists we train begin working more directly with these issues with their Clients.

It used to be I could only work with a dozen or so teachrs or therapists in one city at a time. The idea NOW is with the e-books, e-courses and private forum on the internet, I can work with hundreds or even thousands of teachers & therapists worldwide instead of a few dozen therapists in a few cities just in America alone.

WHY I Need Your Help …

So a few years ago, I realized I needed to get good at marketing to achieve what amounts to starting a minor E-volution in my niche within health care. I started extensive studies of web-development and marketing strategies. I had no idea how deep and wide a range of new topics I was getting into. And the last year or two there have been major changes in the internet & wb marketing world, meaning I had to learn a lot of stuff ALL over again. … This has taken a LOT of time!

Now, I almost made it, but there was a HUGE amount of work, and I had some MAJOR technical challenges, including a BIG Hack Attack, that nearly wiped me out.

But with everything double backed up, I’m pretty well recovered, but I need some help getting all this work finished …

But first, a little more background …

I had in the 1980s  developed a very clinically successful form of neuromuscular & myofascial therapeutics based on my extensive experiences in Physical/Mental Yoga and Structurally-oriented, hands-on Bodywork. In fact, my hands-on system, originally called Psycho-Muscular Release & BIO-Structural Balancing, was based on the principles of Physical, Mental & Relational Yoga I learned from Joel Kramer, whom many people call the *Father of American Yoga.* I applied his “yogic innovations” (which were published in Yoga Journal) to my therapeutic systems.

You can read some of Joel’s ground breaking articles here:

Joel Kramer’s Pioneering Articles on Physical & Mental Yoga

As you’ll see, one part of the Health Care Void I’m attempting to fill revolves, in part, around helping Yoga / Bodywork Therapists not just treat their Clients for soft tissue inuries, but also become competent advocates for their Private Clients & Students in the health & medical setting.

We’ll be looking at how to develop relationships with Whole Health Physicians who will appreciate the insights available from our trained Therapists. I mean, who better to collect a LOT of relevant data on the Client than someone who spends an hour or two, sometimes weekly, over extended periods of time? And in a more intimate setting like bodywork and yoga?

There IS the problem of finding the right, open-minded physicians. But that is in part our job, stimulating the demand for more physicians to become trained and comeptent in such work. It will be up to US to help stimulate that demand.

I currently and planning to, and have already started, in making contacts with Naturopathic Physicians who would be interested in forming networking alliances with Yoga / Bodywork Therapists.

YES, this is a Long Term Project. While  is in some way simple, it will not necessarily be easy. But as the old saying goes, if we don’t start Now, then When? And if not US, then Who? …

And if not on-line, then WHERE???

I’m hoping you’ll join me in such efforts.

Now, in 2003 -2005, I had a stint in the Boston area, working with professors and students of classical music, mostly cello and violin and some piano players, at the New England Conservatory of Music. I was working with a number of musicians who were either about to end their careers or live a life of pain, sometimes both.

Many had been under treatment for many months or MUCH longer from the Top Doctors and Therapists in Boston who specialized in musicians’ problems, but NOT getting relief. Some of them thought they would have to quit music all together.

Unfortunately, their therapists were using the usual “slide & glide” strokes, or doing “deep tissue” where they pressed in way too hard and too fast, not giving the tissues enough time to relax. Either too light, too deep, or too fast and not enough time for the tissues to relax sufficiently.

Or they were doing therapeutic stretching without the simple yet subtle elements that make stretcing FAR more effective. (admittedly, not too man people know about this.)

Yet I helped nearly everyone of them recover with my hands-on bodywork and yoga stretching therapy. Only problem is most of them were broke college students, so I gave MANY thousands of dollars of discounts to prove the validity of my work in that realm.

These problems were ALL about soft tissue injury, and the basic principles of helping them — relaxing their neuro-musculo-fascial units — are the same in most cases. I know it might sound too simple, but in many cases, it IS what people need most.

The Problem in Boston was my main Sphere of Influence was the President of the School, and he had a severe case of emphysema. One day, just as I had proven what I can do with musicians, he went into the hospital, and soon passed away. It was tragic becaue he was a very kind and considerate, and competent, man. And he was working for next to no money because he had been VERY successful in his life, and loved classical music.

But that killed my opportunities there. It is too bad because he was a VERY nice man, and had done a LOT for the school and the musicians.

Then in the mid-2000s, still in Boston, I started writing books & webpages, planning to transfer as much of my knowledge, skill & insight into on-line e-courses as possible. I was supposed to move to the Southeastern United States to work with a school there, but then the 2008 / 2009 Crash came, and put a major dent in my plans.

I still pushed on, but I was running out of resources.

(As youcan see, I’ve had a few bad luck events, which is why I’m trying to do this Crowd-Funding Project, so I’m no longer dependent on the actions of other peope to get this work out to The World.)

Along the way, I co-authored the 380-page textbook, **Structural Balancing: A Clinical Approach,** with Kyle Wright. It was published by McGraw-Hill, the largest medical publisher in America, and is available on Amazon for around $100, and some of them are discounted pretty well. I wrote the chapters on the Philosophy & Physiology of Therapeutic Bodywork & Stretching, and several other aspects of the book.

[The 380-page textbook, *Structural Balancing: A Clinical Approach,* I co-authored with Kyle C. Wright of the North Carolina School of Advanced Bodywork, published by McGraw-Hill in 2010.]

Then, I had several MORE disasters, having to do with the technology I was using. The man who designed my website software (based on WordPress for you Tech People out there), whom was considered to be among The Best, Leading Edge software developers in the business, disappeared. I was having BIG technical challenges, and then he had a nervous breakdown (!!!), and disappeared for TWO YEARS. I know I should have switched systems, but I had WELL over 120 webpages of material (some of those “pages” were many pages long), and was afraid I would just pull the same problems over to a new system, and I believed I could, eventually  fix the troubles.

Turns out there was an obscure software / hardware incompatibility with the web host I was using, but it took a LONG time to figure it out. I eventually got most of it handled, but the main developer finally re-emerged, and everything has been running pretty smoothy for several months now.

But it was a LONG haul. And that’s just a few of the stories. … And yes, overall, the entire Tech Debacle lasted about SIX YEARS if you can believe that. … But I DID get a LOT of books written in the meantime.

Now, it’s time for the editing, formatting, and updating with my new research.

So, that’s a long story, and I just scratched the surface.

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David Scott Lynn (DSL)

DSL the Yogi at Whole Life Perspectives

Beginning at 13 years of age, DSL's been involved with alternative philosophies & practices most of his life. Becoming a yoga teacher in 1976, then a hands-on bodyworker in 1981, he developed a unique & highly effective form of Yoga / Bodywork / Whole Health Fitness & Therapeutics. … David wrote the chapters on a wholistic philosophy & physiology of bodywork & stretching for the textbook Structural Balancing, published by McGraw-Hill, Inc. in 2010. … He is the author of the e-Book Simple Steps to Let-Go Yoga, available at: www.letgoyoga.com/simple-steps/ and several other upcoming e-books.

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Latest posts by David Scott Lynn (DSL) (see all)

• Only YOU Can Prevent Yoga Injuries! - February 6, 2015
• Does Psoas Cause Lordosis? - June 11, 2014
• MyoFascial Facts & Fallacies - June 7, 2014