It’s not a stretch to say I’m a music fanatic! A long time Dead Head, world music and a relatively new Phish Phan. There is no way to know how many nights of live music I’ve enjoyed in my lifetime, but it’s never enough. I get FOMO frequently! And, music FEELS GOOD!
I created My FEEL GOOD Way over 20 years ago in response to my own severe chronic pain that left me unable to work. Not a comfortable place to be for a single woman with no insurance in our society. I was desperate to ease my suffering.
I soon learned that posture, balance and stress were the main enemies of our bodies. I first created this program just for myself: to gain control of my nervous system, keep myself aligned in good posture, remind myself to increase the use of my nondominant side, stretch my dominant side, and to stay in rest and digest rather than fight, flight or freeze.
My motivation for creating that original program was to do something, anything that FEELS GOOD. Doing something that feels good can instantly take you out of our sympathetic nervous systems. This has numerous physiological effects. For instance, blood flow comes to the front of the brain which allows you to be in present-time, giving you the ability to make clear, conscious decisions. Breath rate slows down, and your muscles throughout your body can relax. The blood chemistry flowing through your body changes dramatically – from the stress drugs of adrenaline, cortisol, glucagon, and testosterone to endorphins, oxytocin, even opioids and cannabinoids. We wouldn’t have receptor sites for those drugs if our body didn’t need them and knew how to make them. And they are supposed to be full!
So things like self massage, stretching and breathing are what I practice and teach. These change which side of our nervous system we are in, and thousands of people have reported that it’s instantly noticeable. It only takes 30 seconds or so to make this change, so it’s easy to do even while you’re walking around in your life.
So how long does this parasympathetic state, with its calming chemistry last? I figured out it needed to be about every 10 minutes. When I teach this to people, it sounds ridiculous! Right? I learned to be consistent with it using a timer (which I recommend), but I also learned how to give people other real-life ways to remind themselves. One way I do this is to teach people to use music. Every time you notice a song starts, do something that FEELS GOOD.
Connecting music to FEEL GOOD came to me when I was working backstage as a massage therapist – up close and personal with the artists and their employees. I was thrilled that I got to go to the shows, but I realized I didn’t want to drink or smoke or anything that my clients would pick up on the next day. So, I started combining My FEEL GOOD Way with dancing to live music. I was shocked how well it worked! The music was taking me to places that were very close to what drugs had done for me in my teens and twenties. Doing self massage and stretching while dancing was so relaxing that it made my body feel like a well oiled machine that could keep up with the musicians – like my body was part of the band. Doing these practices can lead to more acute hearing, clearer vision, brighter colors. The sense of touch becomes more sensitive. This attunement that happens when doing FEEL GOOD practices while enjoying music is pure magic!
At first I was a bit worried about what others might think at the shows. It didn’t take long to realize: no one is paying any attention! (I’ve also learned to be quite clandestine as these are things I also do while I’m walking around in my life).
I’ve even started teaching some of my classes at live music events where I put on positive music and do the teaching in a talk-over style. It’s an effective way to not only teach the power of FEEL GOOD combined with live music but to also demonstrate how easy it is to take into our everyday lives. Once we FEEL this, we can’t deny it.
Note: My next offering of this class will be at The Golden Road Festival on Saturday November 9th in Selma, California. Here’s the class description:
Rockin’ Self Healing My FEEL GOOD Way with Margo Guenther
"Come and learn ways to dance your way to lower stress while you walk around in your life! This one hour class will give you the tools you need to retrain your nervous system from stress to rest and digest ALL DAY LONG! If you’ve seen FEEL GOOD Friday, you know this stuff works. Get the full story and ways to remember to do this in ways that are FUN and EASY! Wear comfy clothes so you can boogie down to songs we’ve known our whole lives."