Your body stacks itself from the ground up. Each major joint in the body carries the load of what is above it. When we look at the body in segments, we want each major joint to be centered so that the load-bearing joints have positive, equal tension. Symmetry in a joint allows for full function and full range of motion. 

When we have fascial restrictions, the joint can get pulled out of place, and uneven tension can put unequal weight and pressure on that joint. This causes unnecessary wear and tear on the joints. Problems are then passed to the joints above and below it. When the tissue around a joint is restricted and adhered, this pulls the joint askew. When a joint is pulled out of alignment, it can become inflamed, tendons and ligaments can tear, cartilage is worn down, discs herniate, bones change shape and calcify, arthritis sets in. Pain and immobility can set in, all because the fascial tissue is pulling the bones out of alignment.

Bones, when they are out of alignment, can get adjusted and put back into place. The thing about adjustments is that they are not addressing the real cause of the misalignment. The cause of the misalignment is the fascial restrictions. Tight, taut fascial tissue that is bound, adhered and condensed into masses, adhesions and scar tissue bind and hold tissue in a tension that locks down the joint and causes even more of the same: immobility, swelling and pain.

So what can heal these traumas and injuries? How can we address the fascial restrictions and return the tissue to a normal healthy state?

MFR releases muscular fascial restrictions and returns organized, tonified health to your tissues. Fascia has a liquid crystalline matrix. John Barnes, the creator of Myofascial Release, says that as fascial sheaths in the body are "glued" together as a result of injury, trauma, or dysfunction, they become unyielding.

"Restricted fascia has the tensile strength of 2,000 pounds per square inch," he says. "That's two full-grown horses standing on the nerves that innervate the muscle. It's crushing our cells. And it pulls structures out of alignment."

But restricted fascia is entirely capable of being changed.

While massage, energy techniques, and other forms of bodywork address fascia, Barnes says they release only 20 percent of the fascial system—the elastic and muscular components of the myofascial complex.

"It requires very different principles to release the other 80 percent," he says.

When addressing fascia, Barnes says you must first get through the collagenous barrier, something that takes up to 120 seconds of pressure to even begin a release. Most therapists, Barnes says, are not that patient.

"They're either pushing their way through it or pushing over it; they don't wait to be allowed through it."

The other side of that barrier is where Myofascial Release happens. In addition to waiting on the tissue, and, in effect, being "invited in," MFR is also reliant on pressure. Too much pressure, Barnes explains, and the client's subconscious mind takes over and starts a guarding process—something a practitioner can't muscle through. Too light a touch, and the barrier is not being engaged.

"MFR is about 'feeling' into the client's body and reading their body language."

Once engaged with the collagenous barrier, Barnes says there is another 3–5-minute window where you elicit the piezoelectric phenomenon.

"Cells are crystalline in nature; if you put pressure into a crystal, it generates an electrical flow. So, in other words, our mechanical pressure, given significant time, begins to generate a bioelectrical flow. Couple that with mechanotransduction, and you elicit a biochemical response at the cellular level. This then leads to phase transition, into a period of chaos where change and healing occur."

From there we find resonance or release.

When fascia releases, Barnes says it feels like taffy stretching.

"That sense of softening leads to a deeper barrier, and then you wait there for a while."

The art, he says, is finding the restrictions and applying the appropriate pressure.

"You have to use your feeling intelligence, not just your thinking intelligence,"

especially since these barriers are unique to each individual.

Layer by layer, the tissues are addressed. No oils or lubricants are required, only pressure and intention. Barnes tells students that a key to MFR is to never force the tissue; in fact, it's his mantra:

"Never force, never force, never force."

Approaching the tissue with patience avoids any fight-or-flight response and lets the client's mind be available to help begin the healing process. The nuances required for therapists to address this fascial tissue include having a quiet mind while waiting for the tissue to let you in, using the proper pressure, and then feeling the subtle changes that occur in the ground substance—the fluid part of the fascial system.

"It's in the silence and the feel that we heal," Barnes says.

Ironically, most fascia research has been done on cadavers, Barnes says, where the fluidity of tissues is obviously no longer viable. He is still baffled at the disregard paid to the tissue's fluid component and its importance to health.

"Everything must go through the fluidity of the fascial system to get to the cell. If the ground substance [outside of and within the cell] has solidified because of trauma, surgery, or thwarted inflammatory response, that cell is dying—it's not breathing, it's not getting the fluid or the nutrition it needs."

By addressing the fascial system and releasing the restrictions, you can

"reverse the solidity of that ground substance and change the frequency of the vibration."

By doing that, Barnes explains, the cells can rehydrate, the crushing pressure is removed, and then

"our body becomes capable of healing itself."

Despite the critical anatomical role of fascia and all of today's research being conducted on its relevance to health (including on living bodies), Barnes says the "health-care community is still not paying attention to the connective tissue," something he considers to be a huge oversight when addressing issues of pain and well-being.

(Adapted from "Addressing Fascia with Myofascial Release: A Conversation with John Barnes" by Karrie Osborn, Massage & Bodywork Magazine, Sept./Oct. 2016, published by the Associated Bodywork & Massage Professionals.)

I wanted to bring in the voice of John Barnes. He is the creator of Myofascial Release and a pioneer in fascial healthcare. He has advanced the understanding of the muscular fascial system and created the body of work that is Myofascial Release.

I feel grateful to have trained with him in MFR I, II, Unwinding, Cervical Thoracic, Fascial Pelvis, and Women's Health. He has helped me understand the elements and principles at the heart of MFR.

Angela Rose is a Myofascial Release Therapist and an Injury Specialist who practices in Grass Valley at Sol Bodyworks. I practice Myofascial Release Therapy and specialize in helping clients with chronic pain conditions get out of pain and back to doing what they love.