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Zero Balancing

What is Zero Balancing?

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Zero Balancing (or ZB as it is abbreviated) is a gentle and effective form of bodywork for balancing and integrating the body's energy with its skeletal structure.

What are the benefits of Zero balancing?

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ZB is valuable for a wide range of conditions. These days many people lead busy and stressful lives with a tendency to over 'do'. Zero Balancing is excellent for relieving stress and tension and offers and opportunity to just 'be'. Because of its focus on the skeletal structure Zero Balancing can be very helpful for Flexibility and Postural problems such as tension headaches, neck, shoulder and back pain.

Stress reduction: in body and mind. People often feel refreshed, relaxed and invigorated after a session, more able to understand and deal with the causes of stress.

Reparative Touch: ZB is especially helpful for people who are uncomfortable with other forms of bodywork as the client remains fully clothed and the touch in ZB is attentive without being forced or insistent. People find this a supportive and healing way of being touched.

Well-being and personal development: ZB generates an active and conscious state of well-being. It can facilitate the release of outdated mental habits and patterns of emotional responses. Unresolved issues from our personal history may be held in the body and act as obstacles to personal development.

Zero Balancing promotes a deep sense of emotional and physical harmony. There are very few conditions for which Zero balancing isn't suitable and each session is tailored to the specific needs of the client. However, Zero Balancing is not for the acutely ill person. If in doubt, consult a certified Zero Balancing practitioner for their advice.

What is a Zero Balancing session like?

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Sessions are usually booked for 60 minutes which includes listening to how the client is feeling and what their needs are. There will be approximately 30 - 40 minutes of bodywork, where the client lies on a padded table, and then some time to bring the session to a close before the client leaves. The work is carried out with the client fully clothed, only needing to remove shoes and belt.

Zero Balancing consists either of sustained gentle traction or sustained gentle lifts and pressure and then the position is held in stillness for a few seconds. This stillness helps quiet the mind and provides a moment for the reorganisation and integration of the client's energy and structure around the still point. The practitioner will evaluate the quality of movement of particular joints, choose appropriate ways of working and then re-evaluate to see how it has responded. There will be frequent pauses for the client's 'body-mind' to integrate the work.

When beginning Zero balancing three sessions are recommended since the effects are cumulative. Many clients then come for maintenance sessions and the frequency will vary according to their needs. Many clients come simply because they enjoy having a Zero Balancing session.

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Brief History of Zero Balancing

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Zero Balancing was developed by Dr Fritz Smith in the mid 1970s. Dr Smith was both a doctor of osteopathy and a medical doctor. He studied many other forms of bodywork including acupuncture. Zero Balancing was a way of bringing together Chinese ideas about the flow of energy in the body and his experience with skeletal structure from osteopathy. Zero balancing has been taught internationally to thousands of practitioners over the past 30 years. At the time of writing there are approximately 90 practicing Zero Balancers in the UK.

The name Zero Balancing comes from an early client of Dr Smith's who said that she felt perfectly balanced, as if she'd been returned to zero.

Dr Smith believes that the skeleton contains the deepest and strongest energy currents in the body. The skeleton also contains the strongest and most lasting imprints of our life experiences. When someone has a strong experience its first impression will be upon a person's neurology (senses, feeling and thinking) then there may be effects upon the musculature (posture and movement) and in the longer term the bones will adopt to the changes posture, the muscular tensions and the effects of gravity.

Zero Balancing looks at how energy flows through the skeletal structure. The flow is easiest to access the joints between bones. Zero Balancing pays a particular attention to the joints involved with balance and support. These joints have a limited range of movement and people generally have minimal consciousness of their feeling and functioning. When there are problems with these postural joints, people will make unconscious adjustments to how they sit, stand and move which can have profound consequences upon the rest of the body.