Awakening of the artist within you.

So many times I am asked to explain “What is the GYROTONIC®  Method?” 

Well,  you can come across explanations like " GYROTONIC® is a complete system of exercising which articulates your joints, improves the flow of energy through the body and stimulates meridian lines and energy flow."

It is important to add that GYROTONIC ®,  GYROTONIC® & Logo, GYROTONIC EXPANSION SYSTEM® and GYROTONER® are registeres trademarks of Gyrotonic Sales Corp and are used with their permission.  

In my experience Gyrotonic® is three dimensional in its range of movements. Individuals who are used to working in linear movements are often surprised by how little control they have of their bodies in this way. It takes time to learn to do the arch and curl, arms or legs movement in different way not how you would do those exercises in the gym. The whole point of this work is to prevent using the lower back. The breath is the foundation of each movement, the thread that connects body and mind, it helps give our movement both shape and direction. Like an embedded code, every gesture is scripted with an inhale or an exhale, programming our nervous system to work with our musculature in a way that can both calm and energize. When body and breath work together, movement flows naturally requiring less effort.  The narrowing of the pelvis and moving through arch and curl in that way with the breath enabled me to understand how my muscles were talking to each other in soft and balanced way and how to do it in a way that felt right to stop the back pain. It is all about feeling. 

GYROTONIC® can be practiced with different machines, one of which is the Pulley Tower. This is a specially designed wooden machine with rotational discs and weighted pulleys that allow the exerciser to strengthen their muscles using flowing, circular movements. Gyrotonic may resemble Pilates although it has more similarities to Yoga and Tai Chi in its origin and breathing techniques.  The machine facilitates your movements, making you do the work, not the other way round and to see benefits requires consistency and regular sessions.

Remembering my first time with the Pulley Tower at Revolution Pilates Studio in Pert in 2004 I was mesmerized and thought to myself “This is the machine and exercise of the future.”

The science regarding fascia during this time was still in its infancy and I was a fitness instructor and only knew that there was something in this method for my body, which had suffered a lot of back pain caused by physically hard workouts. While working on this machine my body felt the deepness of the science about fascia without having all the theory behind if at that time.

With a background in the fitness industry where the instructions are, "do this, don't do this" when I starter GYROTONIC® course I realised how mechanical I had become. I booked myself to a course in Sydney, one of the first run in Australia at the time by Dana Rader. I attempted movement with poise but amazingly the years spent in the fitness industry had stiffened me so much and my body was slow to respond.  One example when doing a shoulder series I could not move them the way the trainer was asking me, even in the gym or a Pilates class I had perfect form, so it takes time to figure out what it means to not bend the joints the way you would normally and to do it in a different way while connecting with the specific breathing. With arch and curl you have to feel the opposition, the decompression, the articulation and ripple through the spine with the dissociation between pelvis, legs and abdominal muscles. Immediately after the course I purchased my own Pulley Tower in order to further my understanding.

Photos by Bianka Tuzèe

Repetitive practice brought more freedom of movement into my body which slowly changed and begun to feel natural again. The work required some degree of awareness in the body and repetitions helped with feelings that suffice inside and you start to listen to them.

I've noted that GYROTONIC® Method helps people to connect with their feelings and develops intuition rather than just merely following instructions. This is the type of inner artist that surfaces within each one of us who took on this method. When teaching, clients are allowed to find their own awareness because when they start to move, they have to listen to what the movement is telling them to do and how to follow the movement?

 What is there for me and why do I do that?

After 17 years of working with the method the realization dawned on me that I needed a different outlet, not just exercise or movement. One of my clients Bianca, a very artistic soulful photographer asked me if I could do a photo session with her for an exhibition, so we commenced with movement and photography. I applied the Gyrotonic movement into the session and she was able to catch the poses. When viewing the photographs I realized that they were talking to me through the lines, poses and feelings in the language that people don’t understand in words, but when they look at them, they speak through the art of the moment and the eye of the photographer. It’s a different language, the language of movement and the body speaks that movement. Each of us are the individuals, some with better abilities to read this language than others. It’s the same with arch and curl or any other movement in the GYROTONIC® Method. Your body language will be different than my body language, it will not have the same meaning for you as it has for me because I’m expressing it with my body and you will express it with your body. So movement it’s just an expression. When you move, you have to be open enough so you can feel the energy flow through your body, like waves. Through spirals, arch and curl series the wave starts at the feet and goes up, before going down. This kind of a wave feeling in doing it’s up and down flow it’s rhythmical. It’s kind of like the rhythm of life than is following you in movement.

The creator of this method Juliu Horvath always said that Gyrotonic Method is the expression of the body itself.

I believe we all have to find the artist within and movement is like therapy helping us to express ourself without speaking, without telling anyone how you feel. It’s very deep. You just do it without thinking, without big structures, with instinct, with music, with sun, with wind, with ocean with breath and you get rid of everything. After finishing a Gyrotonic session you can experience this feeling of freedom, lightness within your body wants to dance , movement jump just like after a therapy session.

When I started the GYROTONIC® Method I was a loud, temperamental fitness instructor. With years in the GYROTONIC® Method, changed me, freed lots of blockages across my body. I knew my neck was locked. I knew my shoulders were not responding but now after so many years I have this sense of openness of the heart . As a child I struggled with expression through writing and always felt that nobody understood what I was saying even in my native tongue and to this day my colleagues still say my language is "Martian". Maybe I am not good with the written word, but I awaken the artist through the movement and this gives me the empowerment to be an effective teacher of movement. I found my language. 

Photos by Bianka Tuzèe