How important is it to have a teacher ?
How much can one person change the course of your life or be a major influence on your direction ?
Today I was reunited after much too long with one of those life course altering, direction changing influencing people,
my own Ayurvedic Yoga Massage teacher, Master Kusum Modak.
Master Kusum Modak is the creator, inventor and as she shared with me today over her delicious chai, channel of the Ayurvedic Yoga Massage system that she created more than 40 years ago in Pune India.
At 81 years young she still holds court and council, is as sharp as a razor, with a brilliant sense of humour and a digital memory that covers …well… everything !
It had been years since I last visited her at her apartment in Pune, India, where she lives with Spike, her large black Labrador. So much life and growth has happened in the space in between then and now. Scanning back through the last decade together this afternoon, I realised just how “ young ” I must have been when I first came to Pune to be her student and now a decade on and hundreds and hundreds of students later, that I am maybe no longer that wide eyed young man straight out of a massage degree in Newyork, who could recite pretty much every bone & muscle in the body, origin, insertion, agonist and antagonist, but yet…… still had rather a lot to learn …
Kusum like all of us has many sides, she is sweet and motherly, melting you with her humbleness and ability to express on a very emotional level, perhaps unusual for an Indian lady in her 80’s, and at the same time can spare no graces in letting you know her thoughts if your not living up to her expectations. I’ve known both of these qualities personally and can testify to the power of them both. Quite rightly Kusum pointed out today that however much I may not have liked it at the time, her direct way had indeed served me well in becoming the teacher I am today.
But what shone through for me bright as a light as we sat at her kitchen table drinking chai, breathing life and colour back into a multitude of stories, characters, memories and situations, was just how incredibly LUCKY I am to belong to a HEALING LINEAGE with a LIVING MASTER, the living breathing source of what’s become my own life’s work and passion, something that deeply and profoundly affects clients and students alike.
Its just deep tissue massage and assisted stretching after all, but yet the difference felt by everyone that comes in contact with Ayurvedic Yoga Massage is the same - PROFOUND.
Over another chai Kusum shared tales of her travels to South America, North America, Greece, England, Italy, France she’s even been to Japan, all by invitation to give Ayurvedic Yoga Massage sessions to, as she like to call them, her yoga friends.
She talked about how finding the late BKS Iyengar and joining his institute in Pune changed her life on so many levels and helped her to heal not just physically but brought about a deep shift that gave her life a new and happier direction. She spoke of what a disciplinarian Mr Lamaye her ayurvedic doctor and massage teacher had been , how he saw her strengths as bodyworker long before she did, sternly insisting she began working with the patients that came to see him, and of her mother who worried that she was giving all her time and energy to her work, not saving time for herself, and of her father, an allopathic doctor who passed away when she was young but whom she feels has guided her healing hands all the way along her path.
If I’m honest today was a big one for me, it had been way too long that I’d not seen Kusum, we both teared up a little during our catch up and writing this now I’m aware of just how much I’m feeling from my day with her. Like seeing a family member you’ve not seen in for ever, where you can pick up right from where you last saw each other, sharing honestly, without censor, except that this family member has risen in a way to legendary status in the time in between.
I mentioned that she is famous in the west, the massage lady from Pune in the sari . Perhaps bashful or just not interested in the slightest in any kind of fame or notoriety, with a shy smile looking to the floor, she made a small gesture turning both her hands up and inwards before softly casting this statement away with the back of her open hands.
Today was a delightful and timely reminder of just how important it is to have a teacher and of just how much the student I am and will always be. To touch the feet of greatness can do that to you, I can only speak for myself but that’s certainly what happened to me today.
Cherish your own teachers, the ones who opened something in you, the ones who shared their gifts and precious knowledge for your benefit, the ones who’s words and actions sweet or strong helped you to find your own path.
There is no end to the healing journey , but if your eyes are open there are some amazing guiding lights along the way, there to land you right where you need to be.
James Winstanley - Ayurvedic Yoga Massage student, teacher & founder of the Ayurvedic Yoga Massage Institute UK .
Left Nov 2019 - Right Jan 2009
MASTER KUSUM MODAK & JAMES WINSTANLEY
I spent my early years growing up in Wembley in north west London. This area of London was ethnically mixed but the majority of its community were from Indian heritage. My father, an Indian immigrant himself was from the Punjab in northern India and he traveled from India on a banana boat (true story!) where he settled in the UK in the 60’s. My mother was English. My early memories of visiting Indian family in the UK was sprinkled with strange images of deities on the living room walls, repetitive prayer would float through the home, curly bright orange and sicklily sweet Indian treats, trips to the local temple with my father and strange smells from the kitchen. My love of dahl started young!
These early experiences left an impression. Fast forward to 2001 and i took my first trip to India with my father to visit my family in the flat lands of the north. We took trips to the Sikh home, the Golden Temple, I wandered around with my camera trying to capture this fascinating land. The country really opened my eyes and iI came back to the UK knowing I would return one day.
So began my love affair with mother India and I found my self returning most years.
I would travel to experience its rich culture and traditions and was captivated by the way it hides nothing from you. It’s the whole spectrum of life laid out before you, the colour, the dispair, the beauty, life and death and everything in between. No holds bared.
My journey into Yoga began in 2009 and I found through a back injury that a very gentle practise would really help with my chronic pain. With the help of my early teachers i became obsessed with the practise, the history of it and at its heart its Ayurvedic principles.
I completed a one on one teacher training with a teacher from Tri Yoga in London and also attended a 6 month yoga foundation course in London.
My visits to India would continue to further my understanding and knowledge of India’s ancient connection to yogic principles.
As my body awareness grew, my interest in massage also grew. Western and Eastern philosophical schools of thought fascinated me. Hindu and Buddhism philosophy. I read books, took workshops, I returned to India to do a foundation course in Ayurvedic Massage.
I moved from London to Brighton and found an ITEC course in Holistic, Deep tissue massage and Anatomy and Physiology at the College of Classic Massage. Michael Gibbons was an instrumental teacher and the course gave me the foundation and tools of practise that i still draw on to this day.
I spent years in festival fields in the summer, giving treatments, connecting with fellow body workers, and learning, always learning.
Learning about the sensitivity you need to have when working with the body is a vital tool you will obtain in any body work course. The importance of touch and how it’s needed in our world. More now than ever as we find ourselves becoming increasingly detached from one another.
I enjoy working on a massage table and its benefits are huge, I did though, start to wonder about other modalities that I hoped could really connect the giver and receiver in a more profound way. A mode where the client receiving could really ground and find a way to truly surrender, to even feel venerable and know that the space was there for them to really open up and understand the benefit of moving into space themselves, to promote healing and to let go of past traumas in the body and mind.
This is where Ayurvedic Yoga Massage entered my life.
Again to India and while I was travelling in north Goa reconnecting with an old friend I leaned about a workshop taking place that my friend had taken her self and she was adamant iI should attend.
I met James here on a sun soaked Goan roof top, surrounded by palms trees and tropical foliage and enrolled on the then Level 1 Ayurvedic Yoga Massage training work shop.
Straight in I really connected with the hands on way of learning. The knowledge is delivered clearly and through the repetition thats unique to the AYM Institute mode of teaching. I loved that the treatment took place on the floor, getting to move around the body in a tai chi style dance as you move through each breath with your client and invite them into space through dynamic stretches, subtle joint manipulations and invigorating massage techniques. There are so many styles and techniques to draw from it really can offer something for everyone. Different body types and frames. We are all at different stages in our body association and AYM’s range really can speak to everyone.
I left the course feeling confident in the new language of what I’d just learnt. Its yogic association really drew me in also and I really connected with the hybrid of traditional massage strokes, deep tissue work, and breathe work & assisted stretching. It really gave the receiver an all round holistic experience. It really resonated with me. I completed my training with James back in East London and excitedly took my new skills to my existing clients and found there response was very positive. 70% of my clients are yoga teachers or yoga students and they all resonated with the healing it gave them and the space it gave them to evolve there own yoga practise.
James continued to be very approachable and helpful as my own AYM practise grew. I began helping and assisting James on his London AYM workshops. It was a unique opportunity to reinforce my own understanding of AYM but also see new attendees on their journey into AYM and I loved the chance to be able to share what I had learned with them.
My assisting James became more regular and we became good friends. I found his teaching style invaluable. His approach, humbleness and knowledge that came through was clearly coming from a dedicated and passionate place. One lunch time we sat in central London over a cup of the black stuff, coffee, a love of both of us. As we discussed and shared our AYM experiences he asked me whether I’d ever be interested in being mentored by him to become an AYM Institute teacher. I was instantly intrigued and felt utterly humbled he would think to approach me with this opportunity. In many ways that great India tradition of passing down knowledge from teacher to student was happening again. And so the next part of my journey began, along with Steven we found our selves again in the warm arms of a Goan beach where we together completed our Ayurvedic Yoga Massage teacher mentorship.
I get so much joy from teaching and sharing something I’m deeply passionate about. I’m so grateful to part of the AYM family. A journey that will continue to grow.
Nathan Synge - AYM Institute teacher
My first experience of massage was at a UK festival called Big Chill, and my friend very generously decided to treat all three of us to a massage in the healing fields. It was an amazing experience, and I think I was lucky as my therapist was amazing. I could tell he loved his work, and I sensed that he saw it as a craft. It felt like everything was conscious and detailed, but there was definite ‘flow state’. It was a dance of sorts, a coordinated journey round the body, and I was left elated and grounded. I often wish I could meet him and let him know the impact he’d had on that day so many years ago, that he’d inspired my life to slowly move into a different direction. Bodywork. After a career in criminal justice, and then some time travelling, I decided to follow this urge and move back to London to study with Mel Cash, creator of Sports Massage, at the London School of Sports Massage. This course provided me with a firm foundation in anatomy and movement, and some very solid techniques to help maintain mobility and movement, and fix them when problems occurred. I realized that at its core, massage is a very simple offering, and one of the most intuitive. Studying sports massage in London with its creator, Mel Cash, taught me a skillset of solid techniques that I still draw on, and a majority of my clients, many of whom are professional sports folk, still see me for sports treatments. After this, I worked in various settings offering sports massage, at festivals and retreats, in clinical settings and privately. Whilst also following other passions too.
But I do distinctly remember a nagging feeling like i wanted to offer something else, with an idea that I wanted something that would address the holistic and energetic side of bodywork that had initially inspired me as a therapist, and free me from the limitations of the table. I started to look around at different courses involving floor work -feeling a little bit stuck with the tables' lack of dynamism. I first came across Ayurvedic yoga massage after doing sports massage therapist on and off for about 4 years. I stumbled across the AYM institute from a random google search, and read what it had to say about its history, what it offered, and who it was for. I loved the idea of being mobile, and being able to take my work anywhere, so as a firm believer in regularly learning (for learning’s sake) I signed up for the diploma training in the Well Garden in East London .
I loved the idea working on the floor, moving around my client, working with their body in an intuitive way. The assisted stretches and using the breath allowed me to help the client in a way that I’d not experienced before. Much of this aligned closely with what I’d learned with sports massage about post isometric release as a technique for pushing further into a stretch. My poor limbs and joints also loved the idea of using downward force, my feet, gravity, and my own bodyweight -all potentially career saving for a body worker. The course was the perfect balance of demonstration and practice, with enough space to apply my own DNA as a therapist. It was practical from the start, the best way to remember -with the hands and body. It’s slow build made perfect sense, with each sequence -many of which can stand alone, slowly building into a delicious 90 (ish) minute treatment that left me in a state of deeper restoration than any other modality ever has. There was little pressure on ‘remembering’ everything, as the notes were to hand, and everything was regularly repeated and revised before moving to add a new component. Today I draw on AYM in all the massage work that i do, and its a joy to teach and share. Its simple approach to each of the muscle groups regularly leaves therapists of long standing astounded and i’ve lost count of all the times i’ve heard students say ‘oh wow, that’s so obvious, why have I never tried that!’ (or words very close to that). Using the feet to walk on areas of the body which traditionally get pounded by the therapists limbs is also a eureka moment for so many, and a turning point in their offering. I think i’d have had to find another job if it wasn’t for the versatility AYM has given me as a bodyworker. It’s opened a lot of doors, given me the versatility to work in a variety of settings, and it’s always a deep joy to see the effect it has on people, and how it can provide a deep sense of restoration, repair, maintenance, and deep relaxation. Since assisting on courses in Bristol, and being invited to be mentored as a teacher with the AYM Institute in Goa, I've taken AYM to Scandinavia and Glastonbury, and i'm excited with new format of courses on offer in 2020.
The diploma course is the perfect entry to bodywork and quite unique in it's very simple to learn and thorough approach -leaving a new therapist confident to give a 90 minute, full body treatment that can be done pretty much anywhere, with limited resources. I now offer AYM treatments in my studio space in Redland in Bristol, as well as mobile, and my next challenge is getting all my table based holistic and sports clients to see how it can profoundly increase their flexibility and range of movement to give them the edge that they need. Sporty folk can sometimes be a wee bit limited in their scope for other types of bodywork, and often shoot themselves in the foot by not acknowledging other practices and approaches to the body, as well as the localised effect that holistic work can have. But they’re missing out, so I’m keen to share!
Steven Taylor - AYM Institute teacher
I became a massage therapist because I genuinely wanted to help people either bio-mechanically or emotionally; chronic pain, stress and tension are commonplace and massage seemed like an area I could really delve into and quite literally get hands-on.
Some of us have a natural caring touch and are naturally present when we treat people. You may not think it or even realize, but in receiving a session the body listens, senses, and processes the quality of the touch. Benefits of massage are multi-fold from reducing cortisol (stress hormone) to increasing oxytocin (love hormone), reducing tension and pain and even strengthening the immune system. If your touch is mindful then it also lights up an interesting part of the brain - a deeper hidden lobe that governs homeostasis (balance) and harmony, the insula cortex. This center in the brain is also responsible for our sense of self and where consciousness lies.
With regards to being present as a therapist and massaging with awareness, interesting research from Chieti in Italy shows results of mindful verses non-mindful touch using FMRI (functional magnetic resonance imaging) to show brain areas affected during a session.
One control group received non-mindful touch, where therapists were told to focus on an auditory stimulant whilst treating by counting beeping sounds played through headphones; the other control group were told to focus on the quality of the tissues, density, tension, motility and responsiveness throughout the session. Results showed a significant difference in the brain areas affected; changes were noticed in the connectivity of the insula, and cingulate cortex of the brain. This is interesting because it shows touch can actually effect the functional connectivity of the brain; these effected brain regions are now known to be associated with touch and also consciousness, self-awareness, calmness and harmony. It's great to know those things we feel intuitively when treating can now be backed up scientifically.
In this day and age it seems the neuroscientists are on our side! Descartes said I’ think therefore I am’; now many neuroscientists are saying Descartes made an error - it should be ‘I feel therefore I am’ - as this is a more holistic statement uniting the entire body rather than separating it.
I am starting to warm to the statement ‘I touch therefore I am’; as when we touch we really feel a world of information in no time at all - an instant connection between us and another. We meet in a world of sensation. Steve Haines, pain researcher and trauma release therapist, says it was interesting after a session that one student could not stop hugging themselves as if the TRE (trauma release exercises) awakened a state of self and feeling, “when we touch ourselves there are dual signals, a signal going from the hand to the brain and a signal going from inside me to the brain this gives us a bigger picture of who we are, not getting lost in a morass of signals from inside”.
I propose massage has the same power; to inform us of our shape, weight, size, tension in our muscles - giving us a physical sense of who we are which is also very nourishing and even grounding, We are highly attuned to touch, but through dissociation, stress and trauma we can often end up numbing out and leaving our bodies behind. Massage can be the powerful tool that wakes us up to our emotions and tensions - generating space to feel and heal. Feeling is healing.
Studies from Dr Dacher Keltner have shown that in receiving touch for just one second we can accurately judge the intention behind it; interestingly he did this in blindfolded tests with participants that received 6 different emotions through touch, the results showed the participants managed to judge the emotion of the touch with more than 60 per cent accuracy.
There is a primate called a Slow Loris that has a finger specifically for touching other slow lorises! As humans we may not have this special characteristic, but we do have many interesting sensory receptors within our skin, our fascia and even our viscera. These sensory receptors detect vibrations, pressure, angle change, and deformation in the tissues, one of the most interesting are known as C fibers. On a basic level they are nociceptors (pain detectors) responsible for sensing tissue damage and signalling long term chronic pain amongst other things, but they are also highly attuned to sensing tactile touch; in some areas they are called tactile C fibers. If we get the touch right it can have healing powers activating the parasympathetic nervous system calming us and restoring health.
Research shows that grooming in primates is similar to the touch, caress or caring touch we give as signs of affection. As humans the right kind of touch can be very powerful; in primates research has shown how grooming leads to the release of oxytocin - the bonding or love hormone leading to co-operative relationships, longevity and offspring survival. The same is true with regards to the power of human touch and so naturally massage. Studies show that massage also results in oxytocin release and a reduction in stress hormones, as well as an increase in vagal tonicity - the vagus nerve is responsible for homeostasis, healing and relaxation.
Can it be as simple as just holding? Apparently sustained pressure on the tissues is a powerful healer. Teacher and therapist Cathy Alderson speaks of how touch is related to the immune response in the fascia. “The anti-inflammatory benefits of sustaining pressure at the fascial restriction for 3 minutes is that it starts to stimulate interleukin production, a crystalline communication protein essential for healing,” says Alderson. “At 5 minutes of sustained pressure, interleukin levels double. The result? Free radicals associated with the inflammatory process are neutralized and blood cell production is stimulated”.
The takeaway from this is that just being present with your touch and the client is enough to have overall positive healing effects. I believe we were designed for compassion and to hold space for one another. As humans we are a profoundly care-taking species. We have big hearts, but in the motor homunculus, the body map in our brain, the hands look to have more space allocated to it compared to any other body part - I like to see them as the extensions of the heart and as one of the most powerful healers.
Adam Divine - AYM Institute teacher