UNCLENCH

Tactics for (C)PTSD, Anxiety, and Chronic Tension Relief

What’s it about?

This wellness workshop was created for PTSD relief, but these are useful tactics for anyone experiencing high levels of stress, anxiety or chronic tension.

The physical symptoms of stress and anxiety can be obvious, such as chronic tension or even hives, but some manifestations, like high blood pressure or decreased respiratory capability, can go unnoticed until they become severe. 

This workshop is designed to help you:

  • deepen your breathing

  • regulate your nervous system

  • identify tension in your body

  • improve neural communication

  • unclench tense muscles

  • improve range of motion

  • improve cardiovascular health

  • decrease stress and anxiety 

  • and bring an overall sense of ease to your mind and body

2 hours is a long time.. what can I expect?

We will begin with breath work to bring our nervous systems into a state of rest. In a resting state, our muscles are meant to be relaxed. Here we will use a body scan, so participants can identify their individual areas of tension. With the tension identified, we’ll employ the power of our minds for our first step of release through a short, guided meditation. We will wake our bodies from the meditation with shaking and a pat down; gentle techniques known for their energizing effects. Then it is time for the heart of this workshop: a sequence of muscular activations and releases, targeting the most common areas of chronic tension.

Chronic tension is a result of the brain being given the signal that a muscle is off, when part of (or in severe cases, the entire!) muscle continues to clench. We will focus on common areas of chronic tension, getting as many fibers of the target muscles as we can to turn on together, so we can then ask them all to turn off together. If you’ve ever heard the saying, “neurons that fire together, wire together” we are tapping into a physical expression of that concept to relieve chronic tension through muscular recruitment. 

With tension removed from our target areas, we will go through a gentle flow sequence, tying our breath and movement together, and testing out our new ranges of motion. Our time will come to a close in savasana, with a return to the body scan from the beginning of the practice, allowing participants to observe the real time effects of this workshop on their identified areas of tension and depth of breath. 

A Note from the Host:

Hi, I’m Sam, and I live with CPTSD. It can be incredibly challenging some days, but one of my silver linings is a hyper-attunement to my body. I’m an acrobat, an artist and a musician. I work as a personal trainer (since 2016), graduated the Lauterstein Conway School of Massage Therapy in 2023, and became a Registered Yoga Teacher with the Yoga Alliance in March of this year (2024). 

This workshop is my synthesis of everything I’ve learned to this point that I believe could be useful for you. I draw from my formal education, various physical and artistic practices, books, podcasts, and insightful conversations, and years and years of therapy. I hope you find even just one snippet of this workshop useful, and are able to take it with you for your own regulation and growth, or to share with anyone you think it may benefit. 

Thank you for your time and the work you are putting in to better understand yourself and the world around you.

Kindly,

Sam