Hellerwork from heaven

Hellerwork is an intensive therapy that combines deep-tissue massage, movement education and dialogue to help cut back stress and ease mobility. Juhi Dua tells you why you must make it a part of your usually stressful routine

What is Hellerwork?
Hellerwork is a form of bodywork or body therapy developed in the 1970’s by Joseph Heller, an aerospace engineer. It is a powerful system of somatic education and structural bodywork, based on the concept of union of body, mind, and spirit. The body is worked up through a deep tissue massage and is combined with verbal dialogue, helping the person establish a relationship between body and mind.

Conditions Treated
Hellerwork is recommended for improving and treating

• Backache and poor posture
• Muscle pain, especially neck and shoulder
• Stress and stress-related illnesses
• Sports injuries

The 50,000 mile service for the body!
Celebrity health guru and detox expert Dr. Nish Joshi who runs The Joshi Clinic in London and has the likes of Gwyneth Paltrow as his loyal patrons explains how Hellerwork helps in eliminating pain. He says, “By becoming more conscious of the importance of the simple, everyday arts of movement, like sitting, standing, bending and walking, Hellerwork clients learn to use gravity constructively rather than fight against it, which gives them more ease and relief from aches and pains. It releases accumulated chronic tension and proves to be a deeply detoxifying experience for mind and body.”

A Typical Hellerwork Treatment
Hellerwork usually begins with pointing out what’s wrong with your current lifestyle and body conduct. Often photographs are also taken to compare posture and health before and after the Hellerwork effect. The therapy is based on the supposition that every person is intrinsically healthy and needs to be connected with his or her innate health. For the same, a deeper experience is created through integrity in your body, your movement, and in your relationship with your mind, body and spirit, usually through 11 sessions over a period of time.

In each session, a certain part of the body is tackled and the energies are focused on emotions related to that area. The Hellerwork practitioner uses soft tissue manipulation techniques and briefs the client about the best practices on sitting, standing and walking without unnecessarily stressing or straining the body. Along with this, ‘guided verbal dialogue’ is used to address emotions that work on muscles and play a role in controlling breathing. Through a joint effect of all this, when your body comes into alignment within the field of gravity, prolonged aches and body tension get diminished.

Dr Joshi elaborates, “In an intensive approach over a short series of treatments, and working with the deep muscle structure, Hellerwork improves balance and alignment and coaches clients in good use of the body. In this way dramatic improvements in posture can be achieved as if many years of yoga have been practiced. In effect, it services the vehicle and educates the driver!”