Eric N. Franklin

'The Franklin Method training as outlined in this book is the most intelligent apprach to learning about the workings of the body that I have ever attended. It is not just information but the experience of our design as we learn that is transforming.'-Tom McCook, Fitness instructor, Founder and Director, Center of Balance

'In Dynamic Alignment Through Imagery, Eric Franlkin offers an easy-to-read, practical, and educational resource, which I wholly recommend.'-Dr. Emma Redding, Head of Dance Science, Trinity Laban Conservatorie of Music and Dance President, International Association for Dance Medicine & Science

'Dynamic Alignment Through Imagery is a must-have resource. Eric Franklin creates a truly powerful tool for improving movement and function.'-Marie-Jose Blom, PMA Gold-Certified Master Pilates Teacher, Founder and Owner, Long Beach Dance Conditioning Founder and Owner, Angel City Body Kinetics, Founder and Partner, SmartSpine Works

'The Franklin Method has had a profound infuence on my personal and professional life. Eric Franlkin's evoluton of imaery and its application contain the knowledge and power to create a quantum leap in our understanding of human movement and our own potential.'-Jan Dunn, MS, Past President, International Association for Dance Medicine & Science

In this new edition of Dynamic Alignment Trhough Imagery, internationally renowend teacher, dancer, and choreographer Eric Franklin shows you how to use imagery, touch, and movement exercises to improve your coordination and alignment. These exercises will also help you relieve tension, enhance the health of your spine and back, and prevent back injury.

This expanded new edition includes:
More than 600 exercises along with nearly 500 illustrations to help you visualize the exercises and use them in various contexts.
Online audio files for dynamic imagery exercises set to music.
Updated chapters thoughout the book, including new material on integrated dynamic alignment exercises and dynamic alignment and imagery.

Whether you are a dance student or work as a pilates or yoga instructor, personal trainer, dance educator, or other movement professional, this book will help you discover your natural flexibility and quickly increase your power to move.

Contents

Acknowledgments
Introduction How I came to use imagery
Reinforcing what you want
Purpose and will
Using imagery for alignment
Using the audio files
Part I Posture and dynamic alignment
Chapter 1 Roots of imagery for alignment
In search of ideal posture
Somatic disciplines
Summary
Chapter 2 Postural models and dynamic alignment
What your posture reveals
Postural habits
Rich sources for dynamic alignment
Summary
Chapter 3 Foundations of mental imagery
Brain as the basis for imagery
Brain and consciousness
Nervous system
Neuroplasticity and imagery
Develping mind: The role of imagery
Summary
Chapter 4 Change though imagery
Four steps for change
Body image as basic feedback
Developmental patterns and mental imagery
Wrong habits that feel right
Retaining your progress
Motivation and change
Summary
Chapter 5 Benefits and types of imagery
Benefits: What imagery can do for you
Types of imagery
Styles of imagery delivery
Self-talk: The internal monologue
Summary
Chapter 6 General guidelines before using imagery
Factors that influence successful imagery
Guidelines for using imagery
Training your abiitiy to use imagery
Concentration and attention
Stages of learing
Positions for anatomical imagery work
Using imagery when in moton
Image narrative, image bundles,and relational imagery
Summary
Part II Biomechanical and anatomical principles and exercises
Chapter 7 Finding your center and befriending gravity
Planes for direction and location
Central axis
Body geography
Joint movements
Force
Matter and mass
Summary
Chapter 8 Laws of motion and force systems
Newton's laws of motion
Force systems
Lever systems
Energy conservation
Ability of materials to resist force
Dynamic stability
Summary
Chapter 9 Joint and muscle function
Joint types
Bones
Connective tissue and fasica
Muscles
Summary
Part III Exercises for anatomical imagery
Chapter 10 Pelvis, hip joint, and company
Pelvic arches
Balancing the pelvis
Motion of the pelvic halves
Counterrotation and three-dimensional alignment
Pelvic powerhouse
Hip joint and femur
Iliopsoas and piriformis
Summary
Chapter 11 Knee, lower leg, and foot
Knee
Tibia, fibula, and ankle
Foot
Summary
Chapter 12 Spine and body wall
Functioning spine
Pelvis
Vertebrae
Facet joints
Discs, spine, and psychology of pain
Spinal ligaments
Musculature of the abdomen and back
Abdominal wall and fasica
Abdominal muscles and the concept of core stability
Chapter 13 Shoulders, arms, and hands
Suspension of the shoulder girdle
Glenohumeral joint
Humeroscapular rhythm
Elbow
Wrist and hand
Summary
Chapter 14 Head and neck
Atlas and axis
Skull
Suboccipitals
Mandible
Hyoid and tongue
Eyes
Nose and mouth
Summary
Chapter 15 Rib cage, breath, and organs
Rib cage
Breath
Support for abdominal organs
Skin as an organ
Summary
Part IV Returing to holistic alignment
Chapter 16 Definitions of dynamic alignment
Plumb line
Median alignment
Defining ideal alignment
Dynamic versus static alignment
Dynamic and static stability
Puling up and ideal alignment
Summary
Chapter 17 Integrating dynamic alignment exercises
Alignment insupine positions
Alignment in sitting positions
Standing and walking alignment
Releasing excess tension
Continuing imagery exercises
Bibliography
Index
About the author… (meer)

A new book by Eric Franlkin, a pioneer in the use of imagery for conditioning-a book for everyone who wants to find new vitality and confidence and to be pain-free. Combining scietific principles with movement and imagery exercises-both effective and fun-Pelvic Power demonstrates how to create a stronger body by toning the pelvic floor. Increase your energy flow by training the muscles and joints and improving the tone of the organs.

The only full-length book of exercises and mind-body techniques directed to the general public on the newly-recognized importance of the pelvic floor, affecting posture (which affects every other body part), vitality, sexual function, and preventing incontinence.

The pelvic floor acts as a support for the nner organs and contains a passage for the urethra, the sex organs, and for a baby during birth. Many back, knee, and foot problems can be relieved through conscious training of the pelvic floor-a well-trained pelvic floor has an essential effect on our well-being and vitality. Because the female pelvic floor is more flexible and the male floor tends to be less so, this training program has the goals of increased flexibility for men and the building up of strength for women.

Franklin writes of this important new area of study and exercise in a vivid, amusing and highly effective way.

Eric Franlkin has once again written a phenomenal book-useful for practitioners in many fields: educators, medical practitioners, and exercise specialists. His clear, lucid text and wonderful illustrations take a complex topic and make it readable and understandable to all. Thank you , Eric!-Jann Dunn, M.S. International Association for Dance Medicine and Science, Board of Directors, Pilates Method Alliance

Eric is direct, clear, and congenial. His exercises and the creative drawings of accompanying imagery will help people get in touch with their gravitational center of energy. Pelvic power can be yours with this simple, sound approach of sensing, visualizing, and moving!-Glenna Batson, M.A., P.T. Director, Wellness Partners in the Arts Durham, NC

Eric Franklin earned a BFA from New York University's Tisch School of the Arts and a BS from the Univrsity of Zurich. He is a member of the International Association of Dance Medicine andd Science, has taught at the Institute for Psychomotor Therapy in Zurich, and has been guest lecturer at the University of Vienna, He is head of the Franlkin Method Institute in Uster, Switzerland, and travels worldwide conducting workshops.

Franlklin is aurthor of Relax Your Neck, Liberate Your Shoulders, the bestselling Breakdance, as well as Dance Imagery for Technique and Performance and Dynamic Alignment Through Imagery.

Contents

Acknowledgements
Contents
Preface
Solving the pelvic floor riddle
Introduction-What the pelvic floor can do
Evolution of the pelvic floor
Pelvic floor training and imagery
Flexible strength, flowing ch'i
1 What is sensible pelvic floor training?
The search for information
The coffee's getting cold
Muscles want to move joints
What it means to build strength
The body always reacts holistically
Train actively and dynamically
The blind landing
2 The bones of the pelvic floor
3 The joints of the pelvis
Bringing movement into the pelvis
The pelvis is flexible
In key position: The sacrum
Evolution and the birth process
Arrowheads show the way
The dance of the pelvis halves
The pelvis wheels
It's all about rotation
The pelvis tilts, the lower back arches
The coccyx: Place of focused power
As the feet, so the pelvic floor
The sitting tuberosities
4 The muscles of the pelvic floor
The fan muscles
Gliding proteins
The inner part of the fan
The big triangle
More trangles
Representing the muscles with the help of Thera-bands
Training while laying down
The outermost layer of the pelvic floor
The obturator muscles
The currents of the pelvic floor muscles
The directions of the currents
The currents of the triangle muscles
5 The stomach and respiratory muscles
The muscle container
Undrstanding the diaphragm through time travel
The transverse abdominal muscle
The iliopsoas: Muscle of many talents
Everything breathes, everything moves
Voice exercises for the pelvic floor
6 Many stories
The foot and the pelvic floor
The foot and pelvic floor during walking
The first ribs: The roof of the thorax
7 Organs, the pelvic floor and ch'i
Organs and water
The liver: The stormy sea
Kidneys, bladder and the pelvic floor
Kidney ch'i
The bladder and the column of organs
Bladder and intestines
Inguinal hernia
Prostate and male incontinence
Prostate as a spongy ball
Prostate flow
8 Ligaments and connecitve tissue help the pelvic floor
9 The daily life of the pelvic floor: sitting, getting up, sitting down
Bibliography and references
Index Franklin method resources
Other books by Eric Franklin
Workshops… (meer)

Transfer pain permanently into well-being.
We're stressed out and have not time. and, once again, our necks are sore and our shoulders are tense.
What can we do to become more permanently flexible, and to face daily challenges more calmly-without the usual tension, tension that gives us headaches and makes us sore all over?
The exercises developed by Eric Franklin make it possible to become loose and relaxed in a playful way, and to discover increased lightness in both body and soul.
These exercises can be used to target specific problems, but are also very effective in transforming pain into well-being.
Imagery and touch are the keys to this unique approach to eliminating stiffness and pain in the neck and shoulders, with simple and effective exercises that can be done at home, on the job, or while traveling. Experiment with the variety of techniques presented and choose those that work the best.
Sufferers of upper body pain will learn how to detect and eradicate early signs of tension.
Understand the connection between emotional states and tension. Survive stressful sitations calmly and without tensing a muscle. Discover how improving the alignment of the head, neck and shoulders will ease the strain on muscles and joints and promote an aura of confidance and health.

Eric Franklin eaned his BFA from New York University's Tiisch School of the Arts and his BS from the University of Zurich. He is member of the International Association of Dance Medicine and Science, has taught at the Institute for Psychomotor Therapy in Zurich, and has been guest lecturer at the University of Vienna. He is head of the Franklin Method Institute in Uster, Switzerland, and travels worldwide conducting workshops.

Contents

Acknowledgments
Preface: Keping the noodles on the fork
Introduciton
Ideokinesis: Exercising with internal imagery
Thinking patterns
Structure of this book
1 Tension
Tension as interpreted movement
Protection from tension
Time pressures and time robbers
Time abundance
2 Relaxation for beginners
Organs create flexibility
The balance between being and doing
Regeneration-a full-time jpb
Relaxing the shoulders
Arm shaking
70% water
Discrimination and discernment
Shaking the diaphragm
Stretching the diaphragm
Collarbone massage
The swing of the pendulum
Feet and shoulders
Friend tension
3 Refresh your joints
The nature of joints
The shoulder girdle
The shoulder blade
Movement of the shoulder blade
Humeroscapular rhythm (H-rhythm)
The coracoid process
Finger to shoulder blade connections (after Bonnie cohen)
The shoulder joint
4 Muscle harmony
Muscle sliding
The trapezius
Active muscle elogation
The rhomboids
The serratus anterior muscle
The levator scapulae
The triangular or deltoid muscle
Arm rotators
The major and minor pectorals
The latissimus dorsi
5 Organ relaxation
Heart or brain
Soft axes
6 Partnering: The relaxation duet
The wrist joints
Rollup and roll down with the spinous processes
Letting go
Hand on the table
7 Relaxed at your desk, without a care on your chair
Active pelvic floor-relaxed shoulders
Bringing space to the armpits
Bringing space to the shoulders
Standing and sitting
Shopping bags for posture exercises
8 Help for the neck
Neck freedom
The neck starts in the back
Four joints
The muscles of the atlas and the axis
The sternomastoid muscle
Loosening the jaw muscles
Relaxing the tongue
9 Giving oneself up to play
Devotion in daily life
Other books by Eric Franklin
Workshops
Index… (meer)