Learning To SEE & Apply: Physics & Geometry . . .

The next step is learning to observe the bodymind through the physical sciences, like geometry and physics. This allows you to see how structure and posture work, how they go out of balance, the many problems that causes, and most importantly, what to do about it. Again, there are ways to internalize this knowledge, which you will learn here in these pages and in the Live Trainings.

• Structural Dynamics – Seeing & Feeling how Physical Structures & Internal/External Forces Work

• Structural Analysis – Understand the Dynamics of Posture, Movement & Dysfunction

• Postural Evaluation – Determining Specific Structural & Postural Imbalances in Individuals

• Structural Balancing – Strategies on How to Normalize & Balance the Human Structure

Again, we don’t start with This is a Muscle and This is a Bone, then work out from there. … We start with what you’ll see in a Student or Client when they walk into your class or private session, and work inward and outward from there. It’s much easier to learn the details that way, especially if you’re a kinesthetic learner.

Some people are surprised to find out that was MY problem when I first started trying to learn anatomy. The first few times I tried, I got nowhere. No one had given me a kinesthetic context or structure to plug the technical data into. They just started feeding me facts and details without creating the Matrix of Thought, Feeling & Experience I could plug the individual facts and details into.

I don’t know about you, but MY brain does NOT work that way. … So I had to create my own Matrix without really knowing what I was doing … at first, anyway. Once the kinesthetic matrix was more-or-less in place, learning the technical details became much easier. And I bet it will be for you too,

This approach to teaching is about reducing your dependence on your teacher(s) — yes, even me — as quickly and as much as possible. And, if you can become a more independent thinker, you will, paradoxically, actually become MORE VALUABLE to the people you teach or provide yoga therapy to. That, by-the-way, is a part of what Time-Binding is all about.

Now, I Must Warn You About Something . . . !

And that is there is A LOT of material in this website — and my teachings in general — that goes contrary to much of what is taught in most yoga classes and trainings (and in massage and bodywork schools, too). And not just yoga, but chiropractic, massage and bodywork, medical orthopedics, neurology, physical therapy, Tai Chi, many Pilates sessions, personal training, and so on.

I am, in certain circles, known as somewhat of a contrarian. It’s not so much that I want to be. Its just that I have to say it the way I see it. … Maybe its genetic, but I just plain see things differently than many others. I probably learned a lot of this from my three mentors in life: John Lynn (my Dad), Joel Kramer (the Guy I learned my Yoga from), and another, Kevin Cullinane, (politics, economics, law and social progress in the context of human freedom). But they are all known for seeing things almost exactly opposite as most other people do. …

So, I just can’t help myself, I guess.

Having had experience with many different bodyworkers, David’s technique is certainly unique. There are levels of healing he achieves I’ve never seen before. This is clearly a result of a vast knowledge of anatomy and physiology combined with decades of hands-on experience.

Dr. John Bordiuk • Yoga Teacher
Nutritionally Oriented Medical Doctor
Marino Center • Wellesley, Massachusetts

This means that in order to apply much of what I show and tell you, you are going to need to be willing to suspend much of what you’ve been told before about yoga and related stuff. Even if you were told by some who are considered World Class Masters of Yoga. … And no, it’s not about believing what I say, either. But suspending judgment just long enough to check it out and see if what I am saying makes sense or not, and whether it works in the Real World of Human BodyMind Health and Integration … or not. Ultimately, YOU decide.

Regardless of what our teachers say, when tradition does not keep up or coordinate with reality, reality must win, IF we are to be effective human beings, and on an evolutionary course in life. As Kevin Cullinane often said, “Nature always bats last.”

Which Brings Up the Big Question:
Why Should YOU Listen To ME?

Well, I’ll let YOU Be the Judge . . .

How A Structural Steel Ironworker Turned Yoga Teacher,
Then Turned Structural Bodyworker … Invented A System of
Yoga/Bodywork Principles & Therapeutics

I have a background that is unique in the Yoga (and Bodywork) World.

I go into this in more depth in this website, especially The History of how I developed this work, so I’ll just tell you the highlights here.

First, in 1967, when I was only thirteen years old, I started in martial arts where I had my first “accidental” Zen-style meditation experience. The next year, I started reading about Buddhism and doing the meditations found in the Dhammapadha, the Buddhist Bible.

From age 17 to 22 I was a full-time structural steel ironworker, building steel buildings, most of the time as a foreman. Trained by my Dad, John, a Total Master of the Trade, I developed an ability to see and work with physical structures more competently than most of my fellow ironworkers, even guys who had been in the trade for 20 or 30 years longer than I was. (Now, would you be surprised to discover that this skill transferred over to my structural analysis skills when I became a structural bodyworker?)

Becoming A Master Structural Repairman . . .

Only problem is, I developed a reputation for being able to fix all the problems everyone else in the other construction crews had created. So I was always fixing stuff that other people screwed up. I wasn’t putting up new buildings most of the time, which, frankly, is far more fun and satisfying. How would YOU feel about going around and fixing everyone elses’ mistakes and errors all the time? Frankly, it’s not that much fun.

But Guess What? … YOU BENEFIT! … Doing all of that turned me into a real Problem Solver, a skill that YOU can learn and benefit from. … IF you will invest some time, awareness, thought and energy.

Truth is, straightening out complex steel structures has a lot of similarities to straightening out an out-of-balance human neuro-musculo-skeletal structure. Yes, there are also a lot of differences, but I truly believe this was vital to my overall development as a Structurally Oriented Yoga/Bodywork Therapist and, later on, Trainer.

Now, here’s the leap from martial arts and construction to Yoga.

Studying With The Father of American Yoga . . .

When I was nineteen, my Mom, Linda Lynn, told me about a lecture and demonstration on yoga. (I had read some about yoga, but had not really dived in to it yet.) The presenter, Joel Kramer, has in recent years been called, by Yoga Journal and many others, the First American Yoga Master and the Father of American Yoga.

Although not as widely known like Iyengar, Amrit Desai, or the late Vishnudevananda are today, he was far more influential in the development of Yoga in America than most people realize. And, up until recently, he had not taught yoga since 1984! (He has, however, been making a comeback after a more than two decade absence from teaching.)

His viewpoints are not always what people want to hear, but he sure makes you think! And he really has the bodymind integration thing down really well. And in ways I have not read or heard about even from most of the great, and far better known, masters of yoga.

Anyway, that seminar is how I got into doing Hatha (physical) and Jnana (mental) yoga.

Then, while I was still an ironworker, in 1976, I went to a small island off the coast of British Columbia. There, I had the great opportunity to study full time for a full month, in residence, with Joel and his invaluable partner, Diana Alstad.

Their teachings were and are unique, effective and, in my opinion, quite profound. Yet, because they taught a very here-and-now approach to yoga and meditation, with no mystical component, and their style was very non-Hindu, non-authoritarian and non-guru, their appeal was not all that wide in the yoga community at the time. At least not in comparison to the Iyengars and Yoganandas of the world. Joel and Diana’s approach was an integration of East and West, without the more religious, mystical, or aesthetic aspects of the many Eastern approaches to yoga.

Joel and Diana provided a strong and deep foundation upon which much of my own Life Work and professional developments are based. A foundation that YOU can benefit from. … And in my opinion, A Lot.

You will learn more about the Joel Kramer/Diana Alstad Principles in the DSL Yoga web pages.

Needless to say, after hanging out on an isolated, beautiful island, doing yoga and personal growth exercises everyday, for a whole month, I just could not bring myself to go back to ironworking. So I quit ironworking and started teaching yoga, retaining and building upon Joel and Diana’s work. I also applied that work to several other aspects of bodymind integration, health and healing. The foundation was, of course, Yoga. But I did not stop there.

Becoming A Structural Bodyworker . . .

When I was, in 1977, Yoga Teacher in Residence at the Inner Garden (the first Holistic Healing Arts Center, but now defunct) in Aspen, Colorado, I met and worked with a man named Eugene Donaldson. From him, I received my very first bodywork session. Some of it hurt like heck, but it opened a new and really big door for me. Because I had a natural talent for it, Eugene and I began doing bodywork sessions on each other. I immediately began evaluating and revising how I would do things based on my experience with Yoga and Joel Kramer.

The first idea was applying Joel’s concept of staying within one’s Edges of Pain and Fear. That’s where I got the basis for my No Pain, MORE Gain  philosophy and technology of yoga and bodywork therapeutics. I later added Resistance – Playing The Edges of Pain, Fear & Resistance – which I’ll explain more about when you get more involved with the DSL Website.

(By-the-way, Eugene went on to co-found Educating Hands, a well-known massage school in Miami, Florida. Though he is very low key about it, he truly became a leader in the field of massage in his own right.)

I started hanging out with and learning, mostly informally, from a lot of different types of massage and bodywork people, mostly massage school owners or educators. Eventually, long story short, in 1981, I became a massage and bodywork practitioner, and went into private practice in Downtown Chicago.

After about a year, I studied for 250 hours (eight hours a day, four days a week) with Daniel Blake, a man who had been trained directly by Ida Rolf, creator of Rolfing™, otherwise known as Structural Integration. Having disagreements with Ida about some of her basic principles — a primary one being whether or not fascia is the primary source of structural imbalance or bad posture, he left to study further and create his own system of Structural Bodywork. So I figured he would be a good guy to study with.

So far, I was getting pretty good at bodywork, and was developing a reputation for helping a lot of people. … But something was missing. . . .

Building The Scientific Basis . . .

As a result of studying with Daniel, I became known as very effective at solving neuromuscular and myofascial problems with posture, pain, loss of movement and other dysfunction that others could not help. Along the way, I did extensive research into the physical, medical and osteopathic/chiropractic sciences that apply to yoga and bodywork, as well as other related fields of study and therapy.

In the mid-eighties, I spent quite a bit of time working with alternative and nutritional medical doctors, chiropractors, and osteopaths. It was here that I began learning more about and integrating orthodox and alternative/wholistic medical principles into the Bigger Picture of Yoga & Bodywork Therapeutics.

I have worked with many soft tissue therapists over the years. David Scott Lynn is the only one educated and skilled enough to do what I want with full confidence that the job will be done. My patients definitely feel the difference.

Gary Fujinami • Doctor of Chiropractic
Prescott, Arizona

My bodywork system is based solidly on principles of physical, mental and relational yoga. My yoga system has been, in turn, heavily modified by what I have learned working privately with Real World Problems of my Clients in the Hands-On Bodywork realm. As a result, much of what is taught in the two fields I have found to be anywhere from inefficient to inaccurate to outright dangerous. I decided to do something about that.

First, Do NO Harm . . . Yoga Related Injury . . .

You might be aware that there has in recent years been a significant increase in yoga-related injuries. There are many reasons for that, which I write about on this website. But most of these injuries are not necessary.

And, contrary to popular opinion — Here I Go, I Warned You! — most of them are NOT caused by NOT aligning or positioning the body exactly correctly in an asana. In fact, in many cases, it is actually the too aggressive attempt to align the body in an allegedly Proper Alignment that is causing many of the problems!

But don’t get me started with that right now. Otherwise this letter to you will go on forever!

DSL has taught in the last 3 teacher training programs I have run this year [2003]. I chose him for the Anatomy & Physiology part of our training because of his yoga background and orientation. I have observed him and participated in his classes in each one of those trainings and have the highest regard for his expertise and knowledge of the body and ways to approach asana. He brings an awareness of how injury occurs in the first place and what role yoga is able to play in healing the body. He brings a depth of knowledge that is unusual to find and a way of teaching that allows students regardless of background to understand and utilize the principles in their teaching of yoga. He is very respectful and pays particular attention to all levels of safety for his students. In my opinion, he definitely should be considered as having mastered the teaching of yoga. . . . 

. . . Ruth Hartung • Director & Instructor
7 Centers Yoga Arts
Sedona, Arizona
[I am no longer teaching at 7 Centers -- DSL]

One of my most important missions, then, is to prevent injury as much as possible, in both realms — yoga and bodywork (although there is a LOT less injury in the bodywork field; unless you count the tendinitis, back pain and other problems the THERAPISTS suffer from!). And a large number of yoga teachers and therapists are doing far more harm, or providing far less benefit, than they realize or are capable of knowing without the full spectrum of knowledge that you will have access to in these web pages and in my LIVE Trainings.

To solve many of the problems that people have, and other therapists and healers have not helped, I’ve had to spend huge amounts of time thinking about, studying and experimenting with different approaches. But because I was fortunate enough to study yoga with Joel Kramer, and in bodywork, two very innovative men, Eugene Donaldson and Daniel Blake, I have been able to maximize results and avoid negative consequences with my work.

One Other – Kind of Important – Thing . . .
My Own Troubles With PAIN

Maybe most instructive, that I will tell you just a bit about here, were my own problems with pain.

As an heavy construction worker (ironwork), and a few other things in my teens like racing (often crashing) motorcycles, I developed SEVERE posture, pain and movement dysfunction. Worse, even, than most of my Clients over the later years when I became a Yoga/Bodywork Therapist.

Not anywhere near as bad as Evel Knievel (the daredevil motorcycle stunt man who broke every bone in his body at one time or another), but no one, not even the people I trained with, or was trained by, could help me. I had to figure it out on my own.

And I did. … But it took A LOT of time and experimentation. I had to apply EVERYTHING I knew and had learned over the years, and figure out a lot of stuff I did NOT know, to solve these problems. It took a couple of years to build the foundation, but it happened. It took many more years to become mostly pain free, most of the time.

Now, I have a reputation with many people in America (and out of country, too) of being able to solve structural, neuromuscular and myofascial problems that very few are able to help. Some people say no one else does what I do. Sure, there are similarities between myself and a handful of other muscle therapists, but I have yet, so far, to run into someone with anywhere near the same overall approach. … If you DO know or find someone who does, Please send them my way.

TO: Yoga Alliance
Reference Letter for David Scott Lynn

The workshop I attended with David was about anatomy and alignment of the spine combined with demonstrations of gentle yoga poses of a more healing and restorative nature. Poses like the cobra, half locust, gentle lying twists, tadasana, taking time to really sink into these simpler poses to experience their full benefits without rushing.

David is a wonderful blend of clarity, humor, strength and compassion as a person and with respect to his teaching style. He has a way of keeping people’s attention focused and on track. He’s very interesting to listen to.

David is excellent at working with people in groups and individually. In his workshop he would sometimes demonstrate a pose and then have the students try, providing insights on alignments and modifications based on the specific needs of individuals. He does not teach yoga on a “one size fits all” basis. He understands a student’s need for individualized instruction. He’s very versatile and intuitive in this way.

He creates a very safe physical, emotional and psychological environment. He’s very professional and personable at the same time, a nice blend of both.

In addition, David is also an expert bodyworker and his understanding of anatomy and physiology is vast. He is creative with his own theories of bodywork and applies this understanding to the practice of yoga.

He’s very intelligent and well-read. He has many years of experience. I go to him for bodywork and he is in my opinion a true healer.

Sincerely, Jennifer Lynn Marcussen
Yoga Teacher • OM Center
Omaha, Nebraska

Anyway, YOU now have the opportunity to learn and benefit from thirty plus years of experience in a wide range of disciplines and conditions that have ALL contributed to the DSL Let-Go Yoga System.

So, when you study with me, you get the benefit of a combination of:

• Physical & Mental Yoga

• Emotional & Relational Yoga

• Hands-On EdgeTouch™ Bodywork Release Techniques
  

• Application the EdgeTouch Skill to Manual Assists & Asana Adjustment

• Neuromuscular & Myofascial Sciences

• Orthodox Musculoskeletal Science & Pathology

• Insights from Medical, Chiropractic & Osteopathic Medicine

• Bio-Structural Analysis & Postural Assessment

• Physical Sciences: How Physics and Gravity Affect the BodyMind

• Principles of Wholistic and Homeopathic Medicine & Natural Healing

• Philosophy, Psychology & Science of Being Human

• A Knowledge of Structure Developed as a Structural, Heavy Construction Worker

All of the stuff in the above list can all be summed up in my overall system of PsychoMuscular Release & Bio-Structural Balancing. That’s my technical name for physical & mental yoga, hands-on bodywork, wholistic medicine and bodymind therapeutics.

• PsychoMuscular implies the Mind, the Active Body and the Nerves that connect and integrate them. It’s actually psycho-neuro-musculo-fascial.
  

• Release is the Letting Go of Chronic, Excess Muscle & Nerve Tension (which includes the myofascial system) that causes so many problems, and DE-Compression of the body.
  

• Bio-Structural implies the living, breathing, Beingness & Action that manifests in the psycho-neuro-musculo-fascial-skeletal structure

• Balancing is figuring out what’s not working, what muscles are not in proper relation to each other, and bringing about the ability for someone to learn how to Feel, Relax, Lengthen, Coordinate & Balance their psycho-neuro-musculo-fascial-skeletal structure (say that 3 times real fast!)

For those who want to go even deeper, my complete system, including Advanced Structural Balancing Strategies & Hands-On Release Techniques, is called DSL EdgeWork: Yoga/Bodywork Therapeutics.

You did for me in 4 hours what physiotherapy couldn’t do in 4 years. And, you gave me the tools to continue working on my own.

Michelle Sands• Yoga Teacher
Montreal, Quebec

Now, you might be wondering . . .

How and Where did I get all the time necessary to learn all this stuff? Well, you can find out on the next (and last) page. But first, why not sign up for my Weekly e-Letter and the 9 Natural Laws e-Course? You can do that Right Here and Right Now … Why put it off? You might forget to come back to this website.

Get Started in Deepening Your Knowledge, Insights & Skills
in Physical & Mental Yoga, Let-Go Yoga and many Related Topics:
Please Sign Up to Receive Your FREE Weekly e-Letter from DSL.

Please SIGN UP for Your FREE Weekly e-Letter On Yoga PLUS a 5 Week e-Course on The 9 Natural Laws of Yoga (via e-mail) Learn More Here

Please Enter Your FIRST NAME & PRIMARY e-Mail Address

PRIVACY POLICY: I’ll will never sell, rent or give your contact data to anyone. That’s a Personal Promise.

Not Ready to Sign Up for my e-Letter yet? … Well, Please Read On to the Next Page and I’ll tell you more about the Details of how DSL Let-Go Yoga, and the many principles and sciences behind physical and mental yoga we’ll work with, can help YOU be an even better Yoga Teacher than you already are.

So Please, Click Right Here and Go To the Next Page, where you’ll Learn More . . .