View Single Post
Old 01-16-2013, 06:46 AM   #1
chillzATL
Location: ATL
Join Date: Jul 2000
Posts: 847
United_States
Offline
Misogi, fascia and stuff

Have any of you Japanese language enabled folks ever read anything in depth in regards to cold water misogi practices and anything related to IP? I have no interest in doing this btw, but once I started feeling some of this stuff a light bulb went off and it made me curious about whether or not there might be more there than just the spiritual aspects that tend to get attached to it via aikido.

If we suppose that the relaxed structure we're training is based around some sort of expansion/contraction of the fascia network through the body, then on the surface it would seem that anything that activates or works against either of those aspects could have physical benefits. Vasoconstriction and vasodilation are real and it appears that there is at least some level of scientific discussion of controlled usage of these things, however small it may be. We have the monks that cover themselves in ice soaked sheets and meditate to warm their bodies and dry the sheets, etc. So I've thought this could go two ways.

1. You warm the body up first, then douse it in cold water, causing everything to contract / tighten up. It would seem that if you can keep your body relaxed and not tense up/shiver, that tightening of the skin would cover the entire body. On the surface it would seem to be a skin/fascia way of flexing the entire body without actually flexing the your muscles.

2. you warm up the body and using intent you activate that relaxed structure and then douse your body in cold water. The goal being to keep your focus/intent active against the distraction of the cold water and the bodies natural desire to tense and shiver, like some sort of fascia isometrics.

Anyway, this isn't something I'm interested in doing or going off into the weeds with my own training on, but once I started feeling some of this stuff and looking back at what some of these people were doing, I found it interesting. Thoughts?
  Reply With Quote