How I Became a Fascia Fanatic
A few years ago, I registered for Yoga Medicine’s Myofascial Release training, thinking it would be a great way to add some new tools to my teaching. What didn’t I expect? It would totally change the way I think about my body and yoga as a whole.
After the training, it didn’t take long to open the door to a whole new way of understanding movement, tension, and connection. I found myself asking new questions:
What’s happening in my rotator cuff during chaturanga?
Why does my neck feel tight when my hamstrings are tight?
What’s going on with my spine in a forward fold?
This module didn’t just give me answers—it gave me a new lens.
Fascia: The Missing Link
People always talk about how “everything in the body is connected,” and I understood that on a surface level. But it wasn’t until I started learning about fascia that it started to make sense—in my body and my teaching.
Fascia is the connective tissue that wraps around every muscle, bone, organ, nerve, and blood vessel—kind of like a full-body wetsuit or internal scaffolding. When it’s healthy, fascia helps everything move smoothly and stay supported. It’s deeply involved in how we move, how we feel, and even how we process stress and recover from injury.
Once I started to understand fascia, I couldn’t stop thinking about it, and I wanted to study it more deeply.
My sister suggested I check out the amazing work Jill Miller is doing in self-myofascial release using therapy balls. Jill is a leader in fascia education and embodied self-care. Her work resonated with me immediately, and I appreciated her approach, combining cutting-edge fascia research with practical tools like balls and breathwork.
Jill's leadership within the Fascia Research Congress has been instrumental in bridging the gap between clinical science and movement education. Being connected to that body of work has given my practice a whole new depth.
Then Came Biotensegrity… and My Mind Was Officially Blown
Biotensegrity is a beautiful concept that views the body as a connected, dynamic structure, much like a suspension bridge. Instead of bones stacked like building blocks, we’re held together through a balance of tension and compression. It explains why pulling on one area (like your hamstrings) can affect something seemingly unrelated (like your neck).
The more I learned about this, the more it made sense—not just in the body, but in how we experience pain, stress, movement, and healing.
A New Direction: Therapeutic Yoga and More
That’s when I knew: I wanted to keep going. I decided to pursue my 500-hour yoga teacher training through a therapeutic lens because I want to support people on a deeper level. I chose the Yoga Medicine®️ route based on its mission: to educate yoga teachers and practitioners in understanding the body deeply, integrating Western and Eastern medical principles to create individualized therapeutic yoga practices.
Whether it’s pain, injury, tightness, or simply the stress of life, I want to help others understand their bodies and feel more connected to themselves in their own skin.
Learning about fascia helped me understand that discomfort isn’t always coming from where we think it is. Sometimes it’s about the bigger picture—the patterns, the compensations, the stories our bodies hold.
So Yes… I’ve Become a Fascia Fanatic
I’m the person who’s always reading about connective tissue now. I travel with therapy balls. I bring up biotensegrity at dinner (sorry, friends).
This work—through Yoga Medicine, Jill Miller’s The Roll Model® Method, and the incredible leadership of other fascia researchers-has completely changed how I approach my own practice, how I teach, and how I care for my body. It’s made yoga even more meaningful—and way more fascinating.
If you’re curious about fascia, myofascial release, or want to feel better in your body, I’d love to share more. This journey has only just begun for me, and I’m so excited to keep learning—and geeking out—as I go.
Fascia images credit: Jean-Claude Guimberteau
