Are your muscles functioning normally, or do you have a muscular imbalance?  How can you tell the difference?

When it comes to muscle function, what exactly is “normal”? “Normal” is only relative to what we’re used to.  If you were once in excellent health but are now suffering a muscular imbalance, and you don’t recall what it was like to be in your “former body”, how can you assess your current state?

In order to reach our greatest potential, we first need to recognize and resolve disruptions in the body that unfairly obstruct our abilities.  When we have hidden vulnerabilities, “normal” becomes an abstract concept.  

It’s tricky to think about.  When it comes to things like muscle imbalance or wear and tear, assessing or gauging our bodies with any accuracy is a challenge.  The human body is complicated and simple assumptions and guesswork are not proper ways to diagnose or treat a problem.

The body automatically compensates for weakness or injury.  When the brain senses instability in various parts of the body, it takes measures to protect itself.  For example, in an attempt to support and protect a joint, the brain sends messages to muscles surrounding that joint to tighten up.  This results in muscle imbalances and can lead to future injuries, recurring pain, tension, and overuse.

When a muscle is either weak or not functioning properly, it is unable to contract or lengthen normally.  Other muscles will step in to pick up the slack. This is known as muscle compensation, and it’s a cycle of stress that may continue for years.  When the compensation reaches a critical point, it results in pain -- a signal that something is wrong.

Most familiar forms of pain are actually derived from muscle weakness.   Traditionally, the symptoms of pain were treated with modalities that failed to resolve the underlying problem.  Recent breakthroughs in biomechanics and  the neural muscular system have resulted in new treatment methods.

“Pain is an indicator of weakness,” says Greg Roskopff, founder of M.A.T. This implies that when we feel pain during movement, or while stabilizing against a force, our muscles are shut down.  Pain is the warning sign.  When the body’s muscle system cannot adequately control force, stress is too high.  We have lost communication with our muscles.

Any ineptitude by our muscles in handling or transmitting force results in stresses of the body’s structure and tissues, and concurrently affects the nervous system.  How effectively does your body react to force placed upon it?  How well does your body apply its own force?  Clearly, stress on our bodies is derived from our distinct muscle weaknesses.  It makes sense, then, to locate and treat the origin of weakness.  This way, the body avoids stress and can heal itself.

Muscle Activation Techniques (M.A.T.) is a biomechanical-based treatment system that can determine, with precision, the areas of weakness and compensation within one’s muscular imbalance and correct them.

M.A.T. recognizes weak and inhibited muscles as the root cause of compensation and pain.  It addresses the injury/pain by targeting the weak muscle, thereby releasing the tight muscles.  M.A.T. corrects this cycle, restoring muscles to their peak functional capabilities.  It resets the neuromuscular pathways, and can dramatically improve the neuromuscular system’s functional capabilities for all age groups and increase performance for people at all levels.     

How does M.A.T. work?  The central nervous system (CNS) directly controls all muscles.  Receptors throughout the body send information, called proprioception, to the CNS.  The information is sent through the nervous system, processed in a feedback loop through the brain, and returned to the muscles. The body loses proprioceptive input due to trauma and/or stress in various forms. M.A.T. increases proprioceptive input to the central nervous system.  When the input is restored, tension is decreased and pain is reduced or eliminated.