You might be wondering why I chose to post a picture of donkeys. When I first started learning about Zero Balancing in 2012, I was introduced to a new way of therapeutic touch called “the donkey lean”. The donkey lean concept not only was a game-changer in how I treat clients but also how I interact with the world.
Donkeys naturally lean on one another when walking up narrow paths climbing a mountain. It is their way to support one another and use less effort during a sometimes arduous journey. In a healing session, I utilize the Donkey leaning concept as a way to engage fully with the client using an equal balance of energetic and structural touch. When I talk about structural touch, I mean their physical body at the deepest layer, the bone. Clients not only feel completely supported but they are in ownership of their energy and I am in ownership of mine. Many clients having general sensations of pleasure and peacefulness while a neutral connection is maintained with me as the practitioner.
If you aren’t quite convinced I encourage you to try an experiment. See how you feel the next time you shake someone’s hand or hug them. Do you feel energized after? Tired? Agitated for no particular reason? You may be taking on their energy or giving away too much of your own. If so, see if something changes by tucking your pelvis (as if you have a tail and are tucking it under you) while bending your knees a little. Tucking your tailbone and bending your knees is one way to ground yourself, create/maintain a donkey-donkey connection and not take on someone else’s energy.
Another thing you can experiment is standing back to back with a friend. Notice if one person or the other is leaning too much versus too little and see if you can find a neutral point without speaking where both of you are leaning using the same weight. That’s the donkey-donkey connection. In the Zero Balancing world the connection is also called, “Interface”. In the yoga therapy world my teacher, Guru Dharam Singh, calls it the “Zero Field”.
With every healing interaction, I first and foremost create this connection with a client and see where their starting point is and I meet them there through this type of touch. It is in this space that healing occurs. By leaning into the space of both energetic and structural healing through an interface connection, the potential for lasting change happens. Clients then have an opportunity to have a new relationship and balance with themselves. I utilize the donkey-donkey connection/interface technique in pretty much everything I do. Before learning about it I was constantly feeling drained. I felt to be an effective healer I had to be this conduit that would transform another person’s energy. Taking on someone’s energy in the process was an occupational hazard. Now I simply allow the healing to occur without getting my energy entangled in the process. Clients not only feel energized but I do as well.
I encourage you to see in what ways you can lean into healing more through Interface. You can lean into a more meaningful connection with your co-workers, partner, friends and family. Instead of choosing to connect artificially through social media, lean into the support of a friend in person. You can even practice when meeting new people. In the end you’ll never look at a donkey the same way again.