May 9, 2025 • 29 mins
Tom Swales transforms how we understand rehabilitation and human movement through his groundbreaking "Five Elements of Human Design" approach. Breaking away from compartmentalized treatment models, he reveals how psychology, neurology, biology, chemistry, and physics interconnect to create a comprehensive framework for healing and performance.
What makes Swales' methodology revolutionary is its ability to identify the true origins of pain and dysfunction. That nagging shoulder pain? It might actually be caused by limited hip rotation on your opposite side. The Achilles tendon that won't heal? Perhaps it's compensating for poor balance and core control issues. By following a systematic assessment process, practitioners can uncover these hidden connections and address root causes rather than chasing symptoms.
The stories Swales shares illustrate the universal application of these principles. When the World's Strongest Man came to him with chronic knee, groin and back pain, Swales didn't focus on strength training. Instead, he identified subtle issues with neck extension and visual tracking. After just one session targeting these areas, the athlete reported a pain-free personal record in his squat the very next day. Similarly, an 85-year-old woman with balance concerns made remarkable improvements through deadlift training - demonstrating how the same principles apply across the performance spectrum.
Perhaps most refreshing is Swales' emphasis on patient independence. "The worst thing we can do as health experts is create dependency," he explains. Rather than fostering reliance on ongoing treatments, his approach educates patients as "students of their own bodies," empowering them with self-awareness and practical tools to maintain their health independently.
Ready to rethink your approach to rehabilitation and performance? Explore Tom's Advanced Movement Therapist certification at amtcertified.ca or access his free resources on YouTube for practical applications of these transformative principles.
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
Well, hello, welcome back to the Healthy Living
Podcast.
I'm your host, Joe Grumbine,and today we have a very special
guest.
His name is Tom Swales and he'sa highly respected
physiotherapist and strengthcoach.
This guy's got 20 years ofexperience with human movement,
injury prevention,rehabilitation, and I can just
go on and on, but what I'drather do is jump into the
(00:25):
conversation, tom.
Welcome to the show.
I'm so glad you're able to joinus and just love to have you
introduce yourself yeah, thanks,Joe.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
so, as you said, my name is Tom Swales.
I am a physio strength coach uphere in Canada for those of you
listening in the states and Ihave a clinic business with my
wife.
We've grown that from just thetwo of us to now almost 30 staff
and we're opening a secondlocation in Barrie, Ontario.
(00:54):
Along my own journey of tryingto be the best I can for those
that I help, doing the courses,doing the certifications, coming
out of school with this bigambition to help as many people
as possible.
Now you run into your ownproblems and what I've created
over the last, I guess, seven toeight years and distilling down
(01:16):
what I feel are the mostrelevant things in the rehab and
performance side of things.
I came up with the AdvancedMovement Therapist certification
to help, you know, cliniciansand coaches coming out of school
to help organize and increaseeffectiveness super quick and
then help those veterans whohave done it all but they don't
know which tools to use at theright time for the right person
and for the right purpose.
So you know it's it's aframework and a system to kind
(01:39):
of build more knowledge on topof, because we're lifelong
learners and we love what we do.
But you know we can also getbogged down with the amount of
information out.
There is like, what do I usefor which person?
And you know, if we have a wayto organize what we know, it
also helps us build more on topof that so that we can continue
to evolve in our thinking andour approaches.
Speaker 1 (01:59):
That's pretty powerful.
It seems that you know, as I'mwalking down my path to health
and meeting all these differentprofessionals and you know you
meet most of the people that arethe most skilled in their
profession are the ones thathave been through the problem
and have solved the problems.
But they don't often, they'renot always good business people.
(02:21):
They don't know how to donecessarily the part that
they're not trying to do, whichis help people, and I think
that's huge.
You know, you run into somebodywho is maybe he's learned how
to solve a problem, maybe he'sgot this whole little practice
that's working great, but hegets stuck with, you know, a
(02:42):
couple of clients or whatever.
And what do you do withsomething like that?
Speaker 2 (02:48):
Right, it's the Thomas Edison and the Nikola
Tesla.
Right, Thomas Edison, he becamefamous and rich.
Why?
Because he had money andbacking and marketing behind him
to tell the world what he doesExactly to tell the world what
he does.
And Tesla became a you know, awell-known later, but you know,
impoverished genius who didn'tget the accreditation or
(03:11):
credibility that he deserved.
Speaker 1 (03:14):
So true, so true.
So how, how?
How does this work?
You know, you've, you've gotthis, this course, this, this
certification and all this, andhow does somebody even approach
it?
How does it even happen?
Speaker 2 (03:29):
So you know it's all online.
I was teaching it from thebeginning, again, pre-covid.
You know I was running aroundweekends teaching level one,
level two certifications, andthen of course, that got halted
in its tracks and my wife wasn'treally too keen on that side of
the business because we werestill running our clinic and
she's like you're going to begone every weekend, Like that's
not the point of this, You'regoing to be working more and uh.
(03:52):
And then when, when we kind ofagain forced everyone uses the
word pivot uh, we turned it intoan on-demand pre-recorded,
hired a professional recordingcompany record five days
straight, banged out all theinformation, rewrote the
textbooks, you know, went from ahundred pages to 550 pages.
Um, yeah and um.
(04:13):
You know, now it's now, it'sthis product that anybody can do
, um, online.
And then we're offering livecoaching sessions come up in the
September where people can getmore clarification and and we'll
do case studies and whatnot.
So you know it's going to be acommunity, the.
The big goal of it is by 2030, Iwant to help 75 million people,
right, as an extension of.
(04:34):
You know, at first I'm like youknow what I want to get.
I want to, I want to certify somany therapists, so many
coaches and clinicians, and I'mlike you know what the bigger
picture because where thepassion lies is teaching, not
just clinicians and coaches Ilove teaching the general public
too is well.
If we can help 75 millionpeople, well, that's just a
bigger, broader perspective andgoal to do.
(04:57):
Because now we can find thelike-minded individuals who want
to level up their skill set,level up their knowledge, think
outside the box of theirtraditional paradigm and that
they can continue to build theirknowledge instead of just get
stuck in what they know is whatthey know, type of thing.
Because it's easy to do that,we get comfortable.
(05:18):
But comfort comes withconsequences and it usually
leads to stagnation and burnout.
Doing this for 20 years now, Isee some of my colleagues are
just like, oh, you know, likeI'm running a business, I'm done
, blah, blah, blah.
I'm going to ride this out foranother 10 years and I'm going
to sell.
I'm like, yeah, or you couldre-spark that love for what you
do by continuing to evolve.
(05:40):
You know, not just as abusiness owner but as a
clinician.
And then you know, maybe youcontinue to mentor and teach
those in your clinic, okay,great.
Well, it's hard to teach those.
You know it takes a lot of timeto get people up to speed in
your clinic.
Well, here's a training system.
It's kind of a hands-off andI'll do it for you.
And now, all of a sudden, hey,you know what?
(06:01):
I'm going to open a secondclinic.
All right, sweet.
Hey, you know what?
I'm going to open a secondclinic.
All right, sweet, why?
Because we took care of one ofthe systems of leveling up and
getting your clinicians goodreally quickly either new, grad
or veteran, and everyone'sspeaking the same language.
Right, we all know that whenrunning a business, the only way
you can kind of step away fromthe business is if you have
(06:21):
really good systems in place.
And early on when we were and ateam you have really good
systems in place and you knowearly on when we were in a team
you got to have people.
You got to have a team, oh forsure, Like the culture and the
people.
But you know, you got to findthe right ones on your bus, that
that are along for the ride andsee the end goal.
I mean, that is so critical.
We've learned that over thelast 13 years and we have an
amazing team, which is why we'reable to, you know, open up a
(06:43):
second location.
Everyone's excited to do it andhelp out, but everyone's rowing
in the same direction.
Everyone has this mindset ofyou know, of this cohesive
culture, and everyone coming inwants to teach the newbies
coming in.
They're excited because that'swhat was given to them.
We had this culture where it'san open-door policy.
(07:03):
Everybody teaches everybody.
You know, we have mastermindsonce a quarter.
We do mentorship every week andwe're just constantly refining
skills.
Oh, you learned something newthis weekend on a course.
Guess what you're doing?
Mastermind, You're now theexpert and you get to teach
everybody and everybody yeah,it's so fun.
Speaker 1 (07:17):
Student becomes the teacher, and then you learn
something, but you know where?
Speaker 2 (07:20):
I learned, when I realized when, anytime I learn
something, I take the mindset isI'm going to be teaching this
tomorrow.
So now I really have to drivein understanding so that I can
communicate this new skill set,this new information, in a
practical, applicable way, sothat now those that I work with
(07:42):
can also take that newinformation and adapt it to
their skill set, rather thanthem having to go out for the
weekend, right?
So everyone takes thatmentality of they know if
they're taking a course oneweekend, they're coming back and
they're going to be the teachernext, the next mastermind.
So they love it, they love.
Speaker 1 (07:58):
It Raises the level of expectation and puts it on
yourself.
Raises the level of expectationand puts it on yourself.
Raises the bar.
Passion is what brings, I think, most people to their place of
business if they'reself-employed, and all of these
are certainly that, andeverybody wants to hear about
(08:19):
the why, and I understand you'vegot some pretty interesting
stories that bring you here.
Why don't you tell us a littlebit about how you came to this
place?
Speaker 2 (08:29):
Okay, well, I mean, it's every.
Every journey starts with thatpersonal struggle, right?
Coming out of school, you'reeager, you're like oh, I got to
level up.
I know I know what I learned inschool, but I know everything.
It's not the end, all be all.
And I know what I learned isthe foundation.
It's foundation knowledge.
It's also not super like whatyou, what you learn in a
(08:50):
textbook doesn't always apply toreal life, for sure.
So, immediately I startedlearning courses, getting
confidence, getting my handling,acupuncture, manual therapy,
and then, you know, learningkettlebells, learning gymnastics
, integrating those naturalmovement patterns, integrating
those natural movement patterns,you know, I just absorbed
whatever I could.
But then, like I said early on,I started to get confused and
(09:12):
you know, I would go do a courseand guess what?
Everybody got that month Flavorof the month.
Everyone gets this newtechnique that I learned, right,
and you know, from a practiceperspective, you get really good
at that one particular thing.
But then you lose perspectiveon how maybe this isn't the
right tool for the right personat the right time.
So then you start realizing,wow, like this worked on these
(09:33):
people, but it didn't work onthese ones.
Why?
So then, okay, well, maybe I'llgo back and do the other skill
that I learned on this person.
Oh, okay, well, that kind ofworked for 10% of them, but the
other 90% didn't work.
So of them, but the other 90%didn't work.
So then you get confused andnow you're like I have all the I
don't, I don't know what I'mdoing anymore.
So you start to lose confidenceagain, right?
So you come out of school withno confidence.
You learn a couple of things.
You get some confidence andsome wins and then you start
(09:55):
losing confidence because nowyou don't know what to do on
anybody and then you're likenothing works for anybody.
But it was.
I tried to find the through linebetween all of these concepts,
all of these tools andtechniques.
I'm like, what are thecommonalities, what are the
fundamental first principlesthat go through high performance
(10:16):
, through movement patterns,through rehabilitation, through
manual therapy, all the stuff?
And I was able to distill itdown into what originally was
four, but it became five, fivefundamental principles or
elements of human design, and itcomes from kind of the entire
interaction of seeing a client.
(10:36):
So, for example, so these fiveelements are psychology,
neurology, biology, chemistryand physics.
I distilled it down into olderthings, but you don't have to be
experts at those, you just haveto have a baseline
understanding of those things,because those the rules and the
laws of those five disciplines.
They don't change, right, andthey apply across every human
(10:57):
being.
So, psychology, we're going tosit down and we're going to have
conversation.
I need to take a history, thefirst word, the first
interaction, the language that Iuse, the language that I don't
use, you're going to.
I have to make you feel safe.
Right, I'm going to use, I'mgoing to ask questions, I'm
going to create the connection,I'm going to build trust and,
with the trust, create safety.
(11:18):
Well, what happens when youfeel safe in my presence?
Ah, nervous system starts tocalm down.
So, pain levels, sympatheticstate, all of a sudden they
start shifting into this person.
Oh, I can trust this humanbeing.
Great, now we're tapping intothe neurological system.
What do we got to do to look at?
Next, let's look at how you moveas a system.
Right, because the body's asystem, it's not individual
(11:38):
parts.
Individual parts can hurt, butthe cause is typically a
systems-based problem.
Right, can you touch your toes?
Can you backbend?
Can you stand on one leg?
What is your neck doing?
What are your shoulders doing?
Hey, that side's movingdifferent than that side.
Why Then you start breaking upthe pieces.
So you look at deeper into thenervous system.
What's your nerve tension, likeCentral, peripheral?
(12:00):
What's the electrical systemsaying?
Do muscle testing, look at thejoints what parts are moving,
which parts are not, and thenyou can start to kind of whittle
down as to you know what thisright shoulder issue.
That shoulder moves, great.
But you know what doesn't move?
That neck doesn't rotate to theleft, or your rib cage doesn't
rotate, or you don't extend well, or you can't single leg
(12:20):
balance on the opposite side.
Okay, well, let's go look atthose parts and then we'll come
back to the shoulder.
And then, once you start lookingat oh you know what, that left
hip, you can't rotate into thathip.
Oh yeah, I've had low back painfor the last 10 years.
That's kind of important.
Okay, now that low back pain,you've learned to compensate
with that.
But now you've transferred allthose forces and energy into a
(12:40):
shoulder across the body becauseof the gait reflex.
Right, this shoulder works withthe opposite hip, just simply
from walking.
So now we can start saying,okay, well, you know what?
We have a bit of a physicsproblem because energy moves to
the area of least resistance.
Well, this, this and thisaren't moving.
So guess what you're movingmore into?
Ah, the most mobile joint inyour body, which is the shoulder
(13:01):
.
That could be why you have thisoveruse problem.
Or the Achilles tendon.
You have an Achilles tendon ice.
You don't take twice as manysteps on the right than the left
, do you?
No, I don't think so, but couldbe well, you don't balance well
on the left leg, you are notdriving with the right hip very
effectively and you have somecore control problems.
Well, you might be pushing offthat calf and Achilles a little
bit harder with every step, andyour nervous system knows this.
(13:28):
It will always use the strongerpart, it will ignore what's
weak.
So once we start finding oh,you know what we have these
imbalances, now we can start toredistribute forces into the
body effectively.
And now we've taken all thatforce away from the injured area
because we're distributing itmore effectively.
So that's your physics.
Great, now we've taken care ofthe physics problem.
Let's look at well, what'sbiology?
Cells, tissues, adaptationsOkay, how did we evolve?
(13:53):
Okay, we developed throughtubes.
We're in the embryological.
We were organized and designedin the same way, right, in the
same order.
The nervous system prioritizesstructures in the middle.
All of our movement comes fromthe top down.
We develop movement from thecenter out, like babies on the
ground rolling around.
And then we look at chemistry.
Well, what's chemistry?
It's breathing.
If I'm over-oxygenated orunder-oxygenated, am I acidic?
(14:14):
Am I alkaline?
The breathing also affects thenervous system.
If I'm coming into like this,what state am I in?
Sympathetic, can't heal in thatstate.
Ah, we need to go after yourbreathing.
And when we affect yourbreathing, we now improve the
chemistry.
What also affects chemistry isthe food we eat, because it's
all molecular, everything'smolecules right, your molecules,
(14:35):
I'm molecules.
So when we find all of these,you know, when we look at things
through these five elements ofdesign, it gets a little bit
easier to explain what we do,why we do it and how we do it
better.
So people will say well, youknow, I got needling, okay,
great, what did the needle do?
Well, it created this myotacticreflex and it relaxed the
(14:55):
muscle and spinal record and topdown, okay, cool.
But what we essentially did iswe changed the inputs.
Your nervous system said, oh, Ilike that.
And it took the brakes off, itreorganized Ah, we have a window
of opportunity to change thingsneurologically.
But if we don't which ismovement, if we don't take
advantage of that new window ofchange, guess what the nervous
(15:18):
system does Goes back to the oldpatterns, which is why two,
three days later you're like ah,that's stuck again, right,
because you defaulted back toyour old motor patterns.
You didn't learn anything new,right?
And then the last part, againphysics.
So we talked about physics froma physical perspective.
But then we move into thequantum mechanics or quantum
(15:38):
physics, which is vibration,frequency and energy.
Well, if everything's molecularand you look at molecules and
atoms at their fundamental level, it's 99.9999% empty space.
Exactly, right, okay.
So then what are we?
We're over 99% of empty space.
Well, how can?
We can see each other in thisphysical, three-dimensional way,
(16:00):
because everything is.
When you look further down atquarks, it's wavelengths.
Everything is when you lookfurther down at quarks, it's
wavelengths.
So wavelengths that are runningat specific frequencies are now
being perceived and organizedby us in the three-dimensional
world as physical matter.
It's a specific frequency.
That's what we're doing, right,okay, well, what affects?
What affects wavelengths,thoughts and emotions?
(16:20):
Okay, so now it comes back upto psychology.
And what will also determinewhether somebody responds
positively or negatively to amodality?
Manipulation, needling, softtissue work is their belief.
If they believe that's going tohelp, well, it's going to get
the nervous system andeverything to organize in a
positive way.
We get a positive output.
If they had a negativeexperience in the past, well,
(16:42):
you do that same technique.
They're probably gonna have anegative response, right?
So this is where it all loopsback up together.
And once we understand thesefive elements, then what we do
from a manual therapyperspective, from a
rehabilitation throughmodalities, through movement,
now we can better understand howthat individual is going to
(17:03):
respond to the therapy thatwe're providing individual is
going to respond to the therapythat we're providing.
Speaker 1 (17:12):
That's powerful.
I you know, through the lastcouple of years of doing this
podcast, we've been talkingabout health and you know
there's two ways to look atsomething.
Well, many ways to look at it.
But there's a singular orlinear approach that says I'm
going to do this thing and it'sgoing to cause this thing, yeah.
Then there's a holisticapproach, which is what we're
talking about here.
Then it's all affecting thisand we're going to look at the
whole picture and we're going togive value to all the parts in
(17:35):
the picture.
And it's been my experiencethat when you're able to step
back a little bit and use thisholistic approach, we find
unexpected developments,unexpected breakthroughs.
Tell me about some of theremarkable changes that you've
discovered.
Speaker 2 (17:56):
Well, I mean, there's all kinds of fun cases and I
always like using kind of twoextremes.
So I've had the opportunity andthe privilege to work recently
with the world's strongest man.
He lives in my town.
He reached out to me, right, amI going to make him stronger?
No, he's already the world'sstrongest man, right, and he's
crushing and he's on like he'ssuch a good human being and he
(18:19):
has no problem with me.
Uh, talking about that, he'sonline and he does lots of stuff
.
So he first came to me.
He's like yeah, like I'mlifting well, but I always have
this chronic knee right, groinright, low back issue.
I said, okay, cool, go throughsome basic movements.
His neck didn't really extend.
Look at his visual system.
His left eye wasn't tracking invery effectively.
(18:40):
He was kind of bugging out, buthe couldn't stand on his left
leg.
So every time he squatted, heshifted to the right side.
Well, because the nervoussystem knows that's the safer
side.
So guess what?
He's overloading the right sideevery time he squats 800 plus
pounds.
Light him up.
As soon as we took care of somevisual stuff, as soon as we put
his neck into a better position,all of a sudden the glutes
(19:01):
started turning back on and hissquat got easier and we did some
rolling patterns to the left.
We did literally three thingson the first appointment.
The next day he texts me.
He's like hey, I just PR mysquat for four repetitions, no
pain, amazing.
So did I do anything from aperformance perspective?
Not really.
I mean, we just balanced himout and his nervous system took
(19:22):
the brakes off, because we kindof calibrated and reorganized
his nervous system so that hewas able to squat more
symmetrically and he wasunloading that painful side
Right so we could look at thosethings.
Well, those are rehab exercises, not high performance.
Well, what was the outcome?
It led to high performance.
And then you look at the otherend.
We have a little 85 year oldlady who's got balance issues,
(19:45):
who who is scared to fall, she'snot strong, she wants to, you
know, improve longevity andhealth.
Guess what we get her doing?
Deadlifts.
We got her doing up to, likeyou know, a 40 kilo kettlebell
deadlift for five repetitions.
We put it on the agility ladderand guess what got better
balance, foot speed, control,strength.
So we took this, these rehabtools for this certain
(20:09):
individual, and we improvedperformance.
And then we took a performancetool to this individual and we
improved her longevity.
So it it's the same spectrum.
Right, they're just twoindividuals on different ends of
the spectrum, both haveindividual problems, but it's
applying the right tools to theright person at the right time
for the right thing.
(20:29):
So once we have thisunderstanding that we can't be
super siloed into wow, I only dorehabilitation Like, yeah, but
the human being needs to get offyour table and they need to
lift and do things in the realworld again, or else they end up
back on your table and if wedon't find what those
individuals need fromfundamentals, well then we're
(20:49):
going to miss the big pictureand we can't help them.
So this is where we need tothink outside the box.
Look at what every person infront of us needs, go through
the same system and it's likeit's an algorithm we figure out.
You're like, oh, we hit thiskind of fork in the road.
We actually need to go overhere with you.
But for this person we need togo over here.
But the only way to do that isto organize everything that we
(21:13):
do and have a specific systemthat we go through so we don't
miss important pieces ofinformation, so we build our
knowledge on fundamentalprinciples.
So it's almost like a bullshitmeter, right.
It's like we say all thesethings and we're like, ah, you
know, like the science says this, I'm like, well, try it, and if
it made a change, who cares?
Right, maybe it works for 5% ofthe population.
(21:35):
But at least you checkedeverything and make sure you're
not making assumptions and belike ah, well, I think the
shoulder, you know it's a tightpack Well, it could be nerve, it
could be a neck issue, it couldbe anything else.
Why is that nerve?
If we always ask why, then it'sgoing to be better.
You're going to find bettersolutions to the pain questions
that people are coming in with.
But it just helps streamlinewhat an individual needs by
(22:00):
being very, very specific, verydisciplined in our approach on
the front end, say, of anassessment, so we can get
creative on the back end withour treatment.
What clinicians will often dois we get very creative with our
assessment on the front end andthen everybody gets the same
exercises on the back end right,everyone gets protocols right.
(22:23):
But that's cookie cutter whenyou have a set system on the
front and you're checking allthe boxes and you're going
through the algorithm and you'refinding what, what the true
problems are, not just the pain.
Now you get to be creative onthe back end with your treatment
.
Speaker 1 (22:41):
So a lot of times when people come to a therapist,
they have a specific injury orillness that they're dealing
with.
Right, they have a problemthey're trying to solve.
But a true therapist or aprofessional practitioner,
ambition, I would think, wouldbe to help the person for the
(23:01):
rest of their life.
Yeah, and you know, this iswhere I think.
A lot of times you know you goto the doctor, you get your fix
and then you're done, yep, butwhat do you?
I mean, it seems like thissystem has all the capabilities
and the tools to really takeboth the practitioner and the
patient into a journey to health.
(23:23):
So why don't you tell us alittle bit about what's the part
that makes it go from okay,you're done to now you get to
start and keep going?
Speaker 2 (23:32):
It's educating the patient.
So every client that comes intoour facility, we treat them
like a student, their student oftheir own body.
We're not going home with them,right?
The 30 minutes that we spendwith somebody, you know, there's
just over, I think, 10,000minutes in a week.
Speaker 1 (23:48):
Right.
Speaker 2 (23:49):
And we always tell people like, look, here's the
problem, here's what you need towork on.
You need to work on thesethings so that next week, when
you come back, we can continueto move forward.
Right, if you don't do thethings that I'm asking you to do
, because it's your body, wecan't continue to progress
forward.
There's no real end game, right?
I mean, we want to dischargepeople.
(24:10):
We want them getting back towhat they love doing
independently.
They shouldn't need us.
The worst thing that we can doas health experts is create
dependency.
You know, oh, I need to get mycrack, I need to get my needles
to feel good, or I can show youhow to release this on your own,
so that when you start to feelthese muscles tightening up or
(24:31):
this imbalance starting tohappen again, you know how to
correct it before it becomes aproblem.
So a lot of it is creatingself-awareness and educating the
people coming to us for helpthat they have the power and the
ability to make sure thisdoesn't come back.
And it's when they let it keepsliding or they continue to do
the old habits that arecontributing to the problem but
(24:52):
not counteracting it.
Well, it comes back.
Now they need their fix again.
And then what do we become?
We become drug dealers, exactlyRight Like.
I mean, I didn't get into thisfield to create these long-term
repeat clients.
I mean it's great that you knowthey come to us for help, but
at the end of the day we want togive them solutions for their
(25:14):
issues and that they can becomeindependent again.
It's not this.
I need this person.
I need this thing For me, forus at our clinic, we are very
happy when clients get back 100%plus more than what they've
expected, and they're off andrunning.
And if they do something sillyagain and they come in with
(25:35):
something new, great, come back,we'll help you out again if you
can't figure it out.
But at least we can create thatself-awareness in our clients
and our athletes so that theycan continue to perform in life
and sport or whatever it is, forthe long run, as long as they
want to do it, not.
Oh, I got to keep getting thissorted out.
The pain came back.
Speaker 1 (25:57):
Well, if the pain keeps coming back right.
Speaker 2 (25:59):
Well, if, if, if, you keep coming back for the thing,
that feels good.
I haven't done my job as aclinician to find the true
problem.
We're just treating symptomsand to me that's not fun.
All right, I want you to getback.
I always ask clients if theycome back and like new injury or
old injury.
And they're like new, I waslike, okay, good, that means we
fixed the first one Right.
(26:19):
I'm like I did something silly.
I was playing my sport.
I twist my great, okay, greatNew problem.
Speaker 1 (26:25):
Right, exactly.
Speaker 2 (26:26):
I don't want to see you coming back for the same
thing, which means that maybe wedidn't do our job good enough
or we didn't find the mainproblem in the first place.
Speaker 1 (26:35):
Well, it seems that you have created a valuable
product in a very importantspace, and this is the part
where I give you a chance to leteverybody know how to find you,
how to access what you have tooffer and give your elevator
pitch here.
Speaker 2 (26:53):
Okay.
Coaches who want to streamlinetheir practice, simplify their
tools, organize what they do,you know, find the why in their
clients, to actually get to theroot cause of pain and problems
or movement dysfunctions orimprove performance.
The AMT certification AdvancedMovement Therapist certification
is at amtcertifiedca.
(27:15):
There's a blog there.
There's a free eight neuralhacks on how to move better and
reduce pain in 60 seconds orless.
That's a fun one.
That's a presentation I do atconferences and it's fun because
it's interactive.
You get people moving.
Also, they can touch their toesand their balance gets better
within 60 seconds, like doingeye exercises, breathing
exercises, tapping all the stuff, uh.
(27:36):
So that's free for anybodygoing on there, whether you're a
clinician or coach or justyou're curious about your body.
My YouTube channel is TommySwales lots of longer format.
You know tennis, elbow stuff,hip impingement if you're a
biker, if you're a runner oryou're a lifter, so there's kind
of troubleshootingself-assessments and
troubleshoot exercises on that.
My Instagram is swalestom,facebook is Tom Swales and as
(28:01):
well as LinkedIn.
So I put lots of free contentup there for anybody who just
wants to kind of troubleshoot iton their own.
But for my clinicians andcoaches out there who kind of
struggle with, or they're nothappy with, the results that
they're getting, or they feellike they can do more.
The A&T certification is theright tool for them.
Speaker 1 (28:22):
Fantastic.
Well, tom, I very muchappreciate you joining us today.
Your information is rivetingand, I think, impactful, and I
hope that the professionals thatare listening are going to find
it important, and I just wantto thank you for being here.
Thanks for having me, joe.
All right, this has been theHealthy Living Podcast.
I'm your host, joe Grumbine,and we will see you next time.
Well, hello, welcome back to the Healthy Living
Podcast.
I'm your host, Joe Grumbine,and today we have a very special
guest.
His name is Tom Swales and he'sa highly respected
physiotherapist and strengthcoach.
This guy's got 20 years ofexperience with human movement,
injury prevention,rehabilitation, and I can just
go on and on, but what I'drather do is jump into the
(00:25):
conversation, tom.
Welcome to the show.
I'm so glad you're able to joinus and just love to have you
introduce yourself yeah, thanks,Joe.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
so, as you said, my name is Tom Swales.
I am a physio strength coach uphere in Canada for those of you
listening in the states and Ihave a clinic business with my
wife.
We've grown that from just thetwo of us to now almost 30 staff
and we're opening a secondlocation in Barrie, Ontario.
(00:54):
Along my own journey of tryingto be the best I can for those
that I help, doing the courses,doing the certifications, coming
out of school with this bigambition to help as many people
as possible.
Now you run into your ownproblems and what I've created
over the last, I guess, seven toeight years and distilling down
(01:16):
what I feel are the mostrelevant things in the rehab and
performance side of things.
I came up with the AdvancedMovement Therapist certification
to help, you know, cliniciansand coaches coming out of school
to help organize and increaseeffectiveness super quick and
then help those veterans whohave done it all but they don't
know which tools to use at theright time for the right person
and for the right purpose.
So you know it's it's aframework and a system to kind
(01:39):
of build more knowledge on topof, because we're lifelong
learners and we love what we do.
But you know we can also getbogged down with the amount of
information out.
There is like, what do I usefor which person?
And you know, if we have a wayto organize what we know, it
also helps us build more on topof that so that we can continue
to evolve in our thinking andour approaches.
Speaker 1 (01:59):
That's pretty powerful.
It seems that you know, as I'mwalking down my path to health
and meeting all these differentprofessionals and you know you
meet most of the people that arethe most skilled in their
profession are the ones thathave been through the problem
and have solved the problems.
But they don't often, they'renot always good business people.
(02:21):
They don't know how to donecessarily the part that
they're not trying to do, whichis help people, and I think
that's huge.
You know, you run into somebodywho is maybe he's learned how
to solve a problem, maybe he'sgot this whole little practice
that's working great, but hegets stuck with, you know, a
(02:42):
couple of clients or whatever.
And what do you do withsomething like that?
Speaker 2 (02:48):
Right, it's the Thomas Edison and the Nikola
Tesla.
Right, Thomas Edison, he becamefamous and rich.
Why?
Because he had money andbacking and marketing behind him
to tell the world what he doesExactly to tell the world what
he does.
And Tesla became a you know, awell-known later, but you know,
impoverished genius who didn'tget the accreditation or
(03:11):
credibility that he deserved.
Speaker 1 (03:14):
So true, so true.
So how, how?
How does this work?
You know, you've, you've gotthis, this course, this, this
certification and all this, andhow does somebody even approach
it?
How does it even happen?
Speaker 2 (03:29):
So you know it's all online.
I was teaching it from thebeginning, again, pre-covid.
You know I was running aroundweekends teaching level one,
level two certifications, andthen of course, that got halted
in its tracks and my wife wasn'treally too keen on that side of
the business because we werestill running our clinic and
she's like you're going to begone every weekend, Like that's
not the point of this, You'regoing to be working more and uh.
(03:52):
And then when, when we kind ofagain forced everyone uses the
word pivot uh, we turned it intoan on-demand pre-recorded,
hired a professional recordingcompany record five days
straight, banged out all theinformation, rewrote the
textbooks, you know, went from ahundred pages to 550 pages.
Um, yeah and um.
(04:13):
You know, now it's now, it'sthis product that anybody can do
, um, online.
And then we're offering livecoaching sessions come up in the
September where people can getmore clarification and and we'll
do case studies and whatnot.
So you know it's going to be acommunity, the.
The big goal of it is by 2030, Iwant to help 75 million people,
right, as an extension of.
(04:34):
You know, at first I'm like youknow what I want to get.
I want to, I want to certify somany therapists, so many
coaches and clinicians, and I'mlike you know what the bigger
picture because where thepassion lies is teaching, not
just clinicians and coaches Ilove teaching the general public
too is well.
If we can help 75 millionpeople, well, that's just a
bigger, broader perspective andgoal to do.
(04:57):
Because now we can find thelike-minded individuals who want
to level up their skill set,level up their knowledge, think
outside the box of theirtraditional paradigm and that
they can continue to build theirknowledge instead of just get
stuck in what they know is whatthey know, type of thing.
Because it's easy to do that,we get comfortable.
(05:18):
But comfort comes withconsequences and it usually
leads to stagnation and burnout.
Doing this for 20 years now, Isee some of my colleagues are
just like, oh, you know, likeI'm running a business, I'm done
, blah, blah, blah.
I'm going to ride this out foranother 10 years and I'm going
to sell.
I'm like, yeah, or you couldre-spark that love for what you
do by continuing to evolve.
(05:40):
You know, not just as abusiness owner but as a
clinician.
And then you know, maybe youcontinue to mentor and teach
those in your clinic, okay,great.
Well, it's hard to teach those.
You know it takes a lot of timeto get people up to speed in
your clinic.
Well, here's a training system.
It's kind of a hands-off andI'll do it for you.
And now, all of a sudden, hey,you know what?
(06:01):
I'm going to open a secondclinic.
All right, sweet.
Hey, you know what?
I'm going to open a secondclinic.
All right, sweet, why?
Because we took care of one ofthe systems of leveling up and
getting your clinicians goodreally quickly either new, grad
or veteran, and everyone'sspeaking the same language.
Right, we all know that whenrunning a business, the only way
you can kind of step away fromthe business is if you have
(06:21):
really good systems in place.
And early on when we were and ateam you have really good
systems in place and you knowearly on when we were in a team
you got to have people.
You got to have a team, oh forsure, Like the culture and the
people.
But you know, you got to findthe right ones on your bus, that
that are along for the ride andsee the end goal.
I mean, that is so critical.
We've learned that over thelast 13 years and we have an
amazing team, which is why we'reable to, you know, open up a
(06:43):
second location.
Everyone's excited to do it andhelp out, but everyone's rowing
in the same direction.
Everyone has this mindset ofyou know, of this cohesive
culture, and everyone coming inwants to teach the newbies
coming in.
They're excited because that'swhat was given to them.
We had this culture where it'san open-door policy.
(07:03):
Everybody teaches everybody.
You know, we have mastermindsonce a quarter.
We do mentorship every week andwe're just constantly refining
skills.
Oh, you learned something newthis weekend on a course.
Guess what you're doing?
Mastermind, You're now theexpert and you get to teach
everybody and everybody yeah,it's so fun.
Speaker 1 (07:17):
Student becomes the teacher, and then you learn
something, but you know where?
Speaker 2 (07:20):
I learned, when I realized when, anytime I learn
something, I take the mindset isI'm going to be teaching this
tomorrow.
So now I really have to drivein understanding so that I can
communicate this new skill set,this new information, in a
practical, applicable way, sothat now those that I work with
(07:42):
can also take that newinformation and adapt it to
their skill set, rather thanthem having to go out for the
weekend, right?
So everyone takes thatmentality of they know if
they're taking a course oneweekend, they're coming back and
they're going to be the teachernext, the next mastermind.
So they love it, they love.
Speaker 1 (07:58):
It Raises the level of expectation and puts it on
yourself.
Raises the level of expectationand puts it on yourself.
Raises the bar.
Passion is what brings, I think, most people to their place of
business if they'reself-employed, and all of these
are certainly that, andeverybody wants to hear about
(08:19):
the why, and I understand you'vegot some pretty interesting
stories that bring you here.
Why don't you tell us a littlebit about how you came to this
place?
Speaker 2 (08:29):
Okay, well, I mean, it's every.
Every journey starts with thatpersonal struggle, right?
Coming out of school, you'reeager, you're like oh, I got to
level up.
I know I know what I learned inschool, but I know everything.
It's not the end, all be all.
And I know what I learned isthe foundation.
It's foundation knowledge.
It's also not super like whatyou, what you learn in a
(08:50):
textbook doesn't always apply toreal life, for sure.
So, immediately I startedlearning courses, getting
confidence, getting my handling,acupuncture, manual therapy,
and then, you know, learningkettlebells, learning gymnastics
, integrating those naturalmovement patterns, integrating
those natural movement patterns,you know, I just absorbed
whatever I could.
But then, like I said early on,I started to get confused and
(09:12):
you know, I would go do a courseand guess what?
Everybody got that month Flavorof the month.
Everyone gets this newtechnique that I learned, right,
and you know, from a practiceperspective, you get really good
at that one particular thing.
But then you lose perspectiveon how maybe this isn't the
right tool for the right personat the right time.
So then you start realizing,wow, like this worked on these
(09:33):
people, but it didn't work onthese ones.
Why?
So then, okay, well, maybe I'llgo back and do the other skill
that I learned on this person.
Oh, okay, well, that kind ofworked for 10% of them, but the
other 90% didn't work.
So of them, but the other 90%didn't work.
So then you get confused andnow you're like I have all the I
don't, I don't know what I'mdoing anymore.
So you start to lose confidenceagain, right?
So you come out of school withno confidence.
You learn a couple of things.
You get some confidence andsome wins and then you start
(09:55):
losing confidence because nowyou don't know what to do on
anybody and then you're likenothing works for anybody.
But it was.
I tried to find the through linebetween all of these concepts,
all of these tools andtechniques.
I'm like, what are thecommonalities, what are the
fundamental first principlesthat go through high performance
(10:16):
, through movement patterns,through rehabilitation, through
manual therapy, all the stuff?
And I was able to distill itdown into what originally was
four, but it became five, fivefundamental principles or
elements of human design, and itcomes from kind of the entire
interaction of seeing a client.
(10:36):
So, for example, so these fiveelements are psychology,
neurology, biology, chemistryand physics.
I distilled it down into olderthings, but you don't have to be
experts at those, you just haveto have a baseline
understanding of those things,because those the rules and the
laws of those five disciplines.
They don't change, right, andthey apply across every human
(10:57):
being.
So, psychology, we're going tosit down and we're going to have
conversation.
I need to take a history, thefirst word, the first
interaction, the language that Iuse, the language that I don't
use, you're going to.
I have to make you feel safe.
Right, I'm going to use, I'mgoing to ask questions, I'm
going to create the connection,I'm going to build trust and,
with the trust, create safety.
(11:18):
Well, what happens when youfeel safe in my presence?
Ah, nervous system starts tocalm down.
So, pain levels, sympatheticstate, all of a sudden they
start shifting into this person.
Oh, I can trust this humanbeing.
Great, now we're tapping intothe neurological system.
What do we got to do to look at?
Next, let's look at how you moveas a system.
Right, because the body's asystem, it's not individual
(11:38):
parts.
Individual parts can hurt, butthe cause is typically a
systems-based problem.
Right, can you touch your toes?
Can you backbend?
Can you stand on one leg?
What is your neck doing?
What are your shoulders doing?
Hey, that side's movingdifferent than that side.
Why Then you start breaking upthe pieces.
So you look at deeper into thenervous system.
What's your nerve tension, likeCentral, peripheral?
(12:00):
What's the electrical systemsaying?
Do muscle testing, look at thejoints what parts are moving,
which parts are not, and thenyou can start to kind of whittle
down as to you know what thisright shoulder issue.
That shoulder moves, great.
But you know what doesn't move?
That neck doesn't rotate to theleft, or your rib cage doesn't
rotate, or you don't extend well, or you can't single leg
(12:20):
balance on the opposite side.
Okay, well, let's go look atthose parts and then we'll come
back to the shoulder.
And then, once you start lookingat oh you know what, that left
hip, you can't rotate into thathip.
Oh yeah, I've had low back painfor the last 10 years.
That's kind of important.
Okay, now that low back pain,you've learned to compensate
with that.
But now you've transferred allthose forces and energy into a
(12:40):
shoulder across the body becauseof the gait reflex.
Right, this shoulder works withthe opposite hip, just simply
from walking.
So now we can start saying,okay, well, you know what?
We have a bit of a physicsproblem because energy moves to
the area of least resistance.
Well, this, this and thisaren't moving.
So guess what you're movingmore into?
Ah, the most mobile joint inyour body, which is the shoulder
(13:01):
.
That could be why you have thisoveruse problem.
Or the Achilles tendon.
You have an Achilles tendon ice.
You don't take twice as manysteps on the right than the left
, do you?
No, I don't think so, but couldbe well, you don't balance well
on the left leg, you are notdriving with the right hip very
effectively and you have somecore control problems.
Well, you might be pushing offthat calf and Achilles a little
bit harder with every step, andyour nervous system knows this.
(13:28):
It will always use the strongerpart, it will ignore what's
weak.
So once we start finding oh,you know what we have these
imbalances, now we can start toredistribute forces into the
body effectively.
And now we've taken all thatforce away from the injured area
because we're distributing itmore effectively.
So that's your physics.
Great, now we've taken care ofthe physics problem.
Let's look at well, what'sbiology?
Cells, tissues, adaptationsOkay, how did we evolve?
(13:53):
Okay, we developed throughtubes.
We're in the embryological.
We were organized and designedin the same way, right, in the
same order.
The nervous system prioritizesstructures in the middle.
All of our movement comes fromthe top down.
We develop movement from thecenter out, like babies on the
ground rolling around.
And then we look at chemistry.
Well, what's chemistry?
It's breathing.
If I'm over-oxygenated orunder-oxygenated, am I acidic?
(14:14):
Am I alkaline?
The breathing also affects thenervous system.
If I'm coming into like this,what state am I in?
Sympathetic, can't heal in thatstate.
Ah, we need to go after yourbreathing.
And when we affect yourbreathing, we now improve the
chemistry.
What also affects chemistry isthe food we eat, because it's
all molecular, everything'smolecules right, your molecules,
(14:35):
I'm molecules.
So when we find all of these,you know, when we look at things
through these five elements ofdesign, it gets a little bit
easier to explain what we do,why we do it and how we do it
better.
So people will say well, youknow, I got needling, okay,
great, what did the needle do?
Well, it created this myotacticreflex and it relaxed the
(14:55):
muscle and spinal record and topdown, okay, cool.
But what we essentially did iswe changed the inputs.
Your nervous system said, oh, Ilike that.
And it took the brakes off, itreorganized Ah, we have a window
of opportunity to change thingsneurologically.
But if we don't which ismovement, if we don't take
advantage of that new window ofchange, guess what the nervous
(15:18):
system does Goes back to the oldpatterns, which is why two,
three days later you're like ah,that's stuck again, right,
because you defaulted back toyour old motor patterns.
You didn't learn anything new,right?
And then the last part, againphysics.
So we talked about physics froma physical perspective.
But then we move into thequantum mechanics or quantum
(15:38):
physics, which is vibration,frequency and energy.
Well, if everything's molecularand you look at molecules and
atoms at their fundamental level, it's 99.9999% empty space.
Exactly, right, okay.
So then what are we?
We're over 99% of empty space.
Well, how can?
We can see each other in thisphysical, three-dimensional way,
(16:00):
because everything is.
When you look further down atquarks, it's wavelengths.
Everything is when you lookfurther down at quarks, it's
wavelengths.
So wavelengths that are runningat specific frequencies are now
being perceived and organizedby us in the three-dimensional
world as physical matter.
It's a specific frequency.
That's what we're doing, right,okay, well, what affects?
What affects wavelengths,thoughts and emotions?
(16:20):
Okay, so now it comes back upto psychology.
And what will also determinewhether somebody responds
positively or negatively to amodality?
Manipulation, needling, softtissue work is their belief.
If they believe that's going tohelp, well, it's going to get
the nervous system andeverything to organize in a
positive way.
We get a positive output.
If they had a negativeexperience in the past, well,
(16:42):
you do that same technique.
They're probably gonna have anegative response, right?
So this is where it all loopsback up together.
And once we understand thesefive elements, then what we do
from a manual therapyperspective, from a
rehabilitation throughmodalities, through movement,
now we can better understand howthat individual is going to
(17:03):
respond to the therapy thatwe're providing individual is
going to respond to the therapythat we're providing.
Speaker 1 (17:12):
That's powerful.
I you know, through the lastcouple of years of doing this
podcast, we've been talkingabout health and you know
there's two ways to look atsomething.
Well, many ways to look at it.
But there's a singular orlinear approach that says I'm
going to do this thing and it'sgoing to cause this thing, yeah.
Then there's a holisticapproach, which is what we're
talking about here.
Then it's all affecting thisand we're going to look at the
whole picture and we're going togive value to all the parts in
(17:35):
the picture.
And it's been my experiencethat when you're able to step
back a little bit and use thisholistic approach, we find
unexpected developments,unexpected breakthroughs.
Tell me about some of theremarkable changes that you've
discovered.
Speaker 2 (17:56):
Well, I mean, there's all kinds of fun cases and I
always like using kind of twoextremes.
So I've had the opportunity andthe privilege to work recently
with the world's strongest man.
He lives in my town.
He reached out to me, right, amI going to make him stronger?
No, he's already the world'sstrongest man, right, and he's
crushing and he's on like he'ssuch a good human being and he
(18:19):
has no problem with me.
Uh, talking about that, he'sonline and he does lots of stuff
.
So he first came to me.
He's like yeah, like I'mlifting well, but I always have
this chronic knee right, groinright, low back issue.
I said, okay, cool, go throughsome basic movements.
His neck didn't really extend.
Look at his visual system.
His left eye wasn't tracking invery effectively.
(18:40):
He was kind of bugging out, buthe couldn't stand on his left
leg.
So every time he squatted, heshifted to the right side.
Well, because the nervoussystem knows that's the safer
side.
So guess what?
He's overloading the right sideevery time he squats 800 plus
pounds.
Light him up.
As soon as we took care of somevisual stuff, as soon as we put
his neck into a better position,all of a sudden the glutes
(19:01):
started turning back on and hissquat got easier and we did some
rolling patterns to the left.
We did literally three thingson the first appointment.
The next day he texts me.
He's like hey, I just PR mysquat for four repetitions, no
pain, amazing.
So did I do anything from aperformance perspective?
Not really.
I mean, we just balanced himout and his nervous system took
(19:22):
the brakes off, because we kindof calibrated and reorganized
his nervous system so that hewas able to squat more
symmetrically and he wasunloading that painful side
Right so we could look at thosethings.
Well, those are rehab exercises, not high performance.
Well, what was the outcome?
It led to high performance.
And then you look at the otherend.
We have a little 85 year oldlady who's got balance issues,
(19:45):
who who is scared to fall, she'snot strong, she wants to, you
know, improve longevity andhealth.
Guess what we get her doing?
Deadlifts.
We got her doing up to, likeyou know, a 40 kilo kettlebell
deadlift for five repetitions.
We put it on the agility ladderand guess what got better
balance, foot speed, control,strength.
So we took this, these rehabtools for this certain
(20:09):
individual, and we improvedperformance.
And then we took a performancetool to this individual and we
improved her longevity.
So it it's the same spectrum.
Right, they're just twoindividuals on different ends of
the spectrum, both haveindividual problems, but it's
applying the right tools to theright person at the right time
for the right thing.
(20:29):
So once we have thisunderstanding that we can't be
super siloed into wow, I only dorehabilitation Like, yeah, but
the human being needs to get offyour table and they need to
lift and do things in the realworld again, or else they end up
back on your table and if wedon't find what those
individuals need fromfundamentals, well then we're
(20:49):
going to miss the big pictureand we can't help them.
So this is where we need tothink outside the box.
Look at what every person infront of us needs, go through
the same system and it's likeit's an algorithm we figure out.
You're like, oh, we hit thiskind of fork in the road.
We actually need to go overhere with you.
But for this person we need togo over here.
But the only way to do that isto organize everything that we
(21:13):
do and have a specific systemthat we go through so we don't
miss important pieces ofinformation, so we build our
knowledge on fundamentalprinciples.
So it's almost like a bullshitmeter, right.
It's like we say all thesethings and we're like, ah, you
know, like the science says this, I'm like, well, try it, and if
it made a change, who cares?
Right, maybe it works for 5% ofthe population.
(21:35):
But at least you checkedeverything and make sure you're
not making assumptions and belike ah, well, I think the
shoulder, you know it's a tightpack Well, it could be nerve, it
could be a neck issue, it couldbe anything else.
Why is that nerve?
If we always ask why, then it'sgoing to be better.
You're going to find bettersolutions to the pain questions
that people are coming in with.
But it just helps streamlinewhat an individual needs by
(22:00):
being very, very specific, verydisciplined in our approach on
the front end, say, of anassessment, so we can get
creative on the back end withour treatment.
What clinicians will often dois we get very creative with our
assessment on the front end andthen everybody gets the same
exercises on the back end right,everyone gets protocols right.
(22:23):
But that's cookie cutter whenyou have a set system on the
front and you're checking allthe boxes and you're going
through the algorithm and you'refinding what, what the true
problems are, not just the pain.
Now you get to be creative onthe back end with your treatment
.
Speaker 1 (22:41):
So a lot of times when people come to a therapist,
they have a specific injury orillness that they're dealing
with.
Right, they have a problemthey're trying to solve.
But a true therapist or aprofessional practitioner,
ambition, I would think, wouldbe to help the person for the
(23:01):
rest of their life.
Yeah, and you know, this iswhere I think.
A lot of times you know you goto the doctor, you get your fix
and then you're done, yep, butwhat do you?
I mean, it seems like thissystem has all the capabilities
and the tools to really takeboth the practitioner and the
patient into a journey to health.
(23:23):
So why don't you tell us alittle bit about what's the part
that makes it go from okay,you're done to now you get to
start and keep going?
Speaker 2 (23:32):
It's educating the patient.
So every client that comes intoour facility, we treat them
like a student, their student oftheir own body.
We're not going home with them,right?
The 30 minutes that we spendwith somebody, you know, there's
just over, I think, 10,000minutes in a week.
Speaker 1 (23:48):
Right.
Speaker 2 (23:49):
And we always tell people like, look, here's the
problem, here's what you need towork on.
You need to work on thesethings so that next week, when
you come back, we can continueto move forward.
Right, if you don't do thethings that I'm asking you to do
, because it's your body, wecan't continue to progress
forward.
There's no real end game, right?
I mean, we want to dischargepeople.
(24:10):
We want them getting back towhat they love doing
independently.
They shouldn't need us.
The worst thing that we can doas health experts is create
dependency.
You know, oh, I need to get mycrack, I need to get my needles
to feel good, or I can show youhow to release this on your own,
so that when you start to feelthese muscles tightening up or
(24:31):
this imbalance starting tohappen again, you know how to
correct it before it becomes aproblem.
So a lot of it is creatingself-awareness and educating the
people coming to us for helpthat they have the power and the
ability to make sure thisdoesn't come back.
And it's when they let it keepsliding or they continue to do
the old habits that arecontributing to the problem but
(24:52):
not counteracting it.
Well, it comes back.
Now they need their fix again.
And then what do we become?
We become drug dealers, exactlyRight Like.
I mean, I didn't get into thisfield to create these long-term
repeat clients.
I mean it's great that you knowthey come to us for help, but
at the end of the day we want togive them solutions for their
(25:14):
issues and that they can becomeindependent again.
It's not this.
I need this person.
I need this thing For me, forus at our clinic, we are very
happy when clients get back 100%plus more than what they've
expected, and they're off andrunning.
And if they do something sillyagain and they come in with
(25:35):
something new, great, come back,we'll help you out again if you
can't figure it out.
But at least we can create thatself-awareness in our clients
and our athletes so that theycan continue to perform in life
and sport or whatever it is, forthe long run, as long as they
want to do it, not.
Oh, I got to keep getting thissorted out.
The pain came back.
Speaker 1 (25:57):
Well, if the pain keeps coming back right.
Speaker 2 (25:59):
Well, if, if, if, you keep coming back for the thing,
that feels good.
I haven't done my job as aclinician to find the true
problem.
We're just treating symptomsand to me that's not fun.
All right, I want you to getback.
I always ask clients if theycome back and like new injury or
old injury.
And they're like new, I waslike, okay, good, that means we
fixed the first one Right.
(26:19):
I'm like I did something silly.
I was playing my sport.
I twist my great, okay, greatNew problem.
Speaker 1 (26:25):
Right, exactly.
Speaker 2 (26:26):
I don't want to see you coming back for the same
thing, which means that maybe wedidn't do our job good enough
or we didn't find the mainproblem in the first place.
Speaker 1 (26:35):
Well, it seems that you have created a valuable
product in a very importantspace, and this is the part
where I give you a chance to leteverybody know how to find you,
how to access what you have tooffer and give your elevator
pitch here.
Speaker 2 (26:53):
Okay.
Coaches who want to streamlinetheir practice, simplify their
tools, organize what they do,you know, find the why in their
clients, to actually get to theroot cause of pain and problems
or movement dysfunctions orimprove performance.
The AMT certification AdvancedMovement Therapist certification
is at amtcertifiedca.
(27:15):
There's a blog there.
There's a free eight neuralhacks on how to move better and
reduce pain in 60 seconds orless.
That's a fun one.
That's a presentation I do atconferences and it's fun because
it's interactive.
You get people moving.
Also, they can touch their toesand their balance gets better
within 60 seconds, like doingeye exercises, breathing
exercises, tapping all the stuff, uh.
(27:36):
So that's free for anybodygoing on there, whether you're a
clinician or coach or justyou're curious about your body.
My YouTube channel is TommySwales lots of longer format.
You know tennis, elbow stuff,hip impingement if you're a
biker, if you're a runner oryou're a lifter, so there's kind
of troubleshootingself-assessments and
troubleshoot exercises on that.
My Instagram is swalestom,facebook is Tom Swales and as
(28:01):
well as LinkedIn.
So I put lots of free contentup there for anybody who just
wants to kind of troubleshoot iton their own.
But for my clinicians andcoaches out there who kind of
struggle with, or they're nothappy with, the results that
they're getting, or they feellike they can do more.
The A&T certification is theright tool for them.
Speaker 1 (28:22):
Fantastic.
Well, tom, I very muchappreciate you joining us today.
Your information is rivetingand, I think, impactful, and I
hope that the professionals thatare listening are going to find
it important, and I just wantto thank you for being here.
Thanks for having me, joe.
All right, this has been theHealthy Living Podcast.
I'm your host, joe Grumbine,and we will see you next time.
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