Welcome to Lee Howard Garrett
My expertise is in Compassionate Communication, Energetic Awareness, Craniosacral Unwinding and the Alexander Technique. I’m a teacher and life coach, and I help people who want to learn to become more curious about themselves than they already are.
Is there something about yourself that you wish to change or to explore? Your posture? Your balance? Your emotions? Your sexuality? Relationship challenges? Pain in your body? Would you simply like to learn to slow down? Do you know why you are here?
Craniosacral Unwinding emerges out of the life energy model of Polarity Therapy and the Five Elements according to Ayurvedic medicine. It empowers the cerebrospinal fluid and connective tissue systems of the body, and it can encourage higher connection with oneself and with one’s Life Purpose. It is said that our life stories are recorded in our connective tissue, and that energy can become locked in our bodies. I use spaciousness, thoughts, words, awareness and touch to ask your body to unwind and tell its story. I may touch very lightly, sometimes not at all, and listen at visceral and energetic levels through my hands and being. Perhaps there is energy locked within you that wants to move and find expression in your life. Craniosacral sessions can be very calm, and they can also be emotional and energetic—the energy of a session will be unique to the person having the session.
The Alexander Technique, in the way that I teach, is a practical method for learning to engage and direct dural connection in your body, retrain your nervous system, improve physical coordination, and learn to be more at choice. Through the technique you may become aware of how you interfere with yourself, and learn to consciously prevent this interference during movement. There can be a profound refinement of kinesthetic awareness, poise, and movement. You can become more connected to yourself and your environment. Students often report an alleviation of pain symptoms. They report feeling lighter, taller, more relaxed, and more balanced in themselves.
In my own continuing healing journey I discovered critical additional areas that required attention. It seemed for a period of years as if I was stalled, even losing ground in my health. These areas finally were revealed to me when I was evaluated under “The Rule of Four,” a model for health and healing by Dr. Vincent Medici. The model considers your health, your disease, and your symptom, to be a function of four variables specific to you:
- Psycho-Emotional-Spiritual relationship to yourself,
- Biomechanics—flexibility level and dural tissue engagement, how the bones align, how the organs live spatially in respect to each other,
- Biochemistry—blood chemistry, nutritional excess (poisons you need to remove), nutritional deficiencies (what you’re not getting in foods), and
- Physical Scars from Physical Traumas—tissue/organ fibrosis; compromised tissue mobility, nerve flow, lymphatic drainage, etc.
In my search for healing and balance over four decades, escaping my awareness were limitations due to physical scars deep in the body (Physical Scars from Physical Traumas) and scar from bio-chemical inflammation (Biochemistry). Unremediated scar from a broken leg at age 17 followed by multiple surgeries had resulted over time in fibrosis in the tendons and muscles of my upper leg, as well as fibrosis in the connecting tendons and muscles of my tailbone/pelvis/femur. Nutritional deficiencies had resulted in bio-chemically induced fibrin excess in my blood and bodily tissues, and consequently decades of propensity toward tissue inflammation, strain, and injury. These variables needed to be addressed as part of my healing practice if I was to continue to reach higher levels of health.
Just as so many before me have discovered, I’ve discovered that a single discipline or technique is less than likely to be the complete answer in health, healing, and embodiment. I’ve chosen to continue to look for, and discover for myself, models and systems grounded in fundamentals that resonate Truth in my being.
Alexander Technique Lessons
The Alexander Technique, the way I teach the Technique to students, is a practical method for students to learn to engage and direct dural connection within their bodies, retrain their nervous systems, improve physical coordination, and learn to be more at choice.
Through the Technique one becomes aware of how they interfere with themselves, and they learn to consciously prevent this interference during movement. There can be a profound refinement of kinesthetic awareness, poise, and movement. One can become more connected to themselves and their environment.
Students often report an alleviation of pain symptoms. They report feeling lighter, taller, more relaxed, and more balanced in themselves.
Experiencing gracefulness and pleasure in movement!
Cultivating ease and patience…
Clarity, perception and poise during everyday activities.
CranioSacral Unwinding & Compassionate Communication Sessions
Craniosacral Unwinding emerges out of the life energy model of Polarity Therapy and the Five Elements according to Ayurvedic medicine. It empowers the cerebrospinal fluid and connective tissue systems of the body, and it can encourage higher connection with oneself and with one’s Life Purpose.
It is said that our life stories are recorded in our connective tissue, and that energy can become locked in our bodies. I use spaciousness, thoughts, words, awareness and touch to ask your body to unwind and tell its story. I may touch very lightly, sometimes not at all, and listen at visceral and energetic levels through my hands and being. Perhaps there is energy locked within you that wants to move and find expression in your life.
Craniosacral sessions can be very calm, and they can also be emotional and energetic—the energy of a session will be unique to the person having the session.
Thoughts, support, emotion, release, grace…
Whole Being Weekend – guest practitioner – Idyllwild, California
Resource Links
Compassionate Communication & NVC
Medici Medicine
Reflections
I have had ADHD for a long time. I was hyperactive as a child. Until now I thought I could only move at two speeds: full-stop and full-on. You showed me that there’s a speed in-between. No one else ever showed me that. When I see you for lessons it’s like coming to see a friend. I’m learning how to slow down now. I’m re-wiring myself. I’m finding space in my joints. Thank you.
Hi Lee. Learning not to interfere with oneself. Humm… I’m just beginning to “get” what I’ve gotten myself into. I see now that I have jumped! I feel that I am in the presence of a teacher with a palpable integrity and presence. You shine with having processed well your own journey.
Since I was a teenager, I’ve had aches, tension and general discomfort in my shoulders and back, which I believed was due to scoliosis. Despite regular exercise, and being in my 20s, much of my days are spent sitting at the computer, driving, in meetings… This sedentary lifestyle seemed to exacerbate the discomfort, which became increasingly noticeable. My father recommended Alexander Technique lessons. I was skeptical. I didn’t know anyone else who was taking Alexander lessons, and I hadn’t read much about it. I thought seeing a chiropractor would be much more effective. But I was curious and willing to try something new. By the end of the first lesson with Lee, I realized that this was something very different from anything I’d experienced before. I began to understand that my habits of movement were the real cause of the tension, even if the scoliosis played a part. As I re-learned basic physical movements (sitting down, standing up, walking, etc.), I saw immediate improvements throughout the day. Like all new learning, the lessons can be surprisingly fun. It’s satisfying and interesting to see new approaches to simple and repetitive action. Lee is thoughtful, concentrated, and patient; understands what needs to change, how it can be done, and how he can help me to help myself.
First, I wanted to state that I learned a tremendous amount from you. You were a great messenger for me and I appreciate how you embody your ideas. Thank you. I have considered what we discussed: creating a sacred space, listening for indications of modalities, and reflecting ideas. I have already found them useful in communicating more effectively with my girlfriend. I sense that our relationship is now in motion again.
I am a snail trying to be a bee, buzzing slowly. Lee, you gave me enough information to be able to make a few changes in my priorities with what little time I may have left. I was on such a high discovering myself again. Thank you for that. The next day I chose to work out in the yard, weeding and fertilizing 9 rosebushes and 19 camellia trees. You have such a wonderful way of gently, but firmly teaching us a new way of “choice” within ourselves. I was so amazed at how well you look, and you have such a positive group of friends surrounding you. That’s all one can hope for in life—to be happy and at peace. Lee, thank you again for all the information you gave me, and for a wonderful day. Love, Eleanor.
I thoroughly enjoyed your presentation/workshop this week. As a teacher I thought you were excellent. You were articulate and clear and certainly knew your material. I really liked the chances to calm down from the frenetic environment we live in. A profound new awareness for me was the pelvic hinge. I’ve been bending at the stomach/rib area and recent pilates lessons are helping to straighten that, but your pelvic hinge emphasis was very helpful. Also I appreciate the work you did with us in honoring and developing that inner space (oh how our society needs this).