Rami's Blog

Like the Yin-Yang, Eastern Martial Arts and Western medicine are two halves of a whole. My mission is to preserve the ancient mind-body tools and pass them on to you.

The Zakim Story & Prayer, Part 1

June 7, 2018

THE ZAKIM STORY & PRAYER
&
ZAKIM CENTER INTEGRATIVE THERAPIES FOR CANCER AT DANA FARBER CANCER INSTITUTE

Part 1

2018 HONOREES
May 1st, 2018

Every year, the Zakim Center for integrative therapies at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute has an annual event/fundraiser called “Music heals the soul” which honors Lenny Zakim.

Each year, the event also recognizes special honorees of the year. This year, they chose individuals who have been in the center since the beginning (or very near the beginning!) to be the honorees.

Check out the short video from this year, May 1st, 2018, done by Laura Molta of Molta Media.

The event Music Heals the Soul is a fun filled night of musical performances and exciting auctions. Proceeds benefit integrative oncology research and help to provide educational programs to the cancer community at the Leonard P. Zakim Center for Integrative Therapies at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute.

The evening also includes a cocktail hour, seated dinner, and complementary therapies from the Zakim Center, which offers integrative therapies such as massage, acupuncture, Tai Chi and qigong.

This year we also added musical guest Erich Bergen from the movie Jersey Boys.

Watch: Jersey Boys performing Sherry in the White House.

This year, the Zakim center honored some of the people that have been with the center for many years. And some even, such as your humble mind-body blogger, which have been working with these programs even before the center started, and were lucky enough to witness and be a part of history during the creation of the center.

I also had the opportunity and honor to actually work with both Lenny and his son Josh, and meet Lenny’s wife Joyce.

Read: The Haute Life article about Josh & Lenny.

The Zakim Bridge

Many people ask me, “Is the bridge in Boston, the Zakim bridge, named after Lenny?”

Yes! it was named after Lenny, Leonard Zakim, who was a civic leader and a civil right activist who championed “building bridges between peoples”.

For those of you that do not know, I am actually a Zakim as well, from my mother side by Professor Zichria Zakay Rones.

**Ramel Rones/ Zakay (Zakheim) Family Tree**

Next week I will tell you the meaning of the Zakim name, as well as the story of how the name originated and the prayer that was specially created for the Zakim family. Make sure you are tuning in!

And as usual, happy stretching, deep breathing, empty your mind, strengthen your energetic system, and evoke your spirit!

Isolating the Joints with Flexibility and Strength Essential for Health, Martial Arts, and Various Sports

May 4, 2018

Isolating the joints is a great eastern way to warm up, starting from the energetic system!

(Speaking of sports and warming up: checkout the links in this blog to my martial arts tips for sport on YouTube!)

In my class at Dana Farber and in my research class at Tufts Medical Center, I use isolating the joints as the first warm up to ignite and start-up the energetic system. Then, I continue with a three to five minute walk to also gain the benefits of the typical “western” style exercise warm up. This walk gets the heart pumping faster which then increases blood flow to the muscles and the rest of the body. I find that doing the best of both worlds for a warm up before any physical activity is the best.

Since warming up before any physical activity is a must, make sure that when you are about to take a walk, ride a bike, hike, swim, run, or do any kind of physical activity, spend three to five minutes isolating the joint first. Spend about ten seconds on each one. Then run in place or walk for three to five minutes and that should be a great warm-up for whatever activity you are about to do.

Of course, then spending five to ten minutes for some stretches, before and after, is very important as well. Once you have done that, then you are really ready!

Isolating the joints has two outcomes that you can focus on: one is better health, while the other is better martial arts.

For health, isolating the joints leads to better flow. It is like a gentle massage to both the joints and to the soft tissues around the joints. You can think of the gentle movements of the joints like “oiling the joints,” and at the same time reigniting and charging the energetic system. The gentle movements of the ligaments stimulate the energetic system.

Remember, when it comes to health purposes, move the joints with 40% to 60% effort. Move gently, like your hands are in warm water. You will get better, with time and practice, on both isolation of the joints as well as with the movement. Practice makes perfect!

You will also find that moving the joints gently helps tremendously with Arthritis and other chronic pains around the joint areas, and elsewhere. Many of my students were able to reduce inflammation in the joint or in the tendons around the joints with the gentle joint movements.

Also, over time, breathing deep and emptying the mind while practicing the joint will allow you to experience a nice form of moving meditation.

Many times, when doing the movements correctly, I experience a nice warm feeling in the joint area which then spreads into the rest of the body.

For martial arts, and for various sports, moving the joints is done slowly at first, for correct isolation. Over time, the speed increases to improve performance.

The hands joints are important for both individuals that are interested in martial arts, and for those interested in improving their performance in sports activities. In martial arts, the hands are used for blocking, grabbing, and striking.

While the lower body joints are essential for both martial arts and sport activities, in martial arts, the legs are used for kicking and taking down your opponent.

Over time, you will develop both strength and speed in the joints, which will upgrade both your martial arts and sports abilities.

If flexibility is important, both leg and upper body strength are essential.

Use this exercise to improve both leg strength and speed.

Remember the art of 40%, 60%, and 80% movements too! Each one has different purposes and goals.

That’s all for this week! Come back next week for another video about isolating the joints while doing Tai Chi and Qi Gong!

Happy stretching, deep breathing, empty your mind, strengthen your energetic system, and evoke your spirit!

WCVB-5 (ABC) Boston Covering Ramel Rones at Tufts!

April 27, 2018

“Chronic pain may be easier to manage with tai chi than aerobic exercise, study says”

“Tufts Medical Center research shows patients find relief with low-impact workout, meditation”

Welcome back mind-body students!

After 10 years of research at Tufts Medical Center on Fibromyalgia, using a Tai Chi intervention which I designed, and after our study was published in one of the top and most prestigious medical journals, the BMJ, our results are really beginning to attract media attention!

Not only was our research covered by Time magazine, but Tufts Medical Center also created a short video about the research. And finally, Channel 5 (WCVB-5, ABC Boston) and anchor Emily Riemer did a short report about our research in the medical section of the news!

It is nice to have some fame (even if it is only a few seconds) after so many years of hard work!

You can also read about the journey up to the publication, as well find other research links, videos, and testimonials in more depth in the blog I did two weeks ago.

And as always, happy stretching, deep breathing, empty your mind, strengthen your energetic system, and evoke your spirit!

One of the Top 25 Tai Chi Blogs on the Internet!

January 26, 2018

Welcome back mind-body students! We are glad to have you reading again, and look forward to a new year of new blogs and new readers.

We have very exciting news! In late December, our blog was named one of the Top 25 Tai Chi Blogs and Websites on the internet by Feedspot, a popular blog reader and aggregator service. We're very honored to be on this list, and we hope to qualify again if they update the list next year.

This year we have big plans for the blog and for new Tai Chi courses on my Udemy profile.

On Udemy, you can look forward to Tai Chi courses about dealing with issues as varied as chronic pain, inconsistent sleep, lack of focus, asthma, and more! These courses will be short and sweet, focused around one or two very impactful exercises, and also including a handful of supportive techniques and practices.

On the blog, we have countless possibilities! Starting next week we will be posting small sections of a talk and presentation I did at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, which I hope will be helpful as an introduction to Tai Chi and Qi Gong health practices, and what they can help people accomplish.

After we've gone through that talk, we will be starting our first exercise series: Exercises to do in the car! Many people are so busy that they cannot find enough time to do energetic, exercising, and meditative practices during the day. But, many of these same people have little time because they spend a lot of time in the car. Thanks to a request by one of the blog's avid readers, we were inspired to do a series on how you can be healthier each time you drive!

By the time we're done with that, we'll probably be approaching summer time, and we'll see what else we have in store for 2018.

Happy stretching, deep breathing, empty your mind, strengthen your energetic system, and evoke your spirit!

As always, if you are a new reader, or a returning reader who hasn't checked them out, please follow me on Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube. You can purchase my books and DVDs by following the links on this page, and you can find my Udemy video courses right here.

Finding the Right Mind-Body, Tai Chi and Qi Gong Teacher, Part 3

October 6, 2017

Hello Mind-Body students! This week we are continuing the series on finding the right mind-body teacher, which you can catch on at these links: part 1, and part 2.

So far, we’ve covered the external arts that any mind-body teacher should be well-versed in. However, that is only half of the battle! What is the other key aspect of a great mind-body teacher that you should be looking for?

A truly great mind-body practitioner is equally trained in both the external arts and the internal arts. Most of the time, this means that the teacher studied with a renowned master (or masters) for at least 10 to 20 years. Having both kinds of training means your teacher will be able to help you by using a wide array of mind-body tools, and can tackle your particular issues or weaknesses from the best angle.

A great mind-body teacher will know how important it is to work with your energetic system. An expert should know qigong massage because that means they have lots of hands-on experience. It’s traditional for students of energetic massage to have thousands of hours of massage practice, and your teacher shouldn’t be any different.

In addition to knowing the energetic system, a mind-body teacher should lead you in evoking the spirit and harmonizing the three forces; heaven human and earth. This requires an understanding in the important parts of the human spirit. A sense of humor, experience with loss and death, open-mindedness, and being lifelong learner are all signs that your teacher will be able to instruct you in your spiritual development. Finally emphasizing the 5 building blocks of our being: Body, Breath, Mind, Energy, and Spirit.

A qualified teacher will have experience working with different challenging health issues such as: injuries, chronic pain, fibromyalgia, lower back and neck issues, joint problems like rheumatoid arthritis and osteoarthritis, cancer and all its side effects and symptoms from treatments or the cancer itself, and many more conditions and health issues.

Character is also important in a great mind-body teacher. Compassion, being able to listen, some wisdom, intelligence, diagnostic knowledge, and the ability to make each lesson fresh and new even after 10 or 15 years with them. To find all of these qualities is a single person is rare indeed (almost impossible!), but finding several of them is good.

Next week I will start giving examples of the techniques and teachings that you would expect to get in each of these categories so you can tell whether a mind-body teacher is a good fit for you.

If you are struggling to find sources of mind-body knowledge where you live, you can always start by using my books and DVDs. Nothing is as good as a one-to-one lesson from a trained mind-body teacher, but the more you know from sources like my books, the easier it will be to know when you’ve found the right teacher.

Remember, when trying to understand and learn a philosophy like Tai Chi, Qi Gong, or Yoga through a book, you retain about 40% of the information. Adding a DVD or videos you will be able to learn 50% to 60%. Even with a great teacher, you'll get 70% to 80% of the information. The remaining 20% to 30% is your personal practice and experience.

Happy stretching, deep breathing, empty your mind, strength your energetic system, and evoke your spirit!