Workshop 6 · Phase II
Lasting Strength
Functional strength that grows with you
Every workshop opens with a 10-minute grounding ritual — feet, three breath cycles, orientation. The same each time, so you can arrive from anywhere.
Strength is a nervous system quality before it is a muscular one. Motor unit recruitment — the number of muscle fibres the brain activates simultaneously — determines force output more than muscle size. This is why untrained people become significantly stronger in the first weeks of a programme before any hypertrophy occurs: the nervous system is learning, not the muscle.
Research on functional movement — particularly the work of physiotherapist Gray Cook — shows that strength built in isolation rarely transfers to real-world demands. The body moves in integrated chains, not individual muscles. Training that respects this builds capacity that actually shows up in daily life: carrying, lifting, climbing, recovering from a stumble. Strength that serves living, not just testing.
The Yi Jin Jing — the Muscle-Tendon Changing Classic — is a Qigong system attributed to the monk Bodhidharma and practised for over a thousand years to build functional strength through the entire body. Unlike modern resistance training, it works by loading the fascia and tendons in lengthened positions, training the connective tissue rather than isolating muscle groups. The principle is jing — refined strength, cultivated slowly — which differs fundamentally from raw force. Strength, in this tradition, is an expression of integrated vitality, not a performance of power.
Live on Tenerife? There's a reduced rate for residents — send me a WhatsApp and we'll work it out.
No fixed dates yet — workshops launch later this season. WhatsApp me and I'll let you know when there's a date.
WhatsApp BastiaanThis workshop stands alone — and it is part of a journey. Each of the 9 workshops carries a bridge to what comes before and after.
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