Have you ever felt that something wasn’t quite right with your body, even though your test results came back normal?
That experience is one reason people sometimes look beyond conventional medicine for additional ways to understand their health. Natural Bioenergetics—formerly known as Health Kinesiology—is one of the approaches I have practiced since 2009.
If you’re new to energy work generally, start with my overview here – this post assumes you know the basics.
After all these years, I’ve learned something that may sound simple but is important: people can have experiences that are meaningful and helpful to them without those experiences automatically proving that a particular treatment works.
I believe it’s important to be honest about both sides.
Natural Bioenergetics is a complementary wellness approach, not a substitute for medical diagnosis or treatment. Some of the ideas associated with bioenergetic practices have not been established by conventional scientific research, and evidence supporting muscle monitoring as a diagnostic tool is limited. That doesn’t mean someone cannot find a session useful. It does mean we should be careful to distinguish personal experience from scientific evidence.
With that in mind, here is a straightforward look at what Natural Bioenergetics is, what happens during a session, and where I believe it can fit into a broader approach to health.
What Is Natural Bioenergetics?
Natural Bioenergetics is a complementary health approach based on the idea that the body’s responses may provide information that can be explored during a session.
One of the main techniques used in my practice is muscle monitoring, sometimes referred to as muscle testing. A practitioner applies gentle pressure to a muscle and observes its response while exploring different questions or possibilities.
Natural Bioenergetics can involve looking at many different aspects of a person’s life and well-being, including:
- Physical and structural stress
- Foods or environmental factors a person believes may be affecting them
- Emotional stress
- Lifestyle habits
- Relaxation and body awareness
- Other complementary approaches
It is important, however, to distinguish Natural Bioenergetics from the established medical uses of manual muscle testing.
Manual muscle testing has legitimate applications in areas such as rehabilitation and neuromuscular assessment. That is different from using muscle responses to diagnose illnesses, identify nutritional deficiencies, determine food sensitivities, or detect other hidden medical problems. Research has not established those broader diagnostic uses as reliable medical tests.
That distinction is important to me.
Why Do People Explore Natural Bioenergetics?
Most people who come to me aren’t necessarily rejecting conventional medicine. Often, they are simply looking for additional ways to understand what they are experiencing, manage stress, or become more aware of how their lifestyle affects how they feel.
I think there is room for both.
You can be interested in nutrition, stress management, body awareness, and complementary approaches while still seeing an appropriate healthcare professional when medical care is needed. These don’t have to be opposing teams.
A Personal Example
I once worked with a woman—I’ll call her Jennifer—who came to me while experiencing severe panic attacks several times a week.
She was dealing with a very difficult situation at home and felt that she was carrying significant emotional trauma. She had already worked with conventional therapists and had also tried another type of trauma therapy. She felt that neither had given her the improvement she was hoping for. She was also taking medication and continued doing so while working with me.
We began working together using the techniques I practiced at the time.
The early part of the process was not necessarily easy. Her panic attacks actually became more intense for a period of time. I did not consider that worsening to be proof that the treatment was working, and I encouraged her to continue working with her medical providers and medication as appropriate.
Over the following two or three months, however, she began to report significant improvement. Eventually, the panic attacks stopped occurring.
That experience has stayed with me.
But I also want to be careful about what I conclude from it. One person’s improvement cannot tell us exactly why she improved. It could not establish that Natural Bioenergetics caused the improvement, nor can one person’s experience demonstrate that the approach will work for someone else.
What I can honestly say is that I have seen people report meaningful changes while working with me.
That’s a personal and professional observation—not scientific proof that Natural Bioenergetics can treat panic attacks or other medical conditions.
The Body Is Electrical—But That Doesn’t Prove Energy Therapy
You will sometimes hear the human body described as an electrical system.
There is a legitimate biological basis for that description. Nerves communicate using electrical signals, and the heart’s rhythm is controlled by electrical activity.
But there is an important distinction between those established biological facts and claims about a therapeutic “energy field.”
The fact that the body has electrical activity does not, by itself, demonstrate that muscle monitoring can detect hidden nutritional deficiencies, toxins, emotional blocks, or disease. Nor does it demonstrate that correcting an alleged energetic imbalance will treat a medical condition.
That is why I describe Natural Bioenergetics as a complementary wellness practice rather than a medically proven diagnostic system.
I’d rather tell you where the line is than blur it.
What Happens During a Natural Bioenergetics Session?
A session usually begins with a conversation.
I want to know what brought someone to my office, what they are experiencing, and—perhaps most importantly—what they hope to get out of the appointment.
The length of an appointment can vary. A typical appointment in my practice is about an hour, sometimes a little longer depending on how many questions the person has. I don’t discourage questions. In fact, I encourage people to ask them.
An initial appointment is usually longer because I spend more time taking a history and learning about the person’s situation.
I have always tried to make my office a calm and comfortable place. The room is painted a soft, peachy color, and I keep the lighting comfortable—not too bright and not too dim. Some people have told me that being there gives them the feeling that time slows down.
Once we’ve talked, I ask about different aspects of their life and general health, including things such as:
- Sleep
- Eating habits
- Hydration
- Exercise
- Stress
- Major life circumstances
- Other factors they believe may be affecting how they feel
I then explain how I use muscle monitoring.
I first demonstrate the technique and make sure the person understands what I’m doing. From there, I may use the muscle response as one way of exploring different possibilities and deciding what areas we might want to investigate further.
Depending on what comes up during a session, I may explore different complementary approaches.
These can include the particular “corrections” used in Natural Bioenergetics, as well as approaches such as Emotion Code, craniosacral techniques, breathing or relaxation work, or other complementary methods.
Sometimes the focus may turn toward lifestyle or dietary habits. At other times, a person may be interested in supplements, homeopathy, flower essences, or other complementary approaches.
I may also discuss things such as energetic stones, which I make myself, when someone is interested in that aspect of my work.
These different modalities are each worth explaining on their own, so I’ll be discussing some of them in greater detail in future articles.
At the end of a session, we usually discuss what the person can pay attention to between appointments—what I sometimes think of as their “homework”—and whether another appointment would be useful.
An Important Distinction About Muscle Monitoring
Because muscle monitoring is such an important part of my practice, I want to make this point especially clear.
A muscle response is not a replacement for validated medical testing.
I don’t want someone with a serious medical problem to rely on muscle monitoring instead of getting appropriate medical care.
If you have persistent, severe, or unexplained symptoms, you should seek an appropriate medical evaluation. If you have already been diagnosed with a medical condition, Natural Bioenergetics should not be used as a reason to stop prescribed treatment or ignore your healthcare provider’s advice.
For me, complementary means exactly that: complementary.
An excellent book has been written about muscle testing by Jane Thurnell-Read and available here on Amazon.
What Can Natural Bioenergetics Realistically Offer?
The way I think about Natural Bioenergetics is as another lens through which someone can look at their overall well-being.
It may encourage a person to slow down and pay attention to patterns.
It may help someone become more aware of stress and lifestyle habits.
It may provide a structured time to focus on themselves.
And sometimes, the session itself can simply be relaxing.
Those are reasonable things to value.
What I won’t tell you is that Natural Bioenergetics can reliably identify hidden disease, determine exactly which supplement your body needs, diagnose a food sensitivity, or replace a physician’s evaluation.
The research does not support those claims, and I’m not going to make them.
Three Simple Ways to Pay More Attention to Your Health
You don’t need a complicated protocol to start paying closer attention to your health.
Start with observation.
1. Track Patterns
Keep a simple record of your sleep, meals, stress, exercise, and symptoms.
Our memories aren’t always as reliable as we think they are. Writing things down can sometimes make patterns much easier to recognize.
2. Take Care of the Basics
Sleep, hydration, movement, nutritious food, and stress management aren’t particularly glamorous.
They’re still important.
Before looking for complicated solutions, it’s worth asking whether the basic foundations of health are being addressed.
3. Stay Curious—But Keep Perspective
I believe there is value in being open-minded about different approaches to health.
But being open-minded doesn’t mean believing every claim you hear.
Ask questions.
What is well established?
What comes primarily from practitioner experience?
What has some research behind it?
And what is simply unknown?
You don’t have to accept or reject an entire approach wholesale. You can learn about it, ask questions, consider your own experiences, and still maintain a healthy degree of skepticism.
A Note From Poppa Ben
I’ve been working with people in this field since 2009, and one thing that has remained constant is how badly people want to understand what’s happening in their own bodies.
People don’t just want to be told, “Everything is fine.”
They want to understand why they feel the way they feel. They want to know what they can do to take better care of themselves. And sometimes they want to explore possibilities that aren’t part of conventional medicine.
That’s one of the reasons I started PoppaBen.com.
My goal isn’t to tell you that one approach has all the answers.
Instead, I want to look at the many things people are doing to improve their health—vitamins, nutrition, herbs, complementary therapies, lifestyle approaches, and more—and explain what each approach is supposed to do, what I have learned from my own experience, what the evidence actually says, and where the unanswered questions are.
I don’t think we have to choose between being open-minded and being honest.
We can do both.
Natural Bioenergetics is one part of that conversation.
And that’s what I hope PoppaBen.com will be: a place where we can have that conversation honestly.
Important Disclaimer
The information on PoppaBen.com is provided for general educational and informational purposes only. Natural Bioenergetics is a complementary wellness approach and is not a substitute for professional medical care.
Muscle monitoring and related techniques should not be relied upon to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent disease.
Nothing on this website is intended to replace the advice, diagnosis, or treatment of a qualified healthcare professional. If you have persistent, severe, or concerning symptoms, seek appropriate medical care. Do not delay or discontinue recommended medical treatment because of information presented on this website.
Ben — known to his clients and readers as Poppa Ben — is a certified practitioner of Natural Bioenergetics (formerly Health Kinesiology) with decades of hands-on experience helping people restore their energy and vitality. He writes about natural health, nutrition, herbs, energy work, and the occasional skin-healthy recipe. His approach always comes with the same reminder: your body wants to be in balance, and sometimes it just needs someone to listen.