Psoas Release Party!: Release Your Body From Chronic Pain and Discomfort (Core Walking)

If there's one muscle of the body everyone should study, it's the psoas major. Jonathon FitzGordon's Psoas Release Party concisely explains essential information on the psoas in plain English. It's a pleasure to read and easy to comprehend even if you know nothing about anatomy. Also, the quality of FitzGordon's bodywork should help alleviate back pain if practiced regularly. I would only add Feldenkrais's pelvic clock, mobilization of the spine with continuous arch and curl movements, and planks for spinal stabilization. -- Alfredo Balaban, author of the Financial Athlete

As someone who performs manual therapy and mobility instructions for this muscle quite often, I found this book very informative and adept at communicating anatomy and biomechanics in laymen terms. However, I was a bit disappointed with the stretches and exercises provided at the back of the book. They are VERY simple and there are definitely more effective ways to open up your hip and psoas. Active Release Technique and Kelly Starrett's Mobilitywod(dot)com are much more effective in my professional opinion. Nonetheless, I enjoyed this short read.

The book explains the psoas and gives exercises to help relax it. It has helped tom make my body more relaxed,

Somewhat disappointing. Very thin book, not quite worth the price when compared to other ones. The author writes a very informative blog and has obviously great knowledge in the area. He describes one particular pattern of "poor postural habits" that happens not to be mine, even though I still have problems with the psoas. Unfortunately, I did not receive any insight that would help my particular posture/pattern. I highly recommend "The Vital Psoas Muscle" by Jo Ann Staugaard-Jones.

This neat little book unravels the psoas and it's terrain in engaging fashion. The muscle is explored fully from it's anatomy to it's interaction with the abdominal internal organs and nervous system to its release and (finally) stretch. The text is concise and lively. There are lots of helpful illustrations. I've attended Fitzgordon's Psoas Release Party in person years ago and my regular yoga practice (and street practice) underwent substantial change. It's heartening to see that so much of the spirit and content of the live event have been incorporated into the book. No more reliance on my hastily scrawled notes.

I bought this book because, forgetting ahimsa, I developed a pain that research suggested was connected to the psoas. On the plus side, the book did teach me about the functions of the psoas muscles. On the minus side, it taught me much more than I wanted to know about the functions of the psoas muscles. Also, the exercises didn't seem to do much for my pain, which went away on its own. Finally, the book it seems to imply that to maintain perfect psoas I should spend about half an hour a day exercising them. Given that the psoas are not our only muscles, this seems like a lot. Per Science.com, "the number of muscles in the human body varies from about 656 to 850, depending on which expert you consult." OK, you clearly don't have to exercise them all, and most of them come in pairs -- maybe 50 pairs need exercise?? Wow, if I only had 25 hours a day ----

After 3 years of back pain... 4 or 5 doctors... this guy seems to have summed up my problem in a very easy read book... getting at the TRUE root of the pain most doctors said I would have to "just live with" !

I've read only about a quarter of this book but so far I'm loving it. FitzGordon writes really well -- simply, conversationally but with vivid imagery. Most importantly, he knows what he's talking about. If you like Erik Franklin, another body guru who understands that the body and mind have to work together, you'll like this book. I can't give it five stars because I haven't finished it yet. Besides I always suspect that five star blurbs are the product of paid reviewers.