Teacher of watsu, recognized by Waba International and Watsu Italia, and of systemic yoga, Lisa Bertoni was born into a family of travelers and has always nurtured an important curiosity towards life itself. Graduated in Communication Sciences, she has over 10 years of experience working with babies, children and disabled people. He organizes yoga workshops in various Italian cities, where he brings a practice that affirms life in its entirety through a gentle approach.
He shared his personal vision with us: if we are able to discover the fluid part of life and follow its creative flow, we can find our true self and come into contact with new resources to live a full and joyful existence.
How did you get to know watsu and when did you choose to pursue this profession as a career (or did you choose yourself)?
The watsu my mother found him many years ago in a magazine and showed me the article thinking it was something that could interest me, and it was so ... Some time later, since I worked in a pool with only disabled people I thought of attending a week introductory end ( watsu basic ) to see if it could be useful with the guys who came every day in the water ... It was love at first sight ... From there I started the whole school and for years it was my great love!
The nervous system is a beautiful dance of pure fluidity. We come from the amniotic fluid. Is working in water somehow also connected to life?
Of course, life is born in water and water is life, and we are mostly composed of fluid . There is a very beautiful phrase that has accompanied me for a long time: "Water identifies with life. And life is nothing but water ". I would say that this sentence contains almost everything ...
This also explains why many adults, with great water fears, at some point in their lives want to learn to swim, it is as if they wanted to get closer to a part of themselves that they never wanted to face.
What is the age of the children you work with, how long a lesson lasts, and how is it done, broadly?
Puppies range from two and a half months to three years.
I create as a container in which children and parents can move and enjoy each other's company, I transmit small instruments to teach them to take them underwater, make dives and approach them in a gentle and gentle way to the most primordial element that exists . The main objective is the safety of the child, the pleasantness of skin-to-skin contact between parent and children and fun.
The Watsu: technique, benefits and contraindications
In some cases the contact itself can create discomfort, because massaging is going deep. According to your experience, have you noticed that this potential discomfort is attenuated when the water element variable is added?
Water acts as a filter between those who give and those who receive. It puts you at ease and allows you to go very deep even doing very little. I would say that rare people experience discomfort during a watsu treatment.
Proteus, a marine divinity, represented for the Greeks the pure genesis, the divinity that has in itself any change and metamorphosis. How do you see the children you work with change slowly? What are the emotional or physical aspects most involved in the change?
Good question ... Over time I have seen children "flourish", I followed children who had been hospitalized for the first months of their lives, who had suffered difficult parts or who had spent their last periods in the belly almost in the absence of amniotic fluid and that really bothered entering the pool. Fear and terror of fluidity were rooted in their tissues. With a lot of patience and perseverance, I saw them start playing, having fun, spraying and feeling expectation and joy in coming to do the "swimming lesson"; the parents then confirmed to me that even in everyday life there have been improvements and loss of fears.
This is just one example of how there has been a marvelous metamorphosis and that perhaps may have changed lives for small human beings.
Have you ever worked with children who are really terrified of contact with water? How is it best to act in these cases?
I had and I have many terrified children (even many adults) and I would say that they are the "challenge" that fascinates me the most.
We must act calmly, patiently, kindly and firmly . It is also important to convey to the parent the importance of continuing to bring them into the water and infuse them with safety (very often parents let themselves be carried away by the fear of their children and decide that it is better to suspend or not to come). If you win the parent, then it becomes easier to work with children.
In the Jungian interpretative lexicon, water means the unconscious, the maternal aspect in the sense of the matrix of consciousness. Do you believe that water work and the unconscious are linked?
Absolutely yes. Water represents the emotions, the deep ones ... Approaching the element of water outside the body can help (even unconsciously) approach its most intimate part and can lead, over time, to changes in everyday life .
In short, it is a journey that is always worth taking!
