Extracted from Health Kinesiology And Allergies By John Payne (first published Action Against Allergy newsletter Spring 2006)

Kinesiology (kin-eezy-ology) means the study of movement, and there is a branch of conventional medicine called kinesiology that does just that; studies how muscles move the body. In this discipline, a system of muscle testing was developed to assess neurological damage affecting muscle function in diseases such as polio. It was then realised that muscle function will change for other reasons that may be related to the traditional Chinese acupuncture model of energy meridians. According to this model there is a system of pathways or meridians running around the body accessing all the tissues and organs. Through these meridians flow energy and information in a way somewhat analogous to the nervous system. It was seen that muscle response could be affected by disturbances in the meridian energy system as well as in the nervous system.

It was noted that a muscle would test as though weak in the presence of an imbalance in this meridian system. Correcting the imbalance would restore the normal functioning of the muscle. Body cells rely on the correct energy flow for their functioning, so imbalances in the meridian system can lead to malfunction within the body from a cellular level upwards and correcting the energy flow can therefore restore cellular function as well as muscle function.

It was chiropractor  George Goodheart who recognised this relationship and devised what he called “applied kinesiology.” Subsequently the tool of using muscle testing or “muscle monitoring” to assess the meridian system has been used in many ways and has led to a proliferation of other branches of kinesiology which are now sometimes given the blanket term “energy kinesiology” or “bioenergetic kinesiology” to distinguish them from the original kinesiology. Applied kinesiology still remains in the realm of chiropractors and uses more of a medical model approach to the body than its derivatives.  A widely used version specifically developed for lay people by the late John Thie is called Touch for Health.

In the Touch for Health method, each muscle relates to a specific Chinese meridian and its associated body organ. By putting an arm or a leg into a specific position that isolates the function of a particular muscle, and then applying hand pressure to the limb, one is able to identify if the muscle can “hold” the limb in position or not. If the muscle “unlocks” or seems to switch off, it can be assumed that the energy flow in the related meridian is out of balance. If one monitors a muscle for each of the meridians, and applies an energy balancing technique(s) for each muscle that indicates an imbalance, then a complete balance of the meridian system is accomplished.

A different way of using muscle monitoring is to test an indicator muscle. In this case, a single muscle is “plugged into” the whole meridian system so that any imbalance will switch it off when tested.

In kinesiology anything that tends to disturb the balance of the meridian system is termed “stress.”  So it can be said that muscles will switch off, unlock, or seem weak in relation to stress.

Psychophysiologist Jimmy Scott recognised that with correct preparation an indicator muscle can also be switched off by the response “No” in answer to a question.
If a question is put to the subject who, at some “other than conscious” level believes the answer to be “No,” then the muscle unlocks. This procedure can be used to access information held at subconscious levels about the nature of the stress that is causing any disturbance or imbalance. Dr Scott incorporated this process of verbal questioning into his “health kinesiology.”  Many other branches of kinesiology have subsequently taken it on board.