Understanding Your Demands.

Total Load and the Planning Framework

The foundation session.

You'll learn what your total load is, meet the four phases of a performer's year — Build, Rehearse, Perform, Recover — and figure out which phase you're in right now. In session, you'll map your own current load across rehearsal, performance, class, work, life, and recovery.

You'll leave with the Real World Performance Planner and your own Load Map.

Strength, Capacity, and the Off-Season That Doesn't Exist

Most performing artists never get a true off-season — but the quieter windows are your best opportunity to build strength and tissue tolerance. This session reframes that quiet stretch as a strategic asset, with a pre-recorded intro to a performer-specific strength framework and live Q+A for individualized planning.

You'll leave with a sample Build-phase weekly template and a tool menu reference.

Managing Load When Volume Is Rising

This is where most injuries happen — because load rises faster than recovery adjusts. You'll work through real rehearsal-period scenarios in small groups using the Fatigue and Symptom Decision Guide, and learn when to modify, when to push through, and when to stop.

You'll leave with a laminated Decision Guide and a Phase Check-In tool.

Surviving (and Thriving in) the Perform Phase

Tech week, doubles, travel, disrupted sleep, peak emotional output — timed intentionally for early holiday season. You'll build your own minimum-effective recovery toolkit for a show week with facilitated feedback.

You'll leave with a Perform-phase recovery checklist and a healthcare escalation reference.

The Recover Phase and Nervous System Reset

Most artists skip recovery entirely and move straight from Perform back into Build. This session includes a guided 45-minute rolling and breathwork session so you can actually feel what recovery does, not just hear about it.

You'll leave with a recovery protocol template and a Tune Up Fitness ball to keep using at home.

Nutrition, Energy Availability, and the Artist Who Forgets to Eat

Not about diet culture — about what happens to healing, injury risk, and performance quality when a body is chronically under-fueled, and practical ways to fix it. You'll audit a typical rehearsal or show day and problem-solve the gaps as a group.

When Flexibility Is the Problem

A disproportionate number of performing artists are hypermobile — and most have been told their whole lives it's just an asset. This session reframes it as something to manage, with a guided self-assessment and three foundational stabilization exercises.

You'll leave with a hypermobility self-screen guide and stabilization reference card.

What Your Body Is Trying to Tell You

Most performing artists have been trained to perform through pain. This session builds the vocabulary to tell the difference between normal adaptation, a warning sign, and a stop sign — using real, anonymized scenarios submitted in advance.

You'll leave with an injury literacy quick reference and an updated list of Boston-area performing arts healthcare providers.

The Part We Don't Talk About Enough

Emotional fatigue accumulates the same way physical fatigue does. This session brings nervous system dysregulation, performance anxiety, and burnout into the same conversation as physical health — with a facilitated reflection on where your emotional load is highest right now, and one concrete step you can take this week.

Putting It All Together

The capstone.

The capstone. A full working session — not a lecture — where we finalize your own Sustainable Performance Plan for the season ahead: your personal tool menu, your healthcare team, your minimum viable recovery routine.

You'll leave with a completed, personalized plan and an ongoing AAHC resource guide.