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Dimensions of Holistic Massage Copyright 2009,
Associated Bodywork & Massage Professionals, Inc. by Linda G. Means, Ph.D. CMT Peacehope Healing Arts, Monroeville, PA For modern-day massage therapists, the concept of “holistic
massage” may seem very 21st-century, but in fact for
millennia, healing bodywork was intended to balance the physical, emotional,
mental, energetic, and spiritual bodies.
Just as virtually all ancient medical bodies of knowledge incorporated a
multi-dimensional model, all ancient massage practices also addressed the
holistic organism. When Swedish
massage was developed in 19th-century Europe, the Swedish focus on
the physical body probably helped massage therapists gain acceptance in the
modern-day physically-oriented medical community, but unfortunately neglected
to educate therapists in the holistic potential of the work. In the late 20th century, as American massage schools began
to include a variety of energetic healing modalities in the curriculum, the
massage community began to return to its holistic roots. However, Swedish massage is still often
regarded primarily as a physical practice.
Let’s take a look at a 21st-century model of Swedish
massage which provides for a holistic approach. These principles can be applied
to any sort of a bodywork session, from deep tissue to hot stone massage. A holistic massage session employs a variety of strategies to work
specifically with the client’s physical, emotional, mental, energetic,
and spiritual needs. Deep
relaxation and effective therapeutic results occur most readily when the client
feels 100% safe, comfortable and nurtured, when the client’s and
therapist’s mental activity is quieted, and when clear energy flow is
facilitated. The Mental Body Herbert Benson, M.D., Associate Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical
School, defines the
“relaxation response” as “a physical state of deep rest that
changes the physical and emotional responses to stress (e.g., decreases in heart
rate, blood pressure, rate of breathing, and muscle tension).”1 This is a measurable physiological
response that is the opposite of the fight-or-flight stress response. This effect may account for many of the
diverse medical benefits that have been measured in clinical studies of massage
therapy. This relaxation is not achieved solely by physical manipulation of soft
tissue, nor by the body being at rest.
According to Dr. Benson, who has devoted over three decades to studying
the relaxation response, this effect occurs when mental activity is slowed to a
quiet, relaxed state. This is the
state generally associated with the practices of meditation and yoga. In this state, the electromagnetic waves
of the brain slow down to a frequency of 8-12 Hz, which is called an alpha wave
state. The alpha wave frequency is
also associated with parasympathetic nervous system dominance and hypnotic
trance states. Hypnotic trance is a
state in which the organism is receptive to suggestions for positive change, so
the client’s healing intention may be fulfilled more readily in this
state. During any massage session, we can use specific strategies to subdue
various types of mental busyness which prevent the slow brain wave frequencies
associated with relaxation: “Monkey mind” is a Buddhist term for the usual
walking-around kind of mental activity which occurs during most of our waking
hours. Monkey mind is characterized
by an endless stream of thoughts about anything and everything. Monkey mind produces a beta brain wave
state: >12 Hz, which prevents the relaxation response. We can help the client reduce monkey
mind thought streams by providing a relaxing input for her to focus on,
especially at the start of the session: Ÿ
Consider using music as foreground sound instead of
background sound. Enchanting
melodies with gorgeous instrumentation and lots of movement and suspense can
captivate the client mentally, drawing her attention away from whatever was on
her mind before she got on the table. Sing along with your own sweet voice
to really grab her attention! Ÿ
Some music is specially formulated to induce alpha wave
activity in the brain. Ÿ
A stroke or movement that is highly soothing and unexpected
may attract the client’s attention and help her to focus on the
pleasurable feelings in her body.
Gentle rocking is very nurturing, and according to Shiatsu therapist
Carl Dubitsky, extended rhythmic oscillation slows brain waves.2 Whole-body rocking under the sheet can
provide a gentle, non-threatening start to a massage. Drumming on the body is an
effective way to draw the client’s attention to the body, especially when
combined with beautiful drum music.
Try using a six or seven-minute track from David & Steve
Gordon’s Drum Medicine CD, for
example, drumming with the music and moving over the whole body. Ÿ
Bringing the attention to the breath and slowing the breath
can help the client to move his attention out of the mind and into the body,
and to slow the brainwaves. Slow, deep breathing provides this effect for the
therapist as well as the client. I
sometimes make my long slow breathing slightly audible, so that the client will
hear it and match it, without my having to say a word. Clients have often commented that
hearing my breath helps them to breathe deeply themselves. Ÿ
When the client begins the session in a prone position, she
may be less inclined to talk, because of the difficulty of communicating from
inside a face cradle. Also the face
cradle provides a bit more sensory deprivation, because ambient light is not
coming through the eyelids and the eyes cannot open. So the prone positioning may help to
induce a quiet mind state more readily than a supine position. Also, for clients who have asked for
help with back tension, the prone position enables you to give attention to the
problem area immediately at the start of the session. “Worry mind”
refers to thought patterns that carry concerns about the bodywork session
itself. If your client has had
painful massage experiences in the past, you can relieve worry mind with
reassurances that you do not want to cause pain, and by checking in
occasionally to be sure the client is comfortable, so the client can feel safe
and let go of this fear mentally.
If your client mentions a specific body area that needs attention during
the intake, he may continue to worry about that area until he feels your touch
there. If you tell your therapist
that your lower back is killing you and the therapist doesn’t even touch
that area for the first 40 minutes of the session, you may lie on the table
wondering whether you were heard, or whether you should say something again,
and your attention may stay focused on that discomfort until it is attended
to. As a therapist, you can relieve
this worry thought pattern by beginning the session on that part of the
body. Similarly, if the therapist
has the habit of only visiting each body part once during a massage session,
the client may feel disappointed after the therapist covers up the worrisome
area: “that felt so good, it
was just what I needed, but now it’s over…”. By returning frequently during the
session to the area of concern, you can help the client to feel that the
attention there is never-ending. “Tracking mind” is the phenomenon of noticing where the
therapist is working and anticipating what she will do next. This mental activity is especially
likely if you do the same massage routine during every session, or do the same
massage sequence on the right and left sides of the body during one
session: “okay, now
she’s going to flex the ankle, then she rotates and tractions each
toe… yep, there’s the first toe… second toe… next
toe… next one…”.
You can defeat tracking mind by working in a way which is not
predictable. If the work cannot be
tracked, tracking mind gives up thinking about it. You can also deter tracking mind by
continuing one lovely, soothing stroke or movement for a ridiculously long
time: “that feels great but I
know she’s almost done, she only does that four times… wow,
she’s still doing it… wow, that feels so good, and it just goes on
and on…”. Eventually
the mind surrenders the expectation that the good feeling should stop soon, and
relaxes into pure pleasure. “Social mind” comes into play when the client feels an
obligation to be engaged conversationally with the therapist, which is not
relaxing neurologically! The
brain activity involved in chatting generates beta brain waves, preventing
slower frequencies. You can
encourage clients to enjoy therapeutic silence by addressing this in your
“How to Receive a Massage” literature, and by not allowing yourself
to be drawn into chatting during a session. I sometimes respond to a client’s
chatty questions by saying, very softly, “I’d love to talk to you
about that later. Let’s take
a couple of deep breaths right now…”. Conversation about what is happening
during the session is sometimes necessary of course, and keeps the attention
focused on the bodywork happening in the present. Recent scientific discoveries in neuroplasticity have demonstrated that
the human brain has tremendous capacity to change its patterns even in adulthood. Brain reorganization occurs in response
to repeated new patterns. According
to Sharon Begley, “the actions we take can literally expand or contract
different regions of the brain, pour more juice into quiet circuits and damp
down activity in buzzing ones.”3 In this regard, if our clients
experience slow brain wave states for extended periods of time during massage
sessions, this may also stimulate their brains to adopt new, healthier
patterns. We can help our clients
begin to develop the brain patterns and health benefits of trained
meditators! I have a regular
shiatsu client who goes into an extremely deep trance state during each
session. Recently he said to me at
the end of the session, “My brain just stops thinking, I lose all track
of time and place, there are no thoughts in my head at all during our
sessions,” I replied,
“That is what meditators spend years trying to achieve. You are doing advanced meditation on the
massage table. Good job!” The Emotional Body By providing an emotional sanctuary during the massage session, we can
help the client to relax deeply and let go of emotional armoring which may be
associated with health issues.
Emotional openness comes from a feeling of being nurtured, accepted,
listened to, and appreciated. We
can gain the client’s emotional confidence in many ways, before, during
and after the treatment session. Before the massage: Remember that the session really begins at the moment the client walks
through the door, at the first contact with you and your environment. Do you welcome the client warmly? Do call him by name as he enters your
space? Are you glad to see him? Does the client experience your full
attention from the time that you greet him? Try to get your treatment room set up
completely before greeting the client, so that after you turn your attention to
him, you have no need to take your attention away to light candles, say, or to
close the window blinds or turn on music. A thorough intake discussion assures the client that you are taking all
of her concerns into account. Even
a regular weekly client needs to know that you are basing today’s session
on what her needs are today, and that you are listening attentively to fully
understand her needs. Asking
clarification questions about the client’s issues or repeating what the
client has told you indicates that you are really, truly engaged with the
client’s concerns. The intake discussion also provides an opportunity to reassure the
client that the treatment will be a safe experience. In order to surrender fully to a state
of deep relaxation, the client needs to believe that the therapist will not
hurt her during the massage session.
We can frame the client’s expectations for the session by saying
upfront that we do not intend to cause pain or discomfort, because the body
tenses up in response to pain.
You can ask your client to please let you know if anything feels
uncomfortable in any way, so that you can adjust the work to suit her. This
indicates that we welcome feedback during a session, without regarding it as
criticism or complaint, helping the client to release any fear of the
therapist. When we clearly convey
our intention of providing client-centered massage instead of therapist-centered
work, the client feels secure in knowing that her needs will be met fully. When a client says, “Do whatever
you like,” I respond with, “I’d like to do whatever you would
like!” My friend Annette Sand
tells her clients, “It’s all about you!” … and she
really means it. During the massage: Imagine the feeling of sore muscles that have been aching for
touch. Then imagine that exquisite
feeling of relief when a caring therapist makes the first soothing contact with
those needy muscles. Activate your
own emotional body, fill your hands with the feeling of “help is
here,“ and pour that feeling into your client’s body. This engages the client’s
emotional body as well as the physical body, creating strong emotional harmony
between therapist and client. Peggy
Horan, massage teacher at the Esalen Institute, describes the experience of
emotional harmony in this way:
“I loved that the work was received on deep levels, way beneath
the skin, closer to the soul, where clients experience their sense of real self,
their feelings, and their emotional home inside their body.”4 As you work, the quality of your touch informs the client of how
carefully you are listening to the body, to detect the perfect level of
work. The emotional body does not
feel safe with touch that feels aggressive, reckless or inattentive; we recoil
from people who scare us or cause us pain.
The client can feel the difference between a robotic massage where the
therapist’s hands are on autopilot and the therapist’s mind is
elsewhere, and a massage in which the client’s attention is fully engaged
in the interaction and the hands are responding to what they feel. Attention makes all the difference with deep tissue work, where the
therapist’s inattention makes the client feel unsafe. When deep tissue work is done slowly and
attentively, the client’s body intelligence detects your sensitivity to
what is happening beneath your hands.
Deep compression done too quickly or automatically can blow past the
point of resistance and cause pain, which may also blow the client‘s
feeling of emotional security, and increase her fear and resistance toward your
work. Checking in with the client about the comfort level of pressure,
temperature, how far to take a particular stretch, etc. demonstrates that you
are actively engaged in trying to adapt the work to accommodate all of your
client’s needs as they arise during the session. After the massage: Even if you have time pressure in your work schedule, you can create the
feeling of lingering in the client’s field after the treatment session
ends. Try leaving the feeling of
your touch on the client by releasing your final contact so gently and
gradually that the client still feels you there after you are gone. Allow even just a minute or two
after the session to bask with the client in his state of joy and pleasure, and
to allow your client the opportunity to express his feelings and experiences in
private with you. Remind your
client that the body will continue to respond and unwind over the next couple
of days, to help him carry the effects of the work home with him. The Energetic Body A Swedish massage session can be designed to clear energy blockages and
induce a strong clear flow of energy throughout the body, which moves all
physiological processes back toward normal. Energy blockages are associated
with muscle tension, pain, and inflammation, physical discomforts which we are
trying to relieve during the session.
Swedish massage techniques frequently help to release these blockages. Neuromuscular techniques, for
instance, may help a muscle to release tension; now the excess energy that was
released from that muscle needs to be dispersed to fully relieve the
client’s symptoms and promote total healing. We can accomplish this by clearing the
energy pathway leading from that area through the limbs that connect to that
area. In the case of neck tension,
for example, after releasing the neck we can stimulate energy dispersal through
massage work on the scalp, shoulders, arms, and hands to enable the released
energy to flow freely out of the neck.
Tension released from the lower back can be directed out of that area
via the hips, legs, and feet, and also via the upper back, shoulders, arms, and
hands. Joint mobilization helps to
release energy blockages, and long stretches that traction the whole length of
the body help to stimulate energy flow through the longitudinal meridians. Brushing off the body energetically also helps to disperse excess
energy. This can be most effective
at the end of the session, after all of your good work in releasing energy
blockages. Energy brushing can be
done either touching the body or with the hands off the body, beginning at the
head, grabbing excess energy and smoothing energy flow all the way through the
neck, the torso, legs, and off the ends of the feet, and from the shoulders
down the arms and off the ends of the fingers. Shake off your hands at the end of each
stroke to remove the excess energy from your field. Our choice of music influences the energetic effectiveness of
bodywork. Yin bodywork uses deep
quiet touch to relieve anxiety and sedate overactive energy. Quiet, unstructured music provides a
good energetic complement to yin therapy.
Yang bodywork uses rhythmic movement to stimulate energy flow and
address deficient energy conditions.
Rhythmic, moving music supports the therapeutic energy of yang bodywork.
Most massage sessions benefit from a combination of these energetic
approaches, so it is useful to choose a music playlist which alternates between
yin and yang energetic blueprints, creating a holistic energetic arc for the
session. In the 21st
century, we are lucky to have laptops and MP3 players to specify music
playlists, so we are not constrained to use the predetermined music burned onto
a CD. You can customize the music
very specifically for each session through your observation of the
client’s energetic profile.
If a client shows indications of an excess energy disorder, such as
anxiety, you may want to use predominantly yin music, particularly at the start
of the session, interspersed with some yang work to promote overall energy
flow. For a deficient energy
disorder, such as fatigue, predominantly yang music may be more therapeutically
effective, with yin music used strategically for quiet moments such as deep
tissue work, or slow work on sensitive areas like belly, neck, and face. “Vibrational resonance” refers
to changes in the frequency of an energy field in
response to an external energetic stimulus. Resonance results in vibrational
synchronization between two energy fields.
As therapists, we can create in ourselves a healthy, balanced
vibrational field for the client to harmonize with, by approaching the client
in a calm, relaxed, centered, grounded state. When we work with a quiet mind, focused
on our connection with the client, our brain waves slow down and provide a
relaxed vibrational target for the client’s brain frequencies. When we work with gratitude and
compassion, the client’s emotional field resonates with our joyful,
loving state. These are not
metaphorical constructs, they are actual vibrational manifestations of our
experience, which can transfer to the client through our close, extended
contact during a massage session. I once gave the following feedback to a
student after receiving a shiatsu session from him: “Your work was beautiful
technically, the pressure was perfect, the meridian work was spot on. But what are you so angry
about?” He responded with
surprise: “How did you know that I’m angry?”, and he went on
to tell me about the intense difficulties he had been experiencing in his life
recently. I told him that I could
feel the anger in his touch, and advised him that he needs to develop the
practice of leaving his own emotional imbalances outside the door of the
massage room, because no matter how expertly he works technically, clients will
feel uncomfortable with his negative emotions intruding into his work. Dr. Norman Shealy and Dr. Dawson Church
describe calm emotional states as one of the characteristics of a master
healer: “Healers … who regularly induce feelings of peace and
tranquility in themselves -- and have a spiritual practice focusing on love and
compassion -- are more likely to enter the kind of physiological state
associated with healing… A master healer, in the healing state, is typically
tranquil inside, even if their outer actions are animated.”5 The Physical Body Working holistically on the physical body entails addressing the body as
a whole unit, instead of a collection of parts. The arm does not end at the wrist, it
continues energetically and psychologically through the fingertips. The leg does not end at the upper thigh,
it continues over the hip and into the lower back. If we uncover one leg, work on it in
isolation as far as the upper thigh, cover it back up again and don’t return,
we are telling the leg that it is a separate entity from the upper body. By physically connecting the leg with
the hip, the back, the arm, the opposite leg, we awaken the body’s
memories of how everything is connected and works together. By returning to the
leg again and again during the session, we remind the leg again and again that
it is part of the whole organism. Numerous techniques can help the client to feel the body as a whole: Ÿ
Long strokes that travel the entire length of one side of
the body, from toes to fingertips,
help the client to feel that whole side as one unit. Ÿ
Long bilateral strokes, traversing the entire length of the
body on right and left simultaneously, help the client to feel the connection
between left and right as well as the connection of upper and lower body. Ÿ
Whole-body rocking helps the entire organism to feel the
same rhythm. There are many
hand-holds which can be used to create movement in the entire body, on the
feet, sacrum, shoulder blades, etc. Ÿ
3-D work, contacting the posterior and anterior parts of the
body simultaneously, helps the client to feel the wholeness of a region of the
body. When working with the client
in a supine position, for example, we can help her to feel the whole abdomen by
slipping one hand beneath the lumbar spine while massaging the belly with the
other hand. When the entire session
contacts each region of the body as a whole unit, instead of a front or a back,
the client may experience a greater sense of body integration. The Spiritual Body Compassion is the hallmark of the spirituality of massage. Our clients feel our compassion and
nurture and attention in our hands, or the absence of it. If you engage in your practice as sacred
work, your client’s spirit will respond with gratitude and healing. The groundbreaking work of Dr. Masaru Emoto demonstrates irrefutably the
physical effects of love healing.
Emoto’s photographs of crystals formed in water treated with
compassion and gratitude provide visible evidence of the transformational power
of love. Given that the human body
is composed of over 70% water, it is clear that the compassionate touch of a
spiritually-oriented massage therapist can potentially induce the state of
vibrant, radiant wholeness seen in Emoto’s crystals. As Dr. Emoto says, “If we fill our
lives with love and gratitude, this consciousness will become a wonderful power
that will spread throughout the world.”6 In our role as massage therapists, we
are given a license to touch people with kindness. We are indeed the lucky ones to have the
job of guiding clients into a space of peace, relief, and contentment. Your gratitude for your work may be the
key to your success as a health care provider. The holistic massage approach heals more than just tight muscles. Holistic massage guides the client --
and the therapist -- into a place of wholeness, connection, communion, bliss,
where the client feels loved and listened to, accessing the body’s deep
intelligence to release limitations and old patterns, allowing muscle tension
to fall away naturally. Welcome to
the 21st century! NOTES 1 Benson-Henry Institute for Mind Body Medicine,
http://www.mbmi.org/basics/whatis_rresponse_TRR.asp 2 Carl Dubitsky, Bodywork Shiatsu (Rochester, VT: Healing Arts
Press, 1997), 101. 3 Sharon Begley, Train Your Mind, Change Your Brain (New York:
Ballentine Books, 2007), 8. 4 Peggy Morrison Horan, Connecting Through Touch (Oakland, CA: New
Harbinger Publications, Inc., 2007), 4. 5 Norman Shealy and Dawson Church, Soul Medicine (Santa Rosa, CA:
Elite Books, 2006), 92. 6 Masaru Emoto, The Hidden Messages in Water (New York: Atria Books,
2001), 146.
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