What is Seated Massage Therapy?
Simply put, it is the act of performing a massage while seated. It allows for precise, calculated, and effective techniques often unachievable when performing a massage upright. It conserves energy, reduces wear on the body, and encourages a heightened degree of awareness throughout a massage.
How can seated massage conserve our energy?
A seated massage allows a therapist to comfortably sit throughout a session. This reduces the energy required for proper body mechanics, to maintain an even pace, and encourage calculated techniques to achieve a desired result. A seated massage is a detail-oriented method that eliminates the need for techniques that rely on brute force.
How can a seated massage reduce the wear on our body?
We are taught to use various standing positions to employ our techniques throughout a session. Many massage therapists enter the field lacking the endurance required to ensure their pressure level, and focus is consistent. This leads to fatigue, errors in judgement and improper body mechanics. The cocktail of these factors often results in injury. It is difficult to remain present, focused, and engaged with a client when we are plagued by aches and pains. One side gets neglected for the other. Many therapists sacrifice their own comfort for their client’s wellbeing. Seated Massage Therapy allows a therapist to channel a majority of their awareness toward the massage. They are able to achieve this by minimizing the attention required to protect themselves.
How can a seated massage increase our ability to remain focused, alert, and present throughout a session?
Rather than focusing inwardly on our stance, and endurance it redistributes our energy, and intent on the client. It achieves this by reducing our discomfort and fatigue. The more we focus on ourselves, the less we can focus on them. A rubber band can only stretch so far before it breaks. We are no different. Seated Massage Therapy allows us to apply the elasticity of our energy toward the client instead of managing the challenges we face throughout a massage.
The Stigma of Seated Massage Therapy
Performing massage this way caries a certain degree of stigma. Many believe it is lazy, disrespectful, and unprofessional. I have been ridiculed by peers throughout my career because I perform all of my massages while seated. Many believe there is only one way to practice massage correctly, and those who deviate from the road are vagabonds and miscreants. This lack of humility is one of the reasons our industry is dying. Our ability to open our heart and soul to new ideas are limited by our polarizing ideologies and preconceived notions. We can rise to new heights and establish the greatest era of all time by embracing the virtues of empathy, humility, and creativity.
Why do I perform my massages seated?
When I was going through massage school I was dying of cancer. My right lung was partially collapsed, filled with blood, and being consumed by a softball size tumor. I could barely breathe, moving around erased most of my energy, and I was in constant pain.
Every time I stood to perform a massage I would get soaked with sweat, I would wheeze with every breath, and at the end I felt like my muscles were dead. Even then I knew massage was my purpose. My suffering was immense, but nothing could steal away my dreams.
I asked my instructor if I could sit throughout my session, and he firmly said no. He looked at me like I was lazy and said it was illegal, that if he permitted me to sit, he would get into trouble with the authorities. I am uncertain which authorities he was talking about, but like any good student I acquiesced.
Each massage ate at my insides, and my body thundered with agony. The more tired I became the harder it was to breathe. I would gasp for air and cough into my arm. With each cough my mouth filled with blood, and I would swallow it in gulps. The crimson blood stirred within my stomach, and it made me ill, but my will forced me forward to focus, to feel and to help those who hurt.
Since that time, I have learned my instructor was wrong. There were no laws limiting how I stand or sit. So, I choose to sit. These days the cancer isn’t eating me in the way it once was. Since then, I have had my right lung removed, and I have been burned by the horrors of chemotherapy. These sacrifices have eternally wounded my body and I no longer have the endurance to stand and be as strong as I once was.
I believe every hardship we face is an opportunity to learn how to help others. My cancer journey has shown me many insights and sitting while performing massage is one of them. I had to adapt, and with my professional pivot it unlocked beautiful techniques that would have otherwise been completely unavailable to me.
