Massage and Bodywork is More Than You Think!

I've been doing Tui Na and Thai Massage for going on 15 years, and tutoring and teaching it for about just as long.

I've thought for a long time that eastern therapies don't get enough credit. Ask most Americans what they think of when you say massage therapy they'll usually paint 2 different pictures. One of walking into a relaxing spa type of environment where you get undressed, have some other person rub oil on you while you relax, smell some flowers or incense etc. and spend time with your significant other... or Two they'll think of walking into a side room of a gym, chiropractic, or physical therapist office where the therapist will have you dress down and then grind their elbow deeply into whatever tight area that's bothering them.

... Well there is a third picture, but whenever an officer comes in for a "session" this sort of picture quickly relocates clandestinely... You can fill in the blanks, so... I digress...

The picture of a Tui Na and Thai session is quite different than these. When you walk in to your session, you're greeted by a clean space and a therapist who pays attention to every aspect of your being. Asking how you're doing, and testing this information with your body we find out what you need help with. No need for excess oils, getting undressed or breaking contact you then sit down on a table covered by a fresh fitted sheet and we get to work. Using acupressure, stretching, vibration, impact, heat or cold, communication and care we work together to bring balance into your movement and your life.

In recent years I find that these views are starting to change. Now a days you'll find stretch clinics popping up in shopping centers, alternative therapies, reflexology and Chiropractic care is quite more widespread than in the past. It also seems like the word about Thai Massage, Acupuncture, Acupressure, Tai Chi and Qigong is starting to get out there. Although sadly way fewer people have heard of Tui Na, but it's good to see a change in the right direction.

Thai massage and Tui Na is much more than you may think it is, if you've heard of it at all. In this post I want to shed some light on what makes these therapies so different from other forms of massage, what we hold their foundations to be and how these ancient methods can unlock so much potential for healing as many practitioners have updated them with a modern blending of eastern traditional medicine and western anatomical knowledge.

East and West are two sides of the same coin.
I say if all you have is the western approach to massage, you're working with one side half covered and tapping into less than a quarter of your potential.

From the East we aim with patterns of 'invisible' connections... From the West we can explore and see the physical means by which they move.

​Both are still encapsulated within the age old foundation of Chinese Medicine: Yin and Yang, or its proper name the Tai Chi.

My teacher Dr. Bernard 'Tony' Zayner used to say, "Western medicine is yang in application yin in its approach. Eastern medicine is yin in application but yang in its approach."

In the west learning is based on dissection, definition, and a specific description derived from experiments of what you can see. The physical observable world is meant to be studied with a fine tooth comb. Cutting things down to their most minute detail by which we then decipher +/or discover the way things work. In a nutshell western medicine is a deep dive of looking into 'the turbid solid space' (all these things the Chinese classify as yin).

Anatomy, physiology, chemistry and the knowledge gained from studying them is a full and concrete based understanding. The western world is looked at as a mechanism and also medicine is seen as a warfare, to kill the thing that's trying to kill us. In acute stages, extreme traumatic injury, and fighting against infection, sure it's a good idea and of course it works well. All these problems are yang in nature. So much of western forms of therapy focus on the mechanical process of a thing.

In the east learning is based on looking for the connections which aren't readily apparent but have been seen by other practitioners throughout time. These have been seen and documented symbolically in their own way throughout a long history of looking at how people react to stress, pressure, lifestyle changes, environmental and emotional circumstances. Patterns that motivates or moves through a person. These 'unseen' forces which bring rise to the physical observable world. This 'observable' pathway of feedback throughout time is said to also intuit the future, the Chinese call this the Tao.

So Eastern is yang in its approach because it is focused on how things behave when they connect, and how this connection reflects in the way things work together through time. Whereas the Western approach is yin because it is focused on how things are structured, and uses this as the launching point to derive meaning.

Both approaches are important to our practice of Tui Na and Thai Massage! Without understanding the structure our theory will lack substance. Taking away traditional Chinese medical theory our application will lack inspiration.

This is the foundation to our approach.
It all flows back to yin and yang.

The focus on full body connection, balance, and how actions ripple through the body is how we shape our treatments. This alongside of using tradition as a springboard for possible applications is what makes Tui Na and Thai Massage so different and an exciting form of massage we use to help others.

These arts come from traditions that are rooted in having to noninvasively heal extremely drastic injuries and illnesses. From a manual therapy perspective here's my opinion of why Tui Na and Thai Massage is so effective for helping musculo-skeletal injuries. I firmly believe it came from an inherent need for martial artists to be able to fix injuries gotten from combat training and ancient warfare.

To me it makes sense that the country with one of the most brutal forms of combat sport, Muai Thai, would also have one of the most effective forms of manual therapy.

As to the benefits of Tui Na they are vast, and they form the deeper foundation of our work. Its foundation is Chinese Medicine and its root as a whole is the Tao, so I'll finish with this and we'll explore more in the next post.

"When the principle of the Way (Tao) goes through, human artifice dies out."