Sustainable Health Choices hosting a massage class
In our highly sexualized, high liability culture, our social norm has come to avoid touch. We are inundated with sexually suggestive messages and our country has high rates of sexual violence. Oftentimes we have not been taught positive, healthy boundaries. We commonly only associate touch with sexuality. This reinforces the risk to touch one another.
As a massage therapist, I witness the ways in which healthy touch can heal, nurture, and strengthen.
In the newborn massage classes I teach, I have been able to witness how it is a powerful tool for healing. For newborns, touch is essential for bonding, social development, and neural pathway development. This need for touch does not change as we grow up.
In my Partner massage and Newborn massage classes, you leave with:
- Solid routines that have effective and therapeutic techniques
- Information to feel confident about what you’re doing so you know for sure you’re providing something beneficial
- Tactics for and understanding the necessity of strong communication. It does not matter how strong your hands are, or how many techniques you possess. If you do not ask how the person is receiving it, you may close a door that was opening whether it be with a friend or partner.
Everyone has a different sensitivity to touch, physically and emotionally. We all have different perceptions of boundaries, trust, and affection. This should always be respected. So during any kind of massage, it is essential to ask: How are you doing with this? Please let me know if I need to increase my pressure or lessen.
How do we become a touch positive community? Could massage therapy be one of many ways toward strengthening our relationships, our ability to communicate, and our sense of safety and calm in the world. I think so. We all need to help each other and this is one way we can.
