At the heart of it, Touch Interpretation is a form of art that is really about you: Your filters Your experiences Your ability to sense; intuition Your ability to read into what your client tells you about their needs and body Your latest training and understanding Your hands leading the experience, with your mind close behind (not the other way around) As many new therapists discover, there is a natural gap that exists between learning massage techniques and how your touch becomes 2nd nature to you and your clients. The gap closes the longer you practice massage and understand your new skills. However, I believe that there are ways that…
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Taking the Guesswork Out Massage by Defining Expectations
When someone contacts you for a massage appointment, he or she is not just looking for a “rub.” They are actually looking for a “massage experience.” In my years of working on people, I have observed that most people start looking for massage as a health treatment option when they are experiencing four common motivators. They have a need, defined or undefined, and they just want to “feel” different. The client has a painful area and they want it resolved. Their muscles (and mind) are tired and need “something.” They want to improve their physical performance for running, a weight lifting competition, or “fill in the blank” area of athletics.…
- Autoimmune, Business Concepts, Defining Expectations, Pain Patterns and Treatment, Reverse Triggerpointing
Massage Therapy: Bridging the Gap Between Cause and Effect
For my entire career, this is something I have been constantly trying to find. The illusive bridge; the real answers to healing that “bridge the gap” between hands-on techniques and real pain management. This searching has turned into something like mission for me now. Throughout my time at the massage table, working with a variety of bodies, I can tell you that the techniques and concepts that I have discovered that work the greatest with trying to bridge the gap between cause and effect for pain management are not techniques. They are governing principles about how the body heals itself, regardless of the technique applied. I call these healing applications…
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The Truth About Being Self-Employed
I’m just going to get right to the point here and tell you that the reason I have seen so many small business people fail is that the person that is working for themselves has no idea how to manage their money. Literally – NO IDEA. Managing money as a self-employed person is a lot like trying to stay thin and healthy. It is all about planning, repetition, habits, and control. It isn’t necessarily fun, but you have to develop several new habits to be able to get what you want. See, most of us when we think if being self employed envision having all this extra cash coming into…
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Your Massage Business and Taxes: How to Simplify the Experience
When you become a business owner, your life responsibilities double. You have your home needs and budget and your work needs and budget to track. This can be overwhelming at first for many people. To stay on top of life and not feel constantly overwhelmed, you must learn how to integrate the business part of your life into your personal life as easily as possible. One of the biggest stressers in self-employment is managing your expenses and taxes. There are many ways you can approach this business requirement, but I want to share a trick I learned several years ago that made tracking expenses much easier. It is what I…
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Saving Your Hands: Amy’s Massage Therapy Do’s and Dont’s
I have been wanting to write this article for some time. I have a story to tell you and it doesn’t necessarily have a happy ending BUT the outcome is looking brighter all the time. In January of this year, after 25 years of working at a massage table, I was forced to retire. I had surgery on my left thumb (ouch) because I wore the bone off doing massage. I tease people and tell them I literally worked my fingers to the bone – because that is exactly what I did. Occupational hazard? Yes, mostly, with a little auto-immune stuff thrown in for “fun”. But overall this is one…
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One Small Thing that Can Have Huge Impact on Your Business
After years of trying to figure out how to stay in the “game” of working for myself, I have found that the thing that has the greatest impact on yourself and your business is continuing to learn – every day! I think that there are 3 reasons why training every day or even once a week has a huge impact on your ability to continue to work for yourself: Learning Helps Prevent Burnout Burn out is a real problem in our profession. How do you avoid becoming burned out? You must constantly learn something new to keep the forward progression of yourself and your work. Burn-out is real in many,…
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Why Is It Important to Have Ethics Training?
When I graduated from massage therapy training, I did not really have a clue as to what “Ethics” were. Yes, I understood that when you were in business honesty and integrity were important, but at the time I hadn’t really absorbed the concept of ethics and how far they reached into what I did at work. I was raised in the self-employment world. My father owned his own business for over 40 years and I heard him complain often that the integrity of others in his business world lacked much to be desired. It always amazed and frustrated him, sometimes to the point of legal action, that others in the…
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How to Create a Positive Impact to Your Massage Business EVERY WEEK!
Do you want to increase the number of scheduled clients you have? Do you want to become re-inspired to be self-employed? Are you struggling with moving forward with your business? Do you feel mentally burned out? Having been self-employed for 25 years (and counting), I believe there is one solution for all these feelings and it is very simple. Start investing time in yourself by learning something new. Watch and Learn I like to see what makes people become successful in business and I can tell you that there is a theme that I keep finding every time I start observing their behavioral patterns. Successful business people never stop learning.…
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How to Influence and Win CLIENTS
In today’s blog topic I am going to quote Dale Carnegie’s book “How to Win Friends and Influence People”. I highly recommend this read for anyone starting out in business or needing a refresher on business etiquette and life protocol. This book was written in 1936 – 82 years ago people! What he learned then is the same now when it comes to what people like to feel from someone else. It even defies technology. Mr. Carnegie listed 6 ways to make people like you. Now, “make” doesn’t mean you are going to force people to like you. It’s quite the contrary. These are the attitudes and behaviors that just…
