Creating A Better Session By Igniting Your Presence
Regardless of what form of healing that you practice, we aim for enhancing function and health in our clients. Every discipline that is lumped into the wellness industry has a set point that tells them their job has been accomplished. Hopefully what we have accomplished at some level has effected the entire human being and not just the “problem” that was presented to us when the client walked through the door of our offices. Enhancing the total functioning of our clients requires us to be open and presence beyond the physical reflective state of Presence. Presence is the ability to respond to another with our entire being and oftentimes the silent space of the Witnessing Presence creates powerful changes that can’t be ! But, it can transform our client’s lives beyond what could be attributed to a normal session. Many of us who have been practicing bodywork for awhile, have experienced the power of this quality of attention in our work and the repercussions that go well beyond what one might expect in attempting to restore function.
Massage therapists and other practitioners of bodywork go well beyond manual therapies, we are in many ways educators. Education means to bring forth or to draw something out. We have all experienced great teachers on our journeys. They were able to elicit a quality that went well beyond the average technique. They were able to inspire with their enthusiasm, with their presence. We are actually somatic educators. We draw out and inspire potential, the possibilities, by creating an energetic exchange which has the potential to create an ignition of presence within the body that we are working in, not on. I have witnessed what could be called miraculous results with an ordinary contact, but the state of being between us, the field resonance was so powerfully palatable, that an incredible change in function pursued.
As a side note,I have always thought the term massage therapist, or body worker, rolfer, Traeger practitioner, neuromuscular therapist, cranial sacral therapist, polarity therapist and on and on, in many was was an injustice to those who traveled our journey wearing the healer’s robes. I love the Greek word Soma which means living body. If someone ask you what you did and you replied Soma therapist or practitioner of somatic arts, it would illicit a question that would allow you to truly market alternative therapies and get to the core concepts of what we do when we touch another human. Being a Somatic Therapist we convey the total living presence which we attempt to elicit when we touch another being. The late great somatic educator, Thomas Hanna a “disciple” of Moshe Feldenkrais, believed his discipline should be more aptly named, somatic education. Many of us who attended the Rolf Institute were more comfortable calling ourselves somatic educators because we dealt with the entire body/being. Alas, unfortunately we are all licensed under the massage umbrella.Which has kept us from enjoying full expression within our country’s healthcare system. Really terms like massage continuing education, and massage therapy do an injustice to us as practitioners. And the term rolfing oftentimes sends people running for the hills in fear of being assaulted. So from now on, try calling yourself a Somatic Practitioner when someone asks you what you do, I think you will enjoy the time to market yourself and elicit a connection at a somatic level by being present with your new potential client.
