Massage Is Not A Luxury!

From my business webpage: http://serenitymassagetherapyllc.abmp.com/. 

Too many people in our culture have come to think of massage as a luxury - as spoiling themselves.  While a great massage can actually feel like you've just been spoiled, it does so much more.  See the "Benefits of Massage" tab for more details on this point.  

At Serenity Massage Therapy LLC, my goal is to bring all the benefits of massage to anyone within my reach who needs it.  I understand how hard times are for everyone right now.  For many, it's hard to justify spending money on ourselves, especially when we think it's for something we can do without.  

I believe that the majority of our health issues and several types of injuries find their roots in stress.  If we can reduce or alleviate the stress, the body can learn (or re-learn) how to heal itself without the use of pain medications, drugs for this issue, other drugs for that issue... Once we start taking drugs for one thing or another, we start depending on them.  Then we start needing more drugs to counter the effects of the other drugs. Our bodies end up spending all their efforts filtering out all the drugs we are taking for things we could have resolved ourselves if we could just kick out the toxins caused by stress. 

I'm not saying that no one should ever take any drug.  I keep a bottle of OTC pain meds handy for "just in case."  There are also medical conditions and injuries severe enough that drugs are a vital part of the recovery process. Using massage to reduce stress and relieve muscle pain (and thus joint pain) can aid the work of the prescribed medications by helping the body to relax, help lengthen the muscles, and help push the toxins out of the system by increasing circulation.

Consider yourself a machine that requires fine tuning to keep everything running smoothly.  You need fuel, oil, WATER, a good pump and some good filters: fuel = food; oil = the synovial fluid in your joints; WATER = WATER; pump = heart; filters = lungs and kidneys (with help from the liver).  You don't consider it a luxury to get regular maintenance on your vehicle, do you?  

It is never too late to start treating your body better.  You may have a long way to go to get back to a smooth running machine, and you may not be able to get all the way back to where you were before.  But that doesn't mean you shouldn't try to bring yourself back as close to that state as you can get.  I want to help you realize that you can heal, and I want to help you remember how to heal.  And by doing so, perhaps, I will help bring you that Serenity.  

Ghetto AND Hillbilly

So, research showed me that buying a true Thai mat for my business was going to be somewhat costly.  Rather than drop a ton of money on just the mat, and still have to buy kneeling cushions and pillows and coverings, etc., I went to Wal-Hell. As much as I dislike shopping there, it definitely served its purpose for me on this occasion.  (I'd already been to Target, JCP, and a few other places, but it was still going to cost too much to make my own.)  

So instead of paying $140 for just the mat, I paid $85 total for: 1 Queen size 1.5 inch memory foam mattress topper; 4 rag rugs, 2 flat Full/Queen sheets, and 1 travel size memory foam pillow.  Oh, and 2 small picture holders which are being used to display info cards when I go out marketing myself.  

So how  is this both ghetto AND hillbilly?  Well, right now, the two flat sheets are on either side of the mat (one under and the other on top), and everything gets wrapped up inside this mat/sheet combination, then wrapped in a ... piece of rope.  We're going high-class here, folks.  

However, I have given two massages on this set-up so far, and both people really enjoyed the massage and were moving better afterwards.  So, I guess Ghetto Hillbillies must know what they're doing, huh?  (Oh, and the two flat sheets will soon be sewn together into a home-made duvet, with snaps to close it around the mattress topper.)

Today I spent some time eating lunch with my parents and listening to them talk about events that happened during their youth.  My Father's from the mountains in Kentucky and my Mother's from Illinois (sort of city area, but not like Chicago).  Their lives were very different, but each had a much harder than I had growing up (thanks to them).  Their lives were harder by a hundred-fold than the lives of most kids growing up now.  If a child from this time were tossed through a time warp and ended up back in the earlier half of the 1900's, I doubt that child would survive a week. So, folks, make sure you listen to your elders, spend time understanding what they have lived through - or trying to understand.  I'm not saying I don't get frustrated with them sometimes, but wow.  I don't think I could have survived in their time, either. 

I appreciate them all over again every time I think of all the things they've survived; things I didn't have to survive because of them.  

At Peace

I feel my world changing again, and this time it feels really, really good. And I think this time, instead of trying to direct it where I think I should be going (like I think I'm the boss or something), I will ride along with it like a friend and take some pleasure in the journey.  I'm in a good place right now, and I'd like to enjoy it as long as possible.

In other news, this weekend I took a 2-day course in Thai Massage.  Oh. My. God.  I am still tingling from all the amazing energy and just the magical experience I had.  I feel a breath of fresh air has just infused me and brought along a whole new world filled with healing magic.  Sounding a little crazy, I know, but hey, it's me, and I get that way.  And I really am excited that I will be offering this beautiful practice to people who are open to it.

I just can't describe how amazing it is.  But I can describe how effective it is.  In layman's terms, I went there with chronic lower back pain, chronic shoulder blade pain, and a recently acquired pain in my neck, which seriously limited the range of motion for turning or tilting my head.  I left with all my muscles relaxed and elongated.  

During class each day, the presenter would ask us each to give a word or two description of how we felt.  The first time was before we did everything, and most of the replies were "excited", "nervous", etc.  Mine was "ready".  As we progressed, she asked again.  My answer was "relaxed".  The next time, it was "more relaxed."  At the end of the class, she asked one last time - this time she allowed us to use as many words as we needed.  My response was "at peace".  If you've read my posts over the last 2-3 years, you know that has not been present in my life much.  So, whether the others in the class knew it or not, this was a huge response for me.

And it's true.  I am so much more at peace than I was before I left, and I know it's because of what a Thai massage does.  It lines up the energy fields in your body in such a away that everything starts remembering how to work together.  It all starts remembering it's place, and pushing out all the crap we dump on it through what we eat, drink, inhale, feel, think, and do.

It is that amazing.  And I am eager to share it.