Our skin is our largest sense organ, which makes touch a valuable tool to effect change in our bodies. Massage therapy is a practice of utilizing touch to give the recipient a greater sense of ease. Various techniques are applied that increase circulation, stimulate lymphatic flow, invoke relaxation and to alleviate musculoskeletal pain. Massage Therapy is considered a traditional medicine. There are many different types of massage.
In this article I will focus on the benefits of massage therapy in general. You may of heard that our bodies are made up mostly of water. Keeping the fluids of our body circulating is restoring our bodies own access to health. When the bodies water become stagnant or impeded we may feel uneasy or emotionally at odds with what is happening or overwhelmed. Massage therapy is a way to restore our sense of being relaxed.
Touch stimulates circulation. Increasing circulation supports the bodies effort to bring healing nutrients to the tissue and joints and removes any waste that is in those areas. A massage therapist can use different strokes such as effleurage, petrissage and tapoment to help release stagnation in the muscles. When our muscles are able to move freely, there is greater ease and full range of motion may occur.
In the parietal regions of the brain, is a map of the body and over time this can become skewed due to trauma, repetitive activities or injury. A skilled massage therapist can help to inform that map allowing a new version to emerge. The nervous system tracks all the sensations that are happening. I often say that my clients are sensing their bodies through my hands. It is a profound example of mind body connection. It is quite common that when we are relaxed after a massage we may actually see challenges in a different way.
Pain relief is a very common reason people choose to receive a massage. Licensed Massage Therapist are required to complete a course in anatomy and physiology. We learn what is beneath the skin and how those parts relate to one another. There are many tools that massage therapist use to help reset the tension of the muscles to alleviate joint pain. Compression, cross fiber friction, trigger point therapy and acupressure are common tools in a massage therapist kit.
I am often asked about the energetic qualities that maybe expressed in a massage. Tingling release along meridians, a deepening of consciousness, referral or reflex sensations e.g. I touch your small toe joint and you feel it in your shoulder. This is absolutely normal our bodies are amazing. Tension in the body does occur in any of our tissues, including fluids and in the nervous system. We can create harmony, by offering our awareness, skilled touch and deeply listening for when the tension has shifted.
Sometimes people do have an emotional response during a massage. This is normal and doesn’t happen often. As a massage therapist we are trained to encourage our clients to breath and allow their breath to make them an observer of the body. I like to encourage folks to silently thank their muscles, and all that support their health. I also invite them to give permission to the muscle or area of tension to let go. The work is already working no story needed. Developing a language for your body is a profound way to develop understanding to the many sensations we have.
We are all processing the isolation of the last few years and being touched can be a valuable way to heal the vulnerability that we have felt. We do not judge people for their emotions, in fact each of us as practitioners have experienced meeting our own vulnerability on a massage table and with that comes a deep respect for the process.
People seek out massage because it is affordable and does not require us to take medications. It is a wholistic approach to health and gives people a relaxed sensation that can just make the world feel a little more wonderful from the inside out.
Thank you for taking the time to read my thoughts on the common reasons why people seek out massage. Stay tuned for the next article on the art of reception.
Cathy Robison, LMT. RMTI NM. State Lic. 6599
I studied at the Scherer Institute of Natural Healing in Santa Fe, NM and Graduated in 2010. I have been enjoying the art of massage ever since.
The snow capped peaks surround us, and they still hold the names of god’s and goddesses. They are the vision that commands me to look up, captivating my heart. With whispered breath I pray.
Make me a mountain that does not question it’s existence, but rather stands tall enduring. Being seen by those who have embraced the journey. Seek not my secrets in a way to exploit them. Approach me with the eyes of innocence climb high upon me. Fear not the precipice that which you find yourself know that my mysteries will always be a friend to thee. Within my appetite reflections, still and deep, clarity and passion, the source of life.
I went to Peru to raft through the Grand Canyon of South America, on the threatened and largest free flowing river on the continent, the Rio Marañon. I was in for a big surprise, this was no walk in the park, this river was like none other I’ve ever seen.
In 2010 the Rio Marañon was declared the “energy artery” of South America, by then President Alan Garcia, after signing a pact with the Brazilian President to provide thousands of Mega Watts of power for export, he stated that damming the river was of “national interest.” There are more than a dozen dams being proposed and they would make the river a series of stagnant ponds that stair step down the length of the upper canyon, drowning out villages, small subsistence farms, and areas of natural wonder. Displacing 145,000 people who live along the river. The Rio Marañon is arguably the primary source of the Rio Amazona. The Tributaries in the Amazon Basin are delivering nutrients to the worlds largest set of lungs, our greatest resource in the fight against greenhouse gases. This land holds a delicate balance that has evolved over billions of years. One way to understand what is being wagered in this sanctioned act of terrorism, damming rivers, is to bear witness. We’ve decided to follow a drop of water to the Rio Marañon, tracing it’s course as it lands on the earth, we begin in the Andes, north of Lima in the Huayhuash mountains. The worlds highest tropical range, and yes there are glaciers, at least for now.
Peru has 11 of the worlds 18 eco-regions within its’s borders. It contains 16 percent of the worlds bio-diversity and just 1% of the worlds landmass. Simply put it is an amazing place. We arrived in Lima and the next morning made our way north along the coast through arid dry land dunes. Turning east we begin our climb to Huaraz, a modern city of 120,000 inhabitants living at 10,031 feet in elevation.
photo by Britt Runyon
Everywhere you looked it is possible to catch a glimpse of glacier covered peaks that have lured international climbers for nearly a century. The city has a long history that predates the Inca empire. In fact in the Guitarrero cave which was discovered along side of the Santa River held the remains of a man and other artifacts that were carbon dated at 10,610BCE. Every inch of mountainside is cultivated. The patchwork of fields, containing potatoes, corn and beans. These cultivates are believed to have originated on these fertile slopes. What a contribution the people and land of Peru have made to the rest of the world. Nearly every culture, has these staples in their diet.
It’s a Monday and we hired a taxi to take us to Willkawayin, a highly regarded site for the Wari culture (500-1000A.D.) We arrived only to discover that it was closed, so we decided to continue on the road by foot in order to gain a vista of the surrounding valley and to get a bit of physical conditioning in before we made our trek to Laguna 69. Willkawayin by the way, means the divine or sacred house of the Great Grandchild, this house resides at 11,200 feet and we are feeling the elevation. There was a mother pig resting as the piglets take time to eat. A woman crossed the road in front of me, brilliantly dressed and she smiles and shouts out a warm welcome, I get the feeling they throughly love the land. These farmers are carrying on in a harmonious way of life that has been practiced for thousands of years. Clearly they are winning the endurance race.
Peruvian Pleasures photo by Cathy Jo Robison
When we reached our vista point I saw a couple of men working on a thatched roof of a small stone house. These houses were of the same design that we will see later in Kuelap, made by the Chachapoya people nearly 1500 years ago. I called out a greeting, he replied “Tiene agua?” Do you have water?
The majority of people that we met in the rural areas carry their water. They rely on springs and rivers to supply their water for their fields, cooking, bathing and washing. What if the very act of carrying water made it sacred. A river in it’s free state is doing a job that is far more important than providing power for mining, or diluting toxic waste. It provides life to all beings, to the plants and the very land that supports us. Our life is but a blink in the eye of the earth and with that reality each step we take is a gift. We were born in this world not deserving of its greatness but completely supported by it. We have an obligation to know what luck and good fortune are.
There are six of us, Kathy Hammerlee, Steve Miller, Britt Runyon and myself. We are affiliated through a small and tenacious rafting company New Wave Rafting Companywhich, operates on the Rio Grande and ChamaRiver of northern New Mexico,that Kathy and Steve started in 1980. Britt Runyonarrived on the scene shortly after the conception of New Wave, he is the operations manager and official photographer. I am the new comer to the group having started my training as a guide only a decade before.
Felipe Chauca Torre and Don Juan with Peru Adventure Extreme, a outdoor adventure guiding service, are taking care of the logistics and much more. It’s obvious that they are at home in these peaks. Don Juan wears a winter coat adorned with many patches of different expeditions he has been on. Felipe is a local from Santa Cruz, a small farming village just outside of Huaraz near the Lake Willacocha and has been trained as a professional guide through the Andes Mountaineering School in Huaraz. They both speak Quechua, in addition to spanish and are native to this Ancash region.
We left Huaraz the day before the harvest full moon, traveling north on the highway that parallels the Rio Santa to a small town of Yungay. It is there that we turn eastward and begin our climb to the Huascaran National Park. The elevational range of Huascaran National Park goes from 11,483 feet to 22,205 feet with the maximum elevation corresponding to Huascaran mountain of Peru.
The eco-culture of the valley is known as a Puna grassland and is really a lovely mix of medium to tall grasses. So many textures something that always teases me as if I could lay down and slumber in it’s lushness. Not with out warning for there are a lot of cactuses at this elevation as well as, pin cushion plants.
Snow capped peaks surround us creating a giant bowl and at one end of the bowl is a very large waterfall. It is a cascade that is more than a 1000 feet high and can be heard as white noise of the valley. Each step draws me nearer to the base of the glaciers. These living towers are communing with the clouds. Moving pictures, one that captures the very essence of alchemy.
Huascaran Peaks photo by Cathy Jo Robison
Don Juan is sitting and I join him. We have a audience they are a bunch of rogue cows, handsome but not the sort of wild life I enjoy. His smile gets a bit wider and I see he has a sling shot in his hand as the cows advance he does not hesitate to give them a warning. “Son libres?” I ask. “ Si” he says. They have escaped their pastoral life.
Rogue Cows Photo by Cathy Jo Robison
Only 2 degrees from the equator, yet the temperature is brisk, I am wearing a down jacket. The length of a day does not change near the equator. Later on while in the Jungle I share the fact that where a friend of mine lives in Alaska they have three months without sun and three months where it hardly sets and they stare at me with wide eye disbelief, I am having one of those moments.
We reach the plateau, 14,508 feet, just below the lake and set up camp. The large canvas tent is the kitchen tent and Don Juan’s sleeping quarters. Felipe informs us tea will be served after we our tents are set up. The makeshift table is adorned with a colorful textile, the kind that the woman traditionally wear around Huaraz. The five cups are filled with coca tea, it is said to help with acclimation, a cultural plant that is revered for it’s medicinal qualities. This seems a bit like a dream.
Base Camp Photo by Cathy Jo Robison
The next morning we make our way up to Laguna 69, the name that the park service has given this lake. The view is captivating. On the far end of the lake is a waterfall that comes from the glacier. An avalanche breaks and we hear the cascade of ice and rock. We are witnessing the movements of mountains it’s enough to make you whisper.
Laguna 69 Photo by Cathy Jo Robison
Photo by Britt Runyon
I spent the entire day just sitting on the shore of this lake, it was precious. Before I knew it the time had come to return to our camp. Along the way we saw a cute little high altitude dweller that resembles a rabbit named a Viscacha.
This Refuge is no longer used since the recession of the glaciers. photo by Britt Runyon
That night at camp the clouds cleared revealing the full moon in her splendor. A rare sighting to see the star adorned peaks at night and our guide Felipe was not going to let us leave without enjoying it. He cajoled Kathy and I to take a moonlight stroll with him if nothing else just to breath in the light air that efficiently supports our every function. A beautiful memory and opportunity to see water in the making.
My future posts will include more information on the Rio Marañon.
Walking Water 