Massage as Dialogue
“We have to believe that by engaging in dialogue with the other person, we have the possibility of making a change within ourselves, that we can become deeper.” - Thích Nhất Hạnh
I really love the above quote about meaningful dialogue from the Buddhist monk’s book, Living Buddha, Living Christ. We could replace the word ‘dialogue’ in for ‘bodywork’ and still draw from it the same essence, as bodywork is a dialogue: It engages language that is verbal, nonverbal, and sometimes even spiritual. Massage and bodywork can offer for both giver and receiver a psychological and existential experience shared through an evocative dialogue of felt sense, patience, compassion, and presence.
When I was a fresh massage therapist eager to learn and quickly drop deep into my therapeutic style (turns out - developing trust in yourself as well as in the intimate nature of this work is the ever-unfolding pathway), I read a quote about how massage is really a continuous call and response between therapist and client. (I wish I could recall where this quote came from). I carried just the words with me for a long time, but with a sort of surface understanding of them. I knew they weren’t hollow, that they held depth and meaning, but I couldn’t quite grasp what that was by using my very linear, solution-oriented way of thinking. It wasn’t until I stopped trying so hard to decipher them, stopped inwardly scanning the arrangement of words for a message that I may have overlooked — their secret — that I began to feel them. I was really tuning into the people I work with and listening with an internal ear. These words became more abstract; they integrated within my heart and flowed from my hands.
Most days, it’s difficult to transcribe into written word and explain the dance of this kind of dialogue. It’s an organic way of being with someone while folding into concepts such as vulnerability, selfhood, subjectivity, trust, and embodiment. But it can be helpful to share how to expand subtle messages during massage into full, experiential dialogue, and that is to practice opening yourself to an abstract way of thinking — of being — one that incorporates logic but relies on trust and heart. Logic is immovable but the body and heart ebbs and flows, changes, adapts, grows, and learns — so must our approach to this work be. It’s an approach of art and one of expression, creation, reception, and gratitude. St. Francis of Assisi beautifully captures working as an instrument of art:
“He who works with his hands is a laborer. He who works with his hands and his head is a craftsman. He who works with his hands and his head and his heart is an artist.”
