Synchronized Swimming

There is a neck hold I teach sometimes in Oncology Massage workshops.  It requires you to gently slide both hands under the client's neck while they lie face up in the table.  Once your hands are in place, you maintain a relaxed, gentle hold, encouraging your client to relax their neck.  It is surprisingly effective.  All the therapist has to do is sit still, gently holding and patiently waiting. 

The hardest part about this technique is actually getting into position.  Ideally, the therapist can get their hands into position without moving the client's head around, especially if they are working with someone in active treatment.  I tell my students to think of synchronized swimming, where what you see is all grace and calm and softness, while there is absolute flailing chaos underneath the surface.  At this point, I demonstrate getting into position.  I pull the most ridiculous face I can, while my hands move with grace, calm and softness.  Everyone laughs.  Almost everyone understands. 

What we do is a lot like synchronized swimming.  Everything on or near our clients' bodies should bring only comfort, while beyond the boundary of our clients' space, we may be frantically wondering where we put the lotion bottle, realizing we forgot the bolster, or just letting any invasive thought from the world outside the massage room pass through so we can be present in the space again.  Grace, calm and softness in the air, flailing chaos underneath. 

We ask too much of ourselves when we try to imagine that everything we do in our massage room is done as a beautiful, never-seen dance.  The place where we hold the peace and the power of massage is the space around our client.  Beyond that, there is work to support that space.  It started on our first day of massage school, struggling through anatomy, physiology and technique.  It continues every time we take continuing education, working hard to integrate new knowledge into that which is known and comfortable.  It is there every day, as we work to shield our clients from the little human mishaps that happen in every life.  (Like the countless number of times I have completed a massage with my glasses slid all the way down my nose because I couldn't get them properly pushed up.) 

We owe it to ourselves to embrace and learn to love the chaos, because the chaos makes the peace work.  We owe it to ourselves to thank the work and the chaos for making the dance possible.

Revolutionary Radicalness! Radial Revolutionaries!

I just got back from the Society for Oncology Massage's Healing Summit in Minnesota.  It was three action-packed days of learning and connecting.  I am slowly sorting through all the information and ideas.  I will be doing that for some time now.

The first thing to come forward in my mind, asking for my attention, is our inclination to put what we do in the superlative.  I attended a session describing new approaches to a task we all do as "radical."  While I'm pretty sure the (very good) presenters were a bit tongue-in-cheek when they chose that word, it did make me realize how much we do the same thing without thinking about it.  We talk about our "amazing" results, our "unbelievable" experiences, and our "top-notch" skills.

Maybe these words are appropriate.  I have often felt that language fails me when I try to describe a session.  And I love this work.  (Love! The superlative emotion!)  I am committed to go to work every day, through budding fatigue and surrounding life stresses, because the work engages and energizes my mind and heart.  But does that mean I need to shout about it?

Why not choose, instead, quiet conversations with colleagues, storytelling (in person or maybe, I don't know, on a blog), and a moment every day to sit alone in gratitude for the day?  Maybe it's the introvert in me, but this feels better.  We can be (and often are) excellent.  We can serve our clients and our colleagues without shouting to each other about our total awesomeness.

At the end of a session with one of my frail clients today, my feedback was a warm smile, lingering handshake, and a direct gaze into my eyes with a faintly whispered, "Thank you."  One barely audible moment that showed me that my client felt better after the session than he did before.  Why should I ask for or expect anything more?  Truthfully, why should I ask for or expect anything, if I am truly trying to serve my clients and not my ego?

Now that I am home, I am resolved to speak more gently about my work.  I can express the depth of my commitment to this profession without shouting about it.  I am resolved to remember this quote from Susan Cain's book Quiet:

"There's zero correlation between being the best talker and having the best ideas."

Today is Why

You may recall that Beatrice helped me realize that I need to stick with this profession.  Since then, I have been struggling with the question of why.

Today is why.

I had 3 clients today, all with a cancer diagnosis in the same organ of their bodies.  You could guess the progression and prognosis of their treatment by the hair on their heads -- from bald, to pixie fringe, to long, heavy ponytail.  You could tell a little about their comfort with their bodies by their unguarded eyes -- and be careful not to assume the eyes match the disease progression.  The most raw fear peeks out from under that long, heavy ponytail.

The expectations we set together have been simple, realistic, and sometimes elusive.  "Give me that glowy feeling I always get from massage."  "Help me relax so I can sleep tonight." "Just make my legs feel more comfortable."  My past tendency was to say 'Yes.  I will do that," then spend the better part of the session worrying about whether or not I was doing that.

Today I tried something new.  Instead of "I will do that," I started with "I will hold that intention."  Instead of worrying about keeping my promise, I found myself present in breathing and being with the person in the room.  Out of that beginning, I found myself more able to feel and interpret what was under my hands, and feeling much more energetic at the end of the day.

I needed to learn and feel that again.  This is why I need to stick with this profession.  Or at least one of many "why"s.  It is my intention to keep open and aware for the next ones.

Supposed to Be

Life happens, and lately it has been happening all over the place for me.  Some unexpected changes and the need to scramble to keep up has led to some chaos and too few hours of just doing nothing.  My office remains my sanctuary, though, as was brought powerfully home to me the other day.

It was the middle of a week where any time I spent at my home was spent asleep.  Every morning I packed for the three or four different people I needed to be in a day, and I felt like I was living more in my car than my home.  I arrived at work a little rough around the edges still, and found that the simple act of setting my space was taking forever.  I kept forgetting things and must have walked back and forth between my room and the storage room about 5 times.  It was a day where I needed to check my phone to know what day it was.  (Thank goodness for the "Today" button on my calendar.  If I'm not living in the present, at least my technology can get me there.)

Chaos remained at bay while I was working.  It greeted me outside the room every time I stepped out, but it maintained a respectful distance.  The energy required to keep it there was starting to wear on me.  Towards the middle of the day, I saw a newer client -- an oncology client.  She doesn't talk much, but always listens deeply.  This day, she arrived with her head shaved, having decided to accept the havoc chemo was wreaking on her hair.  I asked her if she was comfortable with a scalp massage and she said yes.  As I sat at the top of the table and laid my hands on her head, I heard a whisper in my inner ear,

"Supposed to be."

As in, I am who, where and what I am supposed to be.  Right in that moment, all was right, and it would be alright.  I said a silent thank you to my client for trusting me with her vulnerability.  I thanked my teachers and mentors for teaching me to do this work.  I thanked the chaos for highlighting what peace looks like.

Bearing Witness

I have a new client*.  She fills out her health history form with abundant detail, and takes me through it step by step, anticipating every question I have or clarification I need.  She walks me through her entire cancer journey, over 15 years in the making, procedure by procedure, chemo by chemo.  She often accompanies her narrative with information about her mental state at that time, or how that time impacts her current mental state.

"Just naming," she says.  Or -- "Just so you are aware."

A while back, I had some news that was difficult for me to handle, but which I felt should not be shared with my whole support network.  I chose one person to tell, and when I went through the whole thing I told her, "I just needed one other person to know what is going on."

These two stories live together in my mind because for me they illustrate an important part of my job as a massage therapist.  The bearing witness.  Just being the person who hears a voice and says, "Yes.  I heard."  Just being the person who sees a face wince and says, "Yes.  I see that your pain is real."  The simple of act of allowing another human being to name, describe and acknowledge their experience with no fear of judgement or contradiction -- this is a powerful part of what we all do.

I looked up the definition of "to bear witness to" and found this:

"to show by your existence that something is true"  

This, for me, is the heart and soul of both of these stories.  By listening while someone speaks and names whatever pain or challenge they have faced, we show that it is true.  Let us never forget,  even with all of our training and all of our knowledge, our clients are still the authors of what is true in and for their bodies.  Let us remember to always bear witness.

*-- any identifying details have been changed