Full Body Massage

What is a full body massage?
Well, most of you might think that a full body massage is a massage that includes all the parts of the body.

But is that really true?
Of course it is true. But it is not the whole truth.

The Art of Massage considers all massage a full body massage for two reasons.

1. Every manipulation even of just one part of the body has an effect on the rest of the body.

Let's say you have a person with a problem in the foot and you would be able to "massage it away" - this would have great effects on the rest of the body.

If the person was not fully stepping on this foot or maybe twisting it because of pain, this would have great influence on the knee, the hip, the spine all the way up to the head.

That means if you are able to free a person from this pain and the person is able to fully use the foot again, this would also lead to positive changes in the knee, the hip, the spine all the way up to the head. In one word full body massage in essence.

2. Parts of the body can only be treated successfully, if you have the whole body in mind.

Exceptions are when you are lucky and the body helps itself without you being aware of it. But every successful massage therapist will know that all body parts are interrelated and connected.

There are many obvious connections - like the ankle joint has influence over the knee joint and vice versa, and some less obvious ones, like the sacrum is connected to the neck (common vision for chiropractors), or the toes are connected to the head (reflexology) and the left ankle is connected to the right wrist and vice versa (chinese massage).

The truth of the matter is that you can only really understand changes in the body if you always keep the whole body in mind.

And why is this so important?

Because let's go back to the example of the problem in the foot. If you are talking about a chronic condition - then you will also see chronic changes in the knee, hip, spine, neck and even head posture. These chronic changes (depending on how long they are already present) will not necessary "want to be changed". The body has (even though in a chronic changed situation) accepted this new posture as the new status quo.

That means you as the therapist have to convince the body to get out of this chronic condition and gain a healthy posture or condition again.

Maybe you are lucky and just work on the foot and the rest will work itself out. Chances are though that the chronic changes within the body will force the foot to return to it's problem, because the body thinks that this is the new healthy status quo.

And this is why a successful massage therapist will always at least keep the whole body in mind, but usually will also work in the sense of a full body massage - maybe not addressing every single part of the body ( like in a classic massage), but the most important influential parts.

So the more fluent you are with the different interconnections of the body, the more you will be able to break through patterns and changes unhealthy postures and changes in the body.

This is really what Full body massage is all about.

Click here to see a full body massage chinese style.