Writing down the bones-a joint enterprise: I’m planning to start a Webinar in July aimed at the Bodywork community in general; to take us through steps in writing and publishing about our real experiences and learnings from our work, using touch therapeutically. In 2004 I first became aware when writing articles for the Journal of Bodywork and Movement Therapy, that most of my colleagues were not writing about their sessions with clients. I realized that if we do not communicate publicly about our work, and what has been happening in our sessions, the public and other caregiving professionals would not really understand the full benefits of touch, and the unique things we were learning. But now, after three years of Covid, I realize that the other caregiving professions only partially understand bodywork. Even less is understood by a touch-wary public.

Thinking about your practice over the years: What stands out for you? What clients and learnings do you recall from those relationships? What insights and curiosities did you receive and how many of those gifts are you still keeping inside? Undoubtedly it would be good for all of us if we could share them with all our colleagues. For 12 years I hosted an inter-professional supervision group biweekly. The group included professional caregivers from medicine, psychology, physical therapy, psychotherapy, bodywork, and theology. We found that we all were dealing with similar situations as helpers for others. We all shared personal difficulties as well as insights derived from our work with clients. What a treasure trove of sharings those group meetings were. I came away realizing that it’s important that we end the false hierarchy of care. Professional touch has a very significant role to play in personal healing, well being, and self-empowerment.   

…The many unique elements of professional touch: Touch is a form of communication that’s deeply effective in releasing pain, tissue constriction, sympathetic autonomic states, and creating somatic awareness. Using touch, we learn that when we teach our clients to feel directly into their places of distress and interact in ways that release those discomforts they increase their own bodily confidence. We can also use touch to encourage client self-awareness by entering a state of presence, which helps to release them from past regrets and future worries. Every session is a lesson in body mechanics for ourselves as well as our clients. We can also teach our clients to practice inner touch and felt sense that they can practice by themselves, and to create their own movement patterns that free up areas of restriction. Finally, we can empower our clients by teaching them to interact with our hands and our words in ways that give them equal authorship of their session’s results.