The essential nature of Nature

This year more than any other (perhaps because my life is generally so brilliant and balanced these days) I've found myself afflicted by Hibernatyitis. (Another possible reason is the replacement of one -itis by another: my severe bout of Londonitis seems to be well and truly over and lifted at the beginning of this year, rather suddenly.) Thankfully, life has been such that my Hibernatyitis hasn't been too torturous (I just find myself more inclined to curl up in a small ball and sleep) but I have been missing daylight so much. Walking to work means that for the majority of the year I get at least 30 minutes of daylight exposure, and in the summer often more when I loiter on the beach on my way home. But for a good while I've been lucky to see much daylight either side of being in work. Which just isn't a good thing.

Wednesday saw me go and administer an hour of daylight in the middle of the day (I hear some people call this a lunch hour...) but TODAY I got to get my favourite dosing of daylight - up on the hills, with a pair of loppers and a pruning saw in my hand. And the obligatory rain and hale showers here and there. Of course.

It wasn't a particularly strenuous day but I like to hope one of today's activities in particular will have made my Da proud: Beasting Elders. We have a long family tradition of attacking these poor, unsuspecting trees (in fairness, they generally get replaced with other native trees but I recognise how weird this family trait - one I absolutely share - may seem, particularly for a card carrying tree hugger). My beasting was of the mild variety (severe lopping rather than complete removal) and was inspired by the fact that another bundle of elders in the same location had been lopped last year and produced many more flowers and fruit. The whole business of pruning is an interesting one and although a brief visit, my time today in this local forest garden added yet more food for thought to my plottings of "Tigger's Idyll".

It also added comfrey to a couple of works' borders (removed with permission, I hasten to add!) Comfrey very much seems to be a double edged sword in permaculture applications, being a great nutrient accumulator, ground cover and voracious grower...but also being a voracious spreader. It's fairly contained in its new locations and (the theory goes) will help "feed" the fruit bushes it's planted alongside but at the moment its all very experimental. The process of devouring a great book on perennial vegetables with a view to choosing different plants for different locations (work may not have a lot of space, but being on various sides of a building it certainly has lots of rather distinct microclimates!) is continuing and I may even get around to hunting seeds and possibly small plants by the end of the weekend. With such a blank canvas ahead of me, anything could happen.

But best of all, I can feel the Hibernatyitis lifting as the days lengthen. Huzzah! That's not to say I won't still take the option of curling up with a duvet when the mood takes me - simply that I'll do it entirely through choice rather than by any midwinter affliction.

Why do damage when there's no need for damage to be done?

So, the title of this post could apply to so many things. And for me, does apply to so many things. But today I'm particularly writing about Massage.

I've been thinking a lot recently about my path to Massage.  Yesterday I was particularly struck by my absolute gratitude for having discovered a way to Massage which enables me to provide the amazing benefits of Touch to my clients while not only causing myself no damage, but actually enhancing my own health. Which is the way it should be, right?

Massage hit my own personal radar when I was about 17. Wow! Since then I've had the great privilege to discover for myself what I believe to be one of the biggest "secrets" of our age: the simple, incredible, healing power of Touch. Massage has been around for millenia and yet somehow the power of Touch and Massage have been degraded. Or simply forgotten about. I have had (and continue to have) some amazing teachers: every client I've seen, every Massage I've received, and every conversation I've had or witnessed within the NO HANDS community. And I'm passionate about doing what I can not just to provide this wonderful thing called Massage, but to communicate its benefits to people who might not otherwise have stumbled across it.

But what I didn't discover at 17, and in fact only first became aware of when doing my first Massage qualification, was the incredible prevalence of work-related injury in the profession. How did I become aware that work-related injury was a problem? Because they told me so on the course. On the one hand (no pun intended) is this incredibly beneficial therapy called Touch. On the other, the knowledge that practicing this therapy can be incredibly damaging to the practitioner. And yet I was taught these damaging moves and told that this injury was "normal".

Good for Client + Bad for Therapist = OK

Even the thought of this equation upsets me. More than upsets me - is absolutely abhorrent to me. And not just in relation to Massage. "OK" to me does not involve inherent risk of, or actual, damage to any party involved. And yet my first professional introduction to being a Massage therapist proposed exactly that. It was proposed as so normal that at the time I didn't question it. Even when I was taking on my first full-time position as a Massage therapist (in a spa on a cruise ship) I thought a book on injury prevention would be enough to protect me. Looking back my naivety is almost endearing, were it not so damaging.

I was on that ship for 6 weeks. In that time the commonality of injury among Massage practitioners was reinforced further - but my accepting of it rapidly waned. Colleagues were prescribed anti-inflammatories and told just to get on with it. One colleague was medically disembarked in a wheelchair due to severe sciatica. As my own injury developed my first response was to do what those around me were doing - buy wrist supports for when I wasn't working, go to see the doctor to get the anti-inflammatories, and keep going.

Remember, this was barely a month into my first position as a Massage therapist.  

But my injury wasn't abating. It wasn't improving. It was worsening. The anti-inflammatories made me sick. I was doing everything I could to avoid using my hands and wrists (I still have a tendency to open doors with either my shoulder, back or occasionally my feet). And, finally, my own belief that my long term health was far more important than any short-term contract surfaced. I had signed a 9 month contract and I believe strongly in meaning what I say. But that contract was damaging me. And if one party's being damaged...you got it, that's not OK to me.

I didn't wait to be medically disembarked. I took the decision to terminate my contract, pay my way home and get myself out of this incredibly damaging situation. I remain eternally grateful that I was able to do that - financially, but also from having had the education and upbringing that let me value myself enough to invest in myself and get out. But I know I was a minority. I know that hundreds if not thousands of therapists in my position were getting injured every day and continued working as their injuries got progressively worse. The turnover in therapists in just the 6 weeks I was there was incredibly high. And, sadly, I have no reason to believe this situation will have changed. Financial profit over employee health. If you ask me that's completely bonkers. And is a situation that arises in so many professions beyond Massage.

So that's the story of how my injury came about. And I know I'm not alone. I know because of the people I saw at the time getting injured, getting medically disembarked. I know from the therapists I've met since who have had to give up a career they loved because it was damaging them. I know from reading the results of several international studies into therapist injury, and having helped with the most recent survey into Massage therapist health carried out by the NO HANDS Massage Company - all of which found that two-thirds of Massage practitioners are experiencing musculo-skeletal damage.

But I'm one of the fortunate ones. I wasn't permanently disabled (which many are). Not only did I discover a completely new approach to Massaging that was beneficial to my own health, but I found a company that taught me more about the power of Touch than I had ever imagined. And from which I continue to learn.

I also now have the great privilege of getting to work for that company. Of playing a small part in addressing this injury pandemic in a profession which I believe to be vitally important. And sometimes I feel like I shouldn't declare my passion, dedication and gratitude to this approach and the people who have made it possible. That somehow by being an employee of the company my opinion may be seen as barefaced marketing. But my reality this morning is that I no longer care what others may assume of my intentions because I know that this is my truth, this is my reality, and the NO HANDS Massage Company have made it possible. Does that make me biased, unfairly prejudiced? No - because this isn't an unfair prejudice: this is my reality and my truth.

And I absolutely LOVE being able to offer the power of Touch and Massage where the equation is no longer Good for Client + Bad for Therapist = OK but, instead is:

Good for Client + Awesome for Therapist = OK

And in that moment in my treatment room yesterday, it was my overwhelming sense of gratitude that prompted this blog post. Because this is my story. It's a big part of who I am today and what I do. It works for me and if there's a chance something here can help another human - all the better.