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Tag: ashiatsu tips

Barefoot Massage Open Challenge 2024: coming in March!

Get ready for this years Barefoot Massage Open Challenge! This year’s topic for the “Open” is on common physical imbalances of Barefoot Massage Therapists that could result in injury. Our instructors have been talking behind the scenes A LOT about all the things that make up “body mechanics“… things like your alignment while working, as well as what movement possibilities and what common restrictions Barefoot Massage Therapists are working around. Together, we’re compiling tips and tricks, videos, exercises and food for thought content for everyone that will help your body be ready and pain free to give a long career full of barefoot massage sessions!

Make sure to subscribe to our new SubStack, which works like a blog and newsletter in one! As we post new content, it’ll show up in your inbox, too! That’s where the challenge will be posted.

We haven’t been able to consistently post an actual ANNUAL challenge, because, well, life. It all started in 2018 and coincided with the CrossFit Open – just something for Barefoot Massage Therapists to push themselves through. We’ve had 3 so far, and this will be our 4th! The goal all along with these challenges has been for you to get out of your box and try something NEW. Our main focus when teaching FasciAshi is for you to make the techniques effective because you are educated on the theory and feel the ease of its application flow through your body. Your inner wisdom shines through when you are able to contemplate WHY or HOW your massage strokes work. When that is put into action in the most physically efficient and effective way possible for your body, you can see progress in yourself, your clients, and you’ll have a seriously better chance of staying in this profession longer.

We’ve got fresh content coming weekly starting March 8th, 2024 – but in the meantime, did you know that we’ve also got an archive of challenges from previous years?! You can dive into them for the 1st time, or the 10th!

Here’s a list of past years’ Barefoot Massage Open Challenges:

(Or just go watch the YouTube Playlist if reading is TMI RN!)

2021 “reSOLEutions”

This was a 3-month long, content creating challenge that pushed you to create NEW content on specific topics that educated YOUR community: Jump in on that challenge here – it was only 1 blog post to pull you through the entire project >>>

2019 “Mobility & Massage”

This was an ambitious 2x/week 5-week challenge that had you moving and massaging in ways to create more physical endurance and mindfulness in your sessions. Jump in on any of the weeks here>>>

2018 “Ashi-Challenge”

This was our first challenge that pushed you out of the routine and encouraged you to work more creatively than robotically. Try these challenges out and see how it changes your approach.

Stay tuned to our new SubStack for what we are preparing for you in March!

National Massage Therapy Awareness Week: 2023

Resources for you to use to educate your immediate circles on the benefits of Massage AND ways to help YOU be more aware within your Barefoot Massage sessions.

First off, welcome to this years National Massage Therapy Awareness Week! This long holiday is our professions chance to spend an ENTIRE DEDICATED WEEK to promote the health benefits of massage therapy and their practices.

If you need some facts to share with your local community, follow these links for great resources to pull from:

OK, now lets get to the juicy part:

Our tips to tune into your own awareness while giving a Barefoot Massage session.

Pulling from the resources listed above, we noticed that according to the national consumer survey from the AMTA, & & . It’s important to recognize here that a well-informed Barefoot Massage COULD be perfect for many elements of injury treatment & pain management – depending on the person & situation …both client & therapist.⁣

This doesn’t just automatically happen when you put a foot on someone. & strategically . FasciAshi is Myofascial, Neuromuscular & Stretch Therapy techniques meant to be individually sequenced as needed for each person underfoot. No two appointments are the same. The more you learn, the more barefoot technique vocabulary & reasoning skills you’ll have to customize for these clients: it just needs to be put into practice to elevate the outcomes.

SO how can you pull details out of your massage education resources from the Center for Barefoot Massage and work with more attention on your intention?

If you’ve attended any of our Center for Barefoot Massage classes already, review your manuals & check out some of the “Why’s” & the anatomical focus points to help pick strokes that work for each client individually this week. Don’t do every stroke you’ve ever learned: just do the ones they “knead!” Next, ⁣check into the mindfulness lists from our Intermediate, ROM and Advanced class manuals to hone in on the intent of your stroke as needed for the person.

Here’s an example for you to try this week in practice:

How can you make your movements/strokes more effortless on your body, but still have the same intent and focus of intensity and effectiveness for your client? Now, this isn’t an excuse to massage lazily: we are asking you to reevaluate all the physical effort you are putting into each stroke, and check yourself to see if it’s needed.

  • Can you relax your grip on the bar?
  • Can your foot on the table be aimed in better alignment with it’s same side knee and hip in a way to better distribute pressure through the working foot?
  • Are you moving with breath – and how are your movements impacting the breath of you and your client?
  • Can you just give it weight, and wait?

⁣There you go!

Take that much of a new perspective to try this week in your massage appointments: our experience has shown that it definitely helps!

(We hope to see you in class soon to teach you more!)

Using a small pillow for Sidelying barefoot massage bolstering

The benefits of side-lying barefoot massage are plentiful. Once you get past the “my client only wants to lie face down to receive the massage” mentality, you’ll find that you can access a number of muscles more easily when they lie on their side.

Why side-lying barefoot massage?

Providing side-lying barefoot massage allows you as a therapist to have better access and angles to work on shoulders, hips, quadratus lumborum, IT band, adductors, and abductors, to name but a few.

(You can learn side-body barefoot massage in our Intermediate class. We also teach side-lying barefoot work in our Fijian barefoot mat class.)

Sometimes you’ll find that your client (typically women, who are more curvy than men) may have trouble lying on their side as their 11th or 12th rib feels like it’s close to or hitting their iliac crest.

This makes it tricky for even the most skilled barefoot therapist to find the QL, as there’s often not enough space for even the heel. Resorting to the lateral edge of the foot may be a solution, but there’s something super simple you can try instead.

Bolstering with a small pillow

It’s easy fix- small toddler or travel pillow placed under their waist in between their body and the table.

Watch the video to see how Mary-Claire uses the pillow and how it flattens out the client’s torso. This makes barefoot side-lying massage much easier (and more comfortable for both the LMT and the client).

The client simply rolls over when you’re ready to work the 2nd side-the pillow should stay pretty well in place.

If you’re going to use the pillow under their stomach for prone work, they simply roll onto their stomach and adjust as needed. (See this video on how to do that.)

Are they rolling on their back next? Just have them lift up a little, grab the pillow and hand it to you or toss it onto the floor-whatever’s easiest.

Let us know what other bolstering techniques are in your grab bag (or you’d like to see!) in the comments.


Where you can find more info…

Visit our main website to find out more about all our classes at the Center for Barefoot Massage.

Or visit us on Facebook and Instagram!

Using a small pillow for bolstering the stomach

Have you ever had a client who has back pain while lying on their stomach to receive barefoot massage or even hand-on deep tissue massage?

This is often caused by hyperlordosis. An excessive curve in the lumbar (it’s sometimes seen in the cervical dish as well) can be caused by structural issues such as:

1. kyphosis AKA “dowager’s hump”
2. discitis
3. obesity (especially with a large stomach)
4. spondylolisthesis

Muscular imbalances:
1. weak glutes, hamstrings, and abdominal muscles
2. tight erector spinae, quadratus lumborum (QL), and hip flexors (especially iliopsoas)

If your client is not comfortable lying on their stomach, try using a small pillow between their pelvis and rib cage.

You can use a travel pillow (mine has feathers, which makes it squishy and moveable) or a toddler pillow (with cotton/polyester fill). The toddler pillow is a little smaller.

Check out our Tuesday Toesday Tip video to see how Mary-Claire uses a small pillow to make her clients more comfortable. (It’s just 3 minutes, 35 seconds.)

Next week will be another tip for when you need to bolster women for side-body massage (you do work on clients on your side, don’t you? )

If you haven’t learned sidelying massage, definitely look into our Intermediate class, where we’ll teach you amazing anterior barefoot massage (mmm..quads! pecs!) and super effective side-lying barefoot massage-you’ll reach muscles your clients may never knew they had.

BAREFOOT MASSAGE OPEN 2.4: #Massage Week 4

Throughout the course of this years and last years Barefoot Massage Open, we’ve pulled out some pretty heavy challenges. I hope that todays challenge helps to answer a very common frustration that many of my mid-level students have: how do I fit it all in?!?!?!

I think that these particular past topics will help you optimize this weeks challenge – so go review these before scrolling down too much further:

1.3: Game Face (Spend an hour with the client supine!)

1.4: Not yo’ momma’s Ashi: (Spend an hour with the client in Sidelying!)

1.5: Weight then Wait (Stop moving!)

+ Take what you learned from this years 2.2 Challenge (Xray Vision) which helped you study the structures that lay underneath the tissue you are aiming at AND revisit the last challenge I posted, 2.3 Mindfulness – where you took a long hard look at what strokes you do most often and why.

 

Got all that at fresh in your thoughts again? OK, now lets scroll down!  >>>>

BAREFOOT MASSAGE OPEN 2.5: #Mobility Week 5

The Barefoot Massage Open 2.5 #Mobility with Dawn Dotson

Ashi Bar Pass-Thru:

  • Start off laying prone on the ground. Keep your arms extended and grip loose. See video
  • Raise the PVC pipe behind of your body . Once overhead, retract the shoulder blades down and pull behind your back.
  • You can adjust and widen your grip if that movement was too difficult. Narrow the grip if you had no difficulty executing the warmup drill. Repeat up to 10 times.
  • Modification or Isolation: Shoulder Pass-thru’s: just do one side at a time instead

Turbo Dog

While it might appear to be about strengthening your arms and back, there’s a lot more to it.

  • Start with Downward Dog: (Hold 5 Breaths)
  • On your hands (shoulder width apart) and knees (hip width apart)
  • Wrap your shoulder blades toward armpits, feel for activating chest muscles and upper back, and relax head and neck.
  • Inhale – Bend elbows 3 inches from the floor, moving them toward each other
  • Exhale – Straighten your legs and lift into Downward Dog.
  • Keep energy moving through your arms and chest, keep collarbones moving towards your feet.
  • Reach your forearms away from your wrists. Use your upper back, chest, and arms to hold the space between the bones of the shoulder joint.

Elevate & Depress Scaps during Scap pull-ups:

  • Begin in a normal pull-up position with a palms-away grip and hands shoulder-width apart.
  • From a full hang, with just slightly shrugged shoulders, you want to draw the scapula down and together, thus raising your body slightly but without bending your arms and pulling as in a regular pull-up.
    • The best learning cues are: Try to “bend the bar” and think about doing a reverse shrug (i.e. shoulders drawn downward). Do this, and you’ll feel your head shift backward and your chest raise upward, as your scapular pinch together.
  • Hold the top position for one second, then return to the starting position. The range of motion is only a few inches to a foot or two (when you get really strong!).
  • Do six to twelve reps, keeping nearly straight arms and tight spinal erectors and glutes throughout.

PULL-UPS YO!!!

Use your bars! Start with scap pull ups then pull all the way through!!!! Tighten all the things! You can do it!

BAREFOOT MASSAGE OPEN 2.3: #Massage Week 3

We structured our FasciAshi classes to incorporate a Mindfulness practice – so I’d like to challenge you to bring an element of mindfulness and attention to your massage practice this week.

Do you have a “Signature” stroke? That one stroke that, for some reason, you feel that you absolutely MUST find a way to sneak into every single session because you love it so much? I think we all have one. This week’s #AshiatsuChallenge is to help you find WHY you are doing what you are doing.

BAREFOOT MASSAGE OPEN 2.3: #Mobility Week 3

Barefoot Massage Therapists need a good amount of strength and flexibility in their hips – which is where mobility exercises that help to create a balance between the two concepts come into play. This week, it’s time to work on those hips! Resistance bands are a great way to strengthen muscles without causing too much stress, so grab your band and get started.

BAREFOOT MASSAGE OPEN 2.2: #Massage Week 2

Here we are: 2 weeks into the second annual Barefoot Massage Open, a weekly massage challenge for ashiatsu therapists – this Friday we’ll step into WEEK 3! But lets not get ahead of ourselves…. lets focus on the now! Today is Tuesday, which means it’s #2sdayTOESday & also massage day in our #AshiatsuChallenge

(It’s also Mardi GrASHIATSU today!!)