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Your chair. "We did a large event one time in conjunction with about 40 other therapists…and many were not trained in how to perform chair massage or even how to adjust the chair. That had a huge impact on clients who had never had a chair massage before." -Jason Miller
Your client. "I think what makes any therapist successful is to be able to establish that rapport on a nonverbal basis. They get an impression of you in a matter of seconds. If you don't connect with them, you might not get another chance. You have to do everything you can to establish that rapport quickly and do everything you can to make them feel comfortable." -Marilyn Kier
Your boundaries. "When things change, what are you willing to do and not willing to do? The owner of a company, at the last minute, called to cancel the chair massage gig. I said, 'OK, I do expect payment,' even though I didn't work. I had blocked out that time, and I wasn't going to fill that time on short notice." -Gary Jones
Your business arrangements. Companies that pay 100 percent of the massage costs make for convenient and seemingly stable, but not necessarily long-term, business arrangements. When the employee pays all or part of the cost of the massage, "they seem to see more value in the massage. Those who do it because the company pays for it don't always see the value right away." Also, "when companies are trying to cut the budget, that's the program that gets hit relatively quickly." -Kevin Zorda
Your business potential: "It's a very rare occasion that somebody receives a
chair massage and doesn't become a repeat customer." -Julie Wallace
Studies by the University of Miami's Touch Research Institute underscored the power of workplace massage.
A 1996 study published in the International Journal of Neuroscience showed that massaged adults exhibited enhanced mental alertness, completed math problems in significantly less time and with more accuracy, and exhibited lower job stress levels after a five-week period.
A 2004 study, also published in the International Journal of Neuroscience, showed that anxiety scores decreased for all groups who received moderate massage (an indentation in the skin), light massage (light stroking) and vibratory stimulation-but that the group receiving the moderate pressure displayed the greatest decrease in stress.
"We found that moderate pressure was the key," Tiffany Field, PhD, one of the leaders of both studies, says of the 2004 study. "You don't get those brain-waves changes and the heart-rate slowing and people being in a more relaxed state in light-pressure massage."
Field says the studies didn't compare the length of massage-therapy sessions. "All I can say is that you won't get the effects unless you use moderate pressure," she says. "I don't think the routine is as much of an issue as moderate pressure. We've done 10 minutes, a half hour, 15 minutes. That doesn't seem to be a factor."
I had three good reasons for getting a chair massage:
- I was getting ready to write an article about it;
- I had $18 in my pocket-enough for a $15, 15-minute massage and a small tip;
- I was getting nagged by my back and shoulders, which were telling me:
"If we don't start feeling better soon, you're in big trouble."
So I visited a therapist after work one day in downtown Chicago. The therapist took my coat and my glasses and told me to have a seat on the chair. I sat down on the chair but wasn't quite sure what else to do. I gingerly rested my chin on the doughnut-looking pad at the top. My eyes looked inquisitively toward the ceiling. My feet were on the floor, my arms at my sides. I felt uncomfortable. And I felt goofy. Said my back and shoulders: "You're killing us."
The therapist, who apparently had assumed that I knew what to do with my head, hands, feet, knees, back and chin, gently and patiently directed me into position, and we were ready to go.
She started by touching my back lightly, sweeping both hands in what felt like figure-eights. It relaxed me, and I liked it. She then really went to work, applying moderate pressure to my back, neck and shoulders. It wasn't doing much for me. It felt as though her hands and my relief were slipping away.
After a few minutes, the therapist told me that she couldn't seem to work through my dress shirt. It was 60 percent cotton and 40 percent polyester-apparently great for killing both wrinkles and massages. I took off my overshirt, and the therapist quickly found what she told me was a trigger point in the upper left side of my back. It was a sign of some sort of repeat activity, she said. I thought about it, and she was right: For months, I'd been carrying a heavy work bag-always on my left shoulder-to and from my commuter train.
Her revelation prompted me to adjust the load in my bag and to occasionally switch shoulders, and her work made the pain go away. I also liked the attention she gave my arms and fingers.
I knew the session was coming to a sad, but soothing, end when she reverted to light touches and figure-eights. She concluded with a couple of light, little taps as if to say: "Atta boy. You finally listened to your body."
-Pete Reinwald
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American Massage Therapy Association®
