MASSAGING YOUR BRAIN

Pain science is telling us that pain is an output of the brain, not an input from the body. Similarly we can note that relaxation and pleasure are outputs of the brain, though we may “feel” them in the effected organs, muscles, and other tissues. Ironically then it turns out that soft tissue manipulation, which…

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Where are You Going? – Massage and the Nervous System, Part 3

by David Lauterstein I once got a greeting card, “On the Family Trip to Nirvana,” with parents sitting in the car’s front seat and two kids in the back, asking their parents, “Are we there yet?” With this next deeper level of the nervous system, we are not at Nirvana but, in a way, we…

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When First We REALLY Meet – Massage and the Nervous System, Part 2

It is not the therapeutic intention that is fruitful, but it is how we really meet that is therapeutically fruitful.  (paraphrase of Martin Buber) The nerve cells which sense pressure and vibration were discovered in 1831 by the Italian anatomist, Giovanni Pacini, who also discovered the cholera bacteria. Named “Pacinian corpuscles” in his honor, these…

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When First We Meet – Massage and the Nervous System, Part I

Meissner’s corpuscles were discovered by the anatomist Georg Meissner in the 19th century.  They are located in the skin, just underneath the epidermis. These are the main receptors uniquely designed and located to detect specifically light touch*.  So these are what our clients first sense with when we lay our hands on a body.  When…

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