Shiatsu
January 22nd, 2008Mention something like aromatherapy or acupuncture or reflexology in conversation and most people will at least have heard of it, but mention shiatsu and more often than not you will be met with a puzzled expression…..leading me to try explaining it as “like acupuncture without needles” or “kind of like having someone do yoga to you” or “a mix of massage, stretching and acupressure” just to put the word “shiatsu” into some sort of context.
So I like it when shiatsu makes it into the national media. We need more coverage. It helps raise the level of awareness. With that in mind, I was pretty happy to see The Guardian’s article entitled “Hands on” in their “A working life” section last Saturday. The series of articles is, I think, meant to give an insight into different careers with a bit of a personal touch. A sort answer to the what do you do all day? kind of question that you might ask someone whose job you’ve never heard of.
If I put myself into the shoes of someone who doesn’t know anything about shiatsu though, I don’t think I would be left much the wiser about it after reading the article. I got the impression that Leo Benedictus (the writer) didn’t actually receive a shiatsu treatment before writing the piece, with the result that shiatsu was never really elegantly described in the article. So, although the article gives an idea of who Katherine Hall (the practitioner interviewed) is, it doesn’t really give an idea of what her job entails (that is what shiatsu actually is) and I think it could have benefited from a small description to help people who have never heard of shiatsu.
Shiatsu is often difficult to describe with words alone. Have a treatment, though, and you kind of “get it”. Get a professional writer who has had a treatment to describe it and we have a good chance of conveying in words what shiatsu is. After all, writers write for a living — they express ideas and experiences through words better than the rest of us can.
The closest we get to a concise description in the article in the Guardian is:
a massage discipline similar to the “tough tendon” technique she practised in Thailand
I suppose that’s a rough definition, but it doesn’t really define shiatsu uniquely enough for it to stick in someone’s mind. And many readers will also know nothing of this “tough tendon” massage either. Someone with no experience of shiatsu would not be able to go away and formulate a description of it in their own words. This isn’t the case for many other complementary therapies. For example, even though many people have never experienced acupuncture, they will often describe it as something like “it’s all about making your qi flow correctly by sticking needles in pressure points”.
Tony over on shiatsublogger.co.uk wrote about this last year. In his post on “Discovering shiatsu“, he makes the point:
what does the word shiatsu mean to most people? Very little and it needs some explaining. If I were to leave a business card lying around how would anyone know that shiatsu could do them some good?
Tiffany took a stab on her blog “Shiatsu….. dog or bodywork?“:
Shiatsu is based on principles of Traditional Chinese Medicine. Similar to Acupressure and using the same theories, Shiatsu can bring balance to the flow of Qi or energy.
This is pretty good, actually. It expresses nicely the aim of shiatsu and points out that it is similar to acupressure, so we immediately know that there will be some massage and that it has a component of TCM.
What else do we have?…..Maybe the shiatsu society can help? hmmm their home page is pretty nebulous:
A traditional hands-on Japanese healing art
and their “About shiatsu” section has the following as the opening sentence under the heading “What is Shiatsu?”:
Shiatsu is a therapeutic practice that can support individuals in moving towards greater health and well-being.
That’s great — I can move towards greater health and well-being, but what the heck is it?!! It is stressful enough if I have an ailment and I’m trying some complementary therapy in the hopes that it will help me. I don’t want to turn up for a treatment in an unfamiliar environment and have no idea what to expect…That definition could encompass pretty much anything in the realm of healthcare from nutrition to massage to exercise to a visit to your GP. Before I get too hung up though, they do have a better explanation further down the page:
a still, relaxed pressure at various points on the body with the hand or thumb, an easy leaning of the elbows or a simple rotation of a limb
Much better. It gives a nice impression of some of the key elements of shiatsu, so I think they should move that sentence up to the home page and really give people something tangible from the get go!
I also like Fiona’s description from her website:
Shiatsu is a dynamic hands-on healing system, originating in Japan, which uses the power of touch, pressure and gentle stretching techniques to balance the body’s energy system
Good stuff — it sums up where shiatsu was developed (Japan) and that it uses massage to balance the body!
All this has lead to me reconsidering how I describe shiatsu here at shiatsudo.co.uk. I think my basic description is a little vague:
a profound form of holistic massage that can greatly improve your quality of life
You have to read further to realise that it is clothed massage and encompasses stretching, joint rotations and acupressure points and so on. Definitely room for improvement there. I want to move towards a clearer description so people are left with an accurate impression of shiatsu. That way, even if they don’t ever book a treatment, at least they go away with some understanding. Far better in a hypothetical conversation that they will be able to say “shiatsu? oh I saw a website on that it’s acupressure massage to balance the Qi” rather than “shiatsu? oh I saw a website on that, but it made no sense”.
Getting a succinct description of shiatsu out into the public conciousness is vital for shiatsu to move forward. Without it we just wont experience the level of popularity that other therapies have. Anyone have any ideas? Drop me a comment. If you are a writer, even better!
Tags:Shiatsu
January 27th, 2008 at 3:37 am
I love this article you wrote. It is amazing but I find it hard to answer that question without going into an hour lecture about chinese medicine and Qi and meridians and the whole time, the person is looking at me like I have 2 heads.
On the AOBTA site http://www.aobta.org/about_styles.php you will find this long description of 5 Element Shiatstu:
“The primary emphasis of Five Element Shiatsu is to identify a pattern of disharmony through use of the four pillars of examinations and to harmonize that pattern with an appropriate treatment plan. Hands-on techniques and preferences for assessment varies with the practitioner, depending on their individual background and training. The radial pulse usually provides the most critical and detailed information. Palpation of the back and/or abdomen and a detailed verbal history serve to confirm the assessment. Considerations of the client’s lifestyle, emotional, and psychological factors are all considered important. Although this approach uses the paradigm of the five elements to tonify, sedate, or control patterns of disharmony, practitioners of this style also consider hot or cold and internal or external symptoms and signs.”
Seriously, would that explain anything to someone who knows nothing about this topic?
Also, I cringe when I see ‘massage’ and Shiatsu in the same sentence or massage used to describe Shiatsu. As we know, Shiatsu isn’t massage and it becomes confusing when described that way.
Perhaps we need to brain storm the most important aspects of Shiatsu and figure out a brief way to explain it in laymen’s terms.
Tiffany
PS. try then to explain the difference between Shiatsu and Tiu na. LOL
January 28th, 2008 at 5:32 pm
Hi Tiffany
Thanks for the comment.
I know what you mean about the word ‘massage’ – I actually prefer ‘bodywork’ which you already use on your blog and website, but when I used to use that, people used to ask me what bodywork was….then I had an extra thing to explain lol. But something like meridian-based bodywork goes some way towards explaining it because I think many people have this idea of meridians already.
I’m not even going to try to explain Shiatsu vs Tui Na……that would be too much.
February 1st, 2008 at 12:10 pm
I have never liked using the term massage but it is a concept that most people are familiar with and perhaps serves as a jumping off point in a conversation about shiatsu.
Describing shiatsu as a “clothed massage based on the theory of acupuncture but using fingers instead of needles” draws a picture that I think most people could imagine.
Massage is not the correct term but if we want to market shiatsu we need to latch on to concepts that potential clients are familiar with. In order to attract clients to lie on our futons for an hour in this age of sound-bites and 30-second ads we need to be as direct in our message as possible.
July 8th, 2008 at 3:19 pm
[...] after our daughter and available to chat to anyone who wants to find out a little more about what shiatsu is, or hear about our experience of using shiatsu and acupressure for pain relief during labour. Our [...]
July 8th, 2008 at 11:42 pm
I always refuse to use the word massage to discribe Shiatsu. It is easily misunderstood with some sexual service. I tend to use treatment. I think as Shiatsu practitioners, if we want the general public to understand what Shiatsu is, we need first of all to agree amongst ourselves a concise but precise description of Shiatsu and use it consistently, on all our marketing materials. Lets have a brainstorm on the most relevant points and select the highest rated ones.
July 9th, 2008 at 9:21 am
Hi Guiliana – welcome to my blog
nice to see a new face….
I think many of us shiatsu practitioners shy away from describing what we do as massage, but Tony has made a good point that we need some sort of concept that people are already familiar with to serve as a starting point.
I see your website describes shiatsu as “an ancient bodywork therapy”….I always liked bodywork as a term it definitely has a place in the description of shiatsu.
Maybe we should start asking our longer term clients to describe shiatsu as well – see what they come up with.
take care
Bevan