:: January/February 2004 Volume 3/Number 1

Partners in Therapy:
Yoga and Massage

By Felicia Tomasko

There is a crucial balance between effort, surrender and ease that is not often achieved in the actual practice of yoga asana. Massage can help restore this balance. It's no wonder more and more yoga studios are offering massage, and yoga is increasingly becoming one of the services a spa provides. Many gyms and health clubs now offer not only massage but yoga classes as well. What's going on, and why? Kent Burden, a yoga teacher and Director of the Mind-Body Program at the Ojai Valley Inn and Spa puts it this way; “I see people who say, ‘I’m so tight, I’ve been doing yoga, what else can I do?’ after observing the body this is when I suggest massage. I go to the massage therapist and say this person is really tight through the iliopsoas, iliotibial band, or rhomboids. I can then tell the massage therapist to direct their efforts in those areas of the body.”

Yoga teacher, Thai Yoga massage therapist and co-owner of Sacred Movement in Venice, Saul David Raye, suggests to all of his yoga students that they receive massage or some other type of healing work on a regular basis. “While working with a therapist,” he says, “the practitioner holds the space and allows the recipient to let go, relax, relieve tension and experience a deeper understanding of their own body and mind.”

The integration of massage and yoga does more than deepen one’s own connection to their mind and their body. According to Burden, "Massage is a modality that serves as one bridge between the individual self and that which is beyond the self, our community." In our yoga practice, even when we are in a class or studio full of people, we still practice alone, as solitary beings. But in a massage, the energy of the giver and the receiver merge to create a union beyond the individual self. In this connection, the receiver becomes vulnerable and in the safety of the massage table becomes trusting, accepting the touch of another person.

Massage may be especially beneficial for yoga practitioners engaged in a physically challenging and sometimes intense asana practice such as power yoga, ashtanga, Bikram or even Iyengar. In a demanding practice, the body may often become rigid, less flexible and more constricted, leading to tight hamstrings and other muscles and an inability to fully relax. To release this tension and allow the practitioner to progress in the physical aspects of their practice, massage can restore a sense of balance. The sweep of warm oil, the pressure of a therapist’s hands running over the body, kneading muscles or applying pressure can activate, cleanse and stimulate the more subtle aspects of the body.
The subtle body is that part of our self described in yoga that is not completely graspable, but contains the layers of our mind, breath, prana (energetic life force) and divine nature. The subtle or energetic body contains channels known in yoga and Ayurveda as nadis, Chinese medicine calls them meridians and in Thai massage and medicine they are known as sen lines. In all cases the channels or streams are associated with both the nervous system in the physical body as well as the means by which prana flows through the subtle body just as blood in the physical body flows through the arteries and veins.

These channels are also a means by which areas of the body are connected to each other. It is because of these associations or linkages in the body that modalities like reflexology, the use of marma or acupressure points, where a therapist affects one area of the body by touching another point, can be applied. Integration of these channels and unimpeded flow of prana and energy through them is important for the maintenance of health.

The primary action of the practice is on the channels of subtle energy that course and flow through the body, known as nadis. Through the pressure on these channels, sen lines in Thai, and the movement of the body into passive asana, the nadis become open and able to flow freely. When space is created in the body, energy flows not only through the nadis, but also through the mind. What's more, muscular tension is eased and the breath becomes calm.

Thai yoga massage is one increasingly popular and accessible technique using passive stretches resembling yoga asana. Therapist and client work on a mat on the floor in a manner resembling time spent on the mat in class. But the poses of Thai yoga massage are different than asana in that the receiver can surrender into the experience of being manipulated by the therapist, rather than using their own musculature to hold poses such as supported cobra, a gentle plow or various twists. The therapists at Thai Sabai in Westwood have experienced first hand the power of recovery in their clients. They told me that “a group of students in a yoga teacher training program came here and told us that we had saved their lives helping them recover from their practice.”

Other Asian therapies, including acupressure, shiatsu and Chinese tuina also affect both the physical body through increased circulation, release of muscular tension and detoxification, and the subtle body through the use of pressure on the meridians and acupressure points. The same points are used in most of these manual therapies as are stimulated in acupuncture since in massage the therapists’ hands are used rather than needles. These methods of massage work with stimulating the meridians, regulating the flow of qi, (energy), analogous to prana, throughout the body. After experiencing tuina and acupressure massage, I felt the effects of increased circulation of prana that enlivened my following yoga asana practice.
Ayurvedic massage is another modality which, although skin is touched and muscles are manipulated, warm oil in the abhyanga (oil massage) is applied with the intention of penetrating the physical body to access the subtle body. In order to create balance, attention is given to individually choose the massage oil as well as the techniques used to bring balance to all layers of the body based on the doshic (vata, pitta and kapha) effects on the body.

In Western techniques, like Swedish or deep tissue massage, the emphasis is on affecting the musculature and soft tissue of the body. These modalities effectively release muscular tension, reducing stress, creating a sense of relaxation and allowing the recipient to feel a sense of ease and comfort in the body.

Through opening the channels via any of these specific techniques, the full flow of prana, or our life force, can be enlivened, also the goal in an asana practice. The prana of the subtle or energetic body is what stimulates the natural ability of the body to heal itself and stimulation and movement of prana happens in asana and especially in massage.

Detoxification
Although we may think of detoxification in terms of special diets or ‘detox tea’, receiving massage and practicing yoga asana detoxify the physical body through increased circulation, pressure on and movement of the muscles and the stimulation of fluid flow through the lymphatic vessels. Many asanas such as cobra, triangle, extended warrior and other side stretches and twists specifically target the lymphatic system, promoting detoxification.

A major difference between using yoga and massage for detoxification, however, is that through the practice of yoga, detoxification occurs slowly over a period of time, while the directed strokes and pressure in most forms of massage induce a much more rapid and immediate detoxification process, allowing for a more complete experience of release.
On an ongoing basis, a regular yoga practice allows us to move toxins and waste material through the body on a continual basis. Regular Practice allows one to obtain the best detoxification effect from asana. Because massage produces an immediate and often dramatic effect, it can be helpful to initiate or activate a cleansing process and then continue the momentum with an asana. Combining the two modalities in this way is an effective method for creating long-lasting change.

Occasionally there are especially difficult substances being held by the body, -- toxic thoughts or the buildup of physical material- and working with a therapist who holds a safe space can be particularly helpful to allow the recipient to feel fully able to allow them to be released.

Just as we can create more flexibility in the body in asana through surrender, we can create more suppleness in the body when receiving a massage through softening, through directing the breath into an area of the body, even with just the mind or awareness.

In addition to the people quoted in this article, the author would like to thank Sasivipa, therapist at thai Sabai, Andrea Emmerich, Thai Yoga massage therapist and yoga teacher, L.B., tuina therapist at Kor, Yosel Tarnofsky and Rich Colella, Thai massage therapists.

Felicia Tomasko teaches yoga and practices Ayurveda in Santa Barbara and Los Feliz. She can be reached at ayurveda_andyoga@yahoo.com.