To Change your beliefs about money requires the understanding of how beliefs are formed, questioning your beliefs and changing your perspective through the process.

The process for me has been quite painful and I also recommend that you work with a good therapist or life coach.  I have both and a supervisor and a peer group that I meet with regularly.

The thing about money is that it is just money.  The problem is really that we tend to attach so man emotions to it and equate it to our own self worth.   Massage therapists have a tendency to say things like “It is not about the money” or not need much in the way of money.

Steve Capalleni talks about this in his book “Making the Switch to Being Rich
“.   If you haven’t heard of Steve -he is one of the prominent leaders in the spa industry and has written on spa therapies and working in spas.  In his book he talks about how massage therapists become massage therapists to keep themselves in the moneyless bubble.   They think that being a massage therapist is more about helping people than making money and often wonder how they can charge for something so loving and caring.   We keep proving over and over again that we can’t make a lot of money and then defend the position of having no money by saying we are doing more good than anything.  He says “if there is an entire group of people who are almost all inside the moneyless bubble, it’s massage therapists”

Where beliefs about money come from.

Beliefs are formed at an early age.  Beliefs are really just the opinions of others that are handed down to us by our families and in school.   The whole grading system and having to do good and not be wrong in school instills fear of making mistakes.   The most common  belief that people have about money is that money is the root of all evil.   You can tell what your belief is about money when you think about people who have a lot of money.  Do you feel jealous of someone driving a Mercedes or even a Bentley?  Do you wonder what they had to do to get that?  Do you think that they must have had to sell their soul to get it or that they are greedy or doing something like taking advantage of people to get that kind of money?

Your beliefs can be found in your feelings and reactions to the world around you.  Since most of our beliefs are really unconscious because they have become so ingrained in our brains and bodies, feelings are the only way to get to them.  Whenever you are feeling anything but love or joy you can know you are buying into an old belief that just isn’t true.  It does sort of bend your mind to start thinking like that.   It is sort of ironic that the whole field of being a massage therapist is based on feeling.  You can learn whatever technique or special type of massage and the only thing the client will know is how it feels to them.  The don’t care if it is myofacial release, cranio-sacral therapy or effleurage.  They just know how it feels.

There are so many other beliefs attached to making money.  We think money will provide us financial security.  It won’t.   I know people who are multi-millionaires and they can’t sleep at night because they worry they don’t have enough.   We think money will bring us freedom.  You can have a ton of money to do what you want when you want or you can have no money at all and be a beach bum and have all the freedom you want.  The other motivation for making money is Power.  You can be like Donald Trump and Mother Theresa – yes Mother Theresa was all about power.  She basically ran the richest church in the world.   Some people look to money to feel loved or get love.  Someone who does  is the massage therapist who charges less than they need to make or doesn’t charge for no-shows or last minute cancellations.  Instead of setting boundaries around money, they feel that it is more important to be nice to people and let them slide and they incur the loss of income.

Beliefs about money are also seen in things like how you promote your massage business or not.   People can easily blame their lack of success in getting clients on the economy being down.  While yes the economy is struggling, it doesn’t mean that you have to be struggling.  It is easier to blame the economy than to take responsibility and do whatever is needed to get the clients that you need.   Do you have a website that is at the top of Google for your keywords -massage, your city?   Do you have a network of other caregivers that refer to you?  Just doing one mailing to 100 people and not getting any response does not mean anything.  Do the same mailing once a week and keep changing the wording until it works and send it to targeted potential clients until it does work.

Teach classes to groups of lay people on massage – like for couples or friends or co-workers.  Offer free classes at your church or other group.  Go out into the community and give and you will soon find yourself on the receiving end.   The struggling economy only means you have to do things differently and start finding things to do to get the clients that you need.   It isn’t easy and it takes also planning financially to start a business.   Do you have enough in the bank to live for a few years before you start your business?

Tools for changing your beliefs.

The biggest thing that I think helped me start changing my beliefs was learning that my feelings are really the key to figuring them out.  Your feelings tell you what you are unconsciously thinking.  So since you can’t really know because it is unconscious – you can start asking -”What would someone be thinking that had that in their life”.   Just start guessing.

The other part of this is that while you can’t really change your feelings – you can change your thinking.  Figure out what you can do to start changing the feelings.  Esther Hicks has a great explanation in one of her books The Astonishing Power of Emotions: Let Your Feelings Be Your Guide She uses a great analogy of having bad feelings is pointing you upstream in a river.  It is hard going and difficult to get anywhere.   You can just change the feeling one little bit to turn your boat around and head downstream. You change the feeling by changing what you are thinking or saying.

Your emotions are what indicate the difference between what you desire and your belief or your expectations around whatever it is that you are struggling with.  Your emotions tell you that you are moving away from your desires.  Your emotions are your guidance system to understanding why you are getting the results you are getting.

It takes much more than a few blog posts to really get this.  I read and studied and worked with a financial counselor to start challenging my beliefs about money and success.  It is still an ongoing process and always will be.  The more conscious you become about one thing it has a way of bringing up things in other areas and you can also see deeper aspects in the same area.

Related posts:

1. Our Beliefs Create our Feelings
2. Understanding Beliefs for Massage Therapists
3. It’s not about the money

I am renaming it what it is really – an online massage therapy professional support and coaching group.  Using my 20 years of practice as a massage therapist and 10 years of writing this website and working with massage therapists in building their practice, my intention for this online group is for it to be what YOU want it to BE!

What help do you need in building your massage practice?  What help do you need in finding a job in massage that pays $40 an hour and gives you 20 hours of massages a weekor more?

Do you have a website that works – meaning one that gets you a steady flow of new clients no matter what struggles the economy is going through?

What are your beliefs about money?

What struggles do you have in managing your money?

Whatever you need, you can ask and get help with.

I am only taking 50 members.  Each member will fill out a profile and introduce themselves and start sharing the details of their situations and asking questions.  It is all done online in a private Yahoo Group.

The fee for joining is $50 a month with a 6 month commitment.  I ask for this commitment because it will take that long to get to know each other and really be able to address the deeper underlying issues around building a practice.  If you are one of the first 25 members you will only have to pay $25 a month for as long as you want to stay in the group with the minimum commitment of 6 months.

If you are in need of a website and purchase a Site Build it! website and business development package during the next few weeks of the Halloween Special where you purchase one SBI! website system and get the second one for only $100 (or purchase just one SBI! system for the regular $299 a year) You will get the first 2 months of the support group for free!  ( You need to purchase directly through clicking on the banner below or emailing me directly to order)

If you don’t already know about Site Build it! (SBI)- it is the webhosting and business building system that has lead me to be so successful online.  I just recently sold a website that I was working on to a developer. (www.massagetherapycareers.com)  The only reason I sold it was because it was for a fairly sizeable offer (over $30,000) that would allow me to move further in developing my sites and creating a new site.  What I learned from creating www.massagetherapycareers.com will allow me to create an even more effective site with even better information.  I know that using SBI! again I will be able to get to the same amount of traffic and income that I was getting before (about 500 visitors a day and about $700 a month in adsense income alone).   I am not telling you this to brag but hopefully to inspire you and give you further proof that SBI! is real and is not hype and it works.   You can buy one website for your massage practice and one to develop into an online business of some sort.  It comes with software that helps you brainstorm a profitable niche and tells you everything you need to do.  While I make most of my income just from Google Adsense there are other ways of making money and SBI! tells you how and helps you every step of the way and now you can also join the support group to get the help you need.

So be sure to let me know if you have any questions about either the support group/coaching group or SBI! – the website and business building system.

Related posts:

1. Massage Mastermind Group Forming
2. Just what does Sitebuildit! offer you?
3. How to choose a webhosting company/service

For me being a massage therapist for 20 years has been my path to self awareness and awakening.  From the beginning just getting the massage myself has helped me heal and helped me grow as a person.  It has helped me grow up in many ways.

The first half of my career I would say I was probably fixing people too much – always giving my advice and always thinking I know best.  With the help of participating in peer supervision to help me discover my real reasons for helping, I have learned to be a better listener.  I don’t assume anything not even the idea that massage can assist people in healing.

When I first started out in massage, I started because I thought it would be a career where I could help people and it would be more meaningful to be a part of people’s healing process.  Making money was no where on my mind.  I had read a book called “Do what you love and the money will follow” by Marsha Sinetar.   So, I was doing what I loved.  I also didn’t need much money back then or want much else except the freedom to set my own schedule and work for myself.

I now know it isn’t about taking care of people.  It is taking care of myself so that I can be present with others on their path- whatever that may be – living with pain, stress, ill health and happiness.  The more I learned to take care of myself by setting boundaries around money, my time and my massage business, the more successful I became.  The more I set boundaries around cancellation policies (making people pay the full price when they missed a session), dual relationships, selling products to massage clients, becoming friends with clients and even dating clients (which used to be allowed and more of acceptable) the happier I became in my life and in my massage practice.

I now write about what I have learned and share it with others.  I often write for my own healing and I still am learning how to write for my readers.

What have you learned from being a massage therapist?

Related posts:

1. 8 Qualities of a Wealthy Massage Therapist
2. Profile of a Massage Therapist
3. Why become a massage therapist?

The best thing you can do to take care of yourself is to become more conscious of your unmet needs and repressed/suppressed feelings so that you can be more present in your massage sessions for your clients. That is what they pay you for really. Your unmet needs and old emotions are what get projected onto others and onto clients in the form of counter-transference. I have written about countertransference before here.

Your unmet needs and old emotions are projected into your practice, your money issues and your personal relationships.  Self  care that addresses these issues and helps you to become more aware of these issues can often reduce the physical stress of doing massage.  The more you take care of yourself in that way, the more confident you become in asking for what you need and creating boundaries to take care of yourself in the client/massage therapist relationship.

Being financially responsible is one such method of self care which usually is not mentioned in self care classes/articles.   Having the money that you need to live and run your business is the highest form of self care possible. The other way to take care of yourself is taking care of your personal needs for appreciation, love and nurturing. When you combine the two things you won’t have to worry about body mechanics or how hard you work on clients or working more than the agreed upon time.

Helping has a way of bringing up our unmet needs. It shows up in counter-transference. The reasons why massage therapists want to help others is usually filled with unconscious unmet needs and old feelings. Countertransference influences the client interactions and the healing process sometimes hindering it. When you are in a state of countertransference , projecting your old issues and feelings onto a client it can cause you to lose the objectivity you need to see the client clearly and hear the client clearly.

In simple terms, projection happens when you are not aware of your feelings or needs so you ‘project’ them onto someone else. Projections can cause reactions such as always giving advice to a client. To become more present means to be able to feel the feeling that is causing the projection (are you following this? It is hard to understand since it is unconscious.)

Remember – this is an unconscious process. Everyone is unconscious most of the time. Since it is unconscious you are not aware of what you are really doing. Becoming more conscious is a very complex process. We live our lives with many blind spots. Some people won’t even believe they are doing something unconsciously because it seems so real. It is real.

The way to track your thoughts and beliefs is through your feelings and becoming more aware of them.

Supervision is one such way of interaction that helps you to become more self aware.  Supervision is not someone telling you what to do in the regular definition of supervision in the workplace.  Supervision is the process of working with a more experienced massage therapist in order to understand your practice issues more and help you become more aware of yourself.  You can learn more about the process of supervision on the website.

Working with a skilled psychologist can also take you deeper into your old patterns of behaving onto can do wonders for your massage practice and personal life. Since all relationships start in transference and the therapeutic relationship has a way of intensifying that transference it is important to find out more about your unmet needs. For the most part all we can do is grieve the loss of never having had them met as it is too late to get them met. Then it is a matter of taking personal responsibility for yourself and actions.  The more you take care of yourself, your unmet needs and deal with the emotions, the more present you are able to be in your sessions and be there for clients.   The more you take care of your internal self the easier it is to do those external self care things like setting boundaries around your time and financial needs.

See also : Understanding Projections

Handling Projections

Why do you do massage?

Related posts:

1. Countertransference for massage therapists
2. Transference for Massage Therapists
3. The therapeutic relationship for massage therapists

Ben Benjamin author of the book “The Ethics of Touch” defines transference as this:

Clients defer to the practitioner’s judgment because they desire to be helped by an authority figure that possesses greater knowledge, healing ability and, therefore, power.

Since a power differential exists in any health care relationship, the client may be inclined to respond to the practitioner as he or she would other authority figures, and in doing so, may recreate elements of similar past relationships. This situation is known as transference, a normal, unconscious phenomenon that appears during a therapeutic process. Professional helping relationships usually have a strong transference element in which the parent-child relationship is unconsciously re-established. In transference, unresolved needs, feelings and issues from childhood are transferred onto the helper.

Elliott Greene author of the book “The Psychology of the Body” writes this:

Transference is the displacement or transfer of feeling, thoughts, and behaviors originally related to a significant person, such as a parent, onto someone else, such as the massage therapist. It is a common reaction of clients to their therapists. A bit of transference happens in most relationships in which there is feeling present. Usually, transference-related feelings were formed in the past, so it could be said that these feelings transfer from the past to the present. In transference then, the client relates to the therapist and present moment as if the therapist were the significant person. In this sense, transference is a projection of the internal drama of the client, and the therapist is assigned a particularly important role and script.”

Nina McIntosh in her book “The Educated Heart” says this about Transference.

“Transference may sound complex and unusual, but it’s actually part of our everyday life even outside of our offices. It’s normal for any of us to bring the past into our present relationship. In fact it happens all the time. They are magnified ina manual therapy session because of the intimacy of the setting, the clients altered state and the way that the practitioner/client roles mimic those of the parent/child.”"Transference isn’t a rational process.

Terrie Yardly-Nohr in her book “Ethics for Massage Therapists” says this:

“The very nature of the therapeutic relationship allows transference to happen easily. Bodywork can trigger a variety of emotions from clients such as anger, frustration, sadness, fear, or joy. These feelings are generally the result of some emotion the client felt in the past towards another person.”

Cidalia Paiva in her book “Keeping the Professional Promise” says this:

“Transference refers to those situations where the patient projects onto the therapist old feelings or attitudes they had about significant people in their past, often parental figures. Transference is often referred to as ‘the unreal relationship in therapy’. The roots of transference are most often found in early childhood, and it constitutes a repetition of past conflicts with significant people in our lives.

So what is transference then?

Simply put, transference happens when there is difference in authority that resembles the parent-child relationship. The client who comes to a massage therapist receives the nurturing that they never received as a child and puts the massage therapist on a pedestal. The nurturing touch brings out the old feelings and emotions that were repressed or suppressed in early childhood. The client unconsciously begins to see the massage therapist as the nurturing parent and it can bring up feelings of attachment that were not resolved growing up. It is when the client unconsciously thinks that the massage therapist is their mother or father or other significant caretaker. Note the word – UNCONSCIOUS.

Attachment is what happens between a mother and child that allows the child to grow and build self esteem. The infant knows learns about themselves through touch. There are various stages of attachment that occur in child development where the infant feels like they are one with the mother. (And of course they once were in eutero.) As a child grows they learn that they are separate from the mother. This is where things often go astray. If a secure attachment is not formed in their early part of life, they will have life long challenges that result from that.

Massage and nurturing touch re-enacts the process of development. I actually think this is also why spa treatments are so popular with the use of healing waters and body wraps. Getting regular massage and developing a relationship with a massage therapist in which the client feels nurtured and cared for as if they were receiving it from their mothers can help heal the grief of not ever getting those early childhood needs met.

Transference is really important yet difficult to understand. The best way to understand it is to experience it. You may or may not have had some of these feelings arise when you were getting a massage from someone:

• Feeling like you don’t want the massage to ever end
• Not wanting to leave the office
• Seeing the massage therapist outside of the office and wanting to follow them where ever they go.

Or from the other aspect seeing it in your clients:

• bringing you flowers or special gifts
• hearing about people’s personal problems
• being asked to make exceptions in scheduling and payment options.
• inviting you out socially as a friend
• asking you out on a date or making other advances on you.

Or if you ever worked with a psychologist or mental health professional in therapy, you can come to learn more about transference from seeing your own. Becoming aware of your projections in a therapy setting can be a painful experience. It is a matter of getting a look at your unconscious thoughts through relationship. It can be a very eye-opening process and really lasts a lifetime.

While some of these things may just seem like normal things, it is difficult to know the difference. You probably won’t know the difference.

What you can do is create a code of ethics and a set of policies and procedures for your practice that will help you make proper decisions in any situation. It is having boundaries that teach people when they are in transference that you are separate from them is what will allow the person to heal and build self esteem.

The other thing about transference is that it not only occurs in these helping types of relationships but almost all relationships. Friendships, significant others, family members and the person who checks you out at the grocery store who seems to ‘look just like your mother”.

Reading and learning everything you can about transference can also help. These are some of my favorite books:

Getting the Love You Want: A Guide for Couples, 20th Anniversary Edition

Take Me To Truth: Undoing the Ego

The The Psychology of the Body (Lww Massage Therapy & Bodywork Educational Series)

Ethics for Massage Therapists

The The Educated Heart: Professional Boundaries for Massage Therapists, Bodyworkers, and Movement Teachers (LWW In Touch Series)

Issues and Ethics in the Helping Professions
On Becoming a Person: A Therapist’s View of Psychotherapy

Related posts:

1. Countertransference for massage therapists
2. Dating Massage Clients
3. Speaking of Transference.

So many massage therapists avoid creating policies like cancellation policies, late fees, no show policies and when they do they have a difficult time enforcing them.

By creating these policies it will let your client become more informed about who you are and what you do. They can then decide if you are a good match for them to work with. It also gives you the opportunity to choose who you want to work with and create your ideal massage practice. I struggled with these things too for years as a massage therapist thinking it was what I needed to do to get and keep clients. I thought that by not charging for missed appointments or working longer on people when they are late for an appointment that I was making an extra effort for them to like me and keep coming as a client. I thought I needed to take everyone as a client regardless of whether or not they fit in with my ideal client. In doing that for more than 15 years, I can now see that it was part of the causes for my burnout in the mid 90′s. Giving away your time, money and energy is just downright draining. Period. You may think it is doing the client a favor and helping them more.

I wrote about this previously and mentioned a readers poll done by Massage Magazine last year about their cancellation policies and the ways they enforce their cancellation policies. There is of course such a wide variety of ways and answers.

The thing is to find out what works best for you in supporting you as a business owner and as a person. On one hand you need to make money to pay the bills. Since the number of clients that you can see in one day is limited and having just one client not show up or cancel at the last minute can effect your income significantly. Enforcing the policy sometimes and not on others can be confusing to the clients. As Dr Phil says – “We teach people how to treat us.

While things do happen to people – getting stuck in traffic, sick kids, sick themselves, issues at work – who is responsible for the clients actions? Them or you?

Setting strict cancellation policies may end the relationship. The question is do you really want someone as a client who does not respect you or your time?

Creating well thought out policies can help you create a stronger massage practice.

-What is your policy for when someone cancels with less than 24 or even 48 hours?

- What is your policy for working on someone who arrives late to their appointment? Do you work longer if you have the time? Or do you stay to the alloted time frame?

-What do you do when someone just does not show up period. They just forgot for whatever reason. Then when you call them, they are not apologetic but blame you for not calling to remind them or say they don’t want to pay for something that they aren’t receiving?

- Do you have a cancellation policy that is clearly written and placed on your website and intake form? Do you verbally state your cancellation policy?

There are a variety of ways to handle these situations:

• Charge a minimum fee like $35 or half your session fee for a no show.
• Charge your whole session fee for a missed appointment.
• Choose to work on someone who is late for the full appointment time if you have the time.
• Give people one session to forget and then remind them of the policy and charge them for any further missed appointments.
• Don’t charge anything or say anything and you just eat the cost for the lost time and energy.  (How does that one feel?!)
• Allow for extra-ordinary circumstances such as sickness, deaths in the family, real emergencies.

I also just did a quick search for ‘massage cancellation policies and found a variety of ways that people are communicating their policies some of which are very interesting with one person even apologizing for having to enforce the policy.

Here are some examples that I just copied off some websites ( I know- don’t get upset.)

Everyone’s time is valuable, that’s why we have to follow a few simple rules.

In today’s hectic world unplanned issues come up for all of us. We recognize this fact, but we respectfully request that you cancel your scheduled appointment by phone or e-mail a minimum of 24 hours in advance. That way the open slot can be filled with someone needing an appointment.

Failing two scheduled appointments in a row or three appointments within six months will result in a scheduling hold for Massage Appointments being placed on your account. This means you will not be able to schedule appointments with the Massage Therapy department.

You can also just do a search yourself and use some of the examples you find to create your own policy.  The most important thing to think about is what you need to create a solid massage business.
I guess I am always amazed when people think they won’t have to pay for a missed appointment or have any obligation what so ever for their commitment (which just happened to me only for the second time in 20 years which is why I am writing about this again!) I think that people do feel bad for missing appointments but it may just be too hard to admit that they do. The feeling will overwhelm them and move them into a defense mode – blaming you, blaming traffic, blaming their boss rather than accepting responsibility. Most doctors have cancellation policies. If you book a flight and miss the flight you have to pay a large fee usually. If you get tickets to a symphony and miss it or are late, you don’t get reimbursed.

While creating these polices will be a very personal thing and enforcing them another just keep in mind that what you do is also affecting the massage profession as a whole.  Letting people get away with no shows, late cancellations and late arrivals is teaching people how to treat us (massage therapists) as a whole.  What policy do you need in place to create a successful and rewarding massage practice and profession?

Related posts:

1. Creating Policies and Procedures
2. Cancellation Policies for massage therapists
3. Recession Proof Your Massage Business

When I read “A New Earth” a few years ago when it first came out, I couldn’t put the book down and it became an inspiration for me to continue writing about such things despite many massage therapists not quite getting it that they can build a massage practice using similar principles of becoming more authentic by being present.

So many massage therapists are caught up in knowing more, learning more and doing more and the client usually gets caught in the middle. Part of the problem is how we are trained to ‘fix’ in massage school and our new role with the medical profession requires us to do it even more by reporting on improvements and having treatment stopped when function returns rather than when pain is resolved.

I was at a spa a few weeks ago and overheard a massage therapist in the hallway talking to someone who had just come out of the massage room and telling her how stressed the client was and how much more work the person needed. I could feel the tension in the air. The person who had just gotten a massage was being berated for how much stress they had rather than being honored for who they are. Now I am sure I am reading into things because I don’t know the whole story but it is examples like these or other stories of massage therapists saying things like “I just need to fix their pain” or ‘it is my duty to tell people about mercury poisoning and other possibilities that could be causing their health issues or I don’t feel like I am doing my job.

What “A New Earth” talks about is our roles that we take on to protect ourselves and our egos from suffering and how that creates more. But it is suffering that can free us from our pain and unhappy lives.

The ego is not something that is bad or that we need to get rid of. He says “It isn’t wrong, it is just unconscious” We are alive today because our egos are invested in ourselves. Tolle says that ‘Our egos are just are false self. It is the unconscious part of ourself.” The way to become more conscious is to become more present and aware of our egos.

But awakening from being unconscious is a little like thawing out from having frost bite – it is painful as we start to regain feeling.

A common thing that I often hear from massage therapist that I work with is about how they don’t feel like they know enough to help people. Tolle says this is actually the best place to be. When you can admit you don’t know enough you can realize that you are enough just as you are.

Another way to become aware of your ego is to become aware of what you are feeling in your body. As massage therapists we have the unique opportunity to help people feel their bodies more. ( I actually think this is more important than any specific massage technique or method.) Tolle says “Body awareness not only anchors you in the present moment, it is a doorway out of the prison that is the ego. It also strengthens the immune system and the body’s ability to heal.”

I also so often see massage therapists who become their role thinking that they are the only ones that can help someone and that massage is the end all answer to the worlds problems. I used to think like that when I first started out saying things like ‘if everyone got a massage once a week there would be world peace” (well there might be!) I also hear them complaining about things like working for chiropractors who take advantage of them or not having enough clients because of the economy or whatever the complaint is at the moment. Tolle says that “Complaining is one of the ego’s favorite ways of strengthening itself”. It makes us feel better to complain. And clients come into us complaining about this or that, this work situation or family situation and they come in with their pain and their attachment to their pain.

He talks about roles and how we take on roles to get the needs of the ego met.
How can we as massage therapists learn to become aware of our roles and learn to just be as a massage therapist?

How can we learn to serve and become more present with ourselves and with our clients to help make “A New Earth?”

Related posts:

1. Effective Massage Therapists Master Their Emotions
2. The Drama Triangle- The rescuer massage therapist
3. Self care for massage therapists

The basic things to understand are things like this isn’t therapy. It isn’t one person telling another what to do. It is learning to listen and provide empathy in order for others to grow on their own in a supportive group. It is basically what happens on your massage table with clients when you remain present with them and learn to become aware of when you are fixing others on a grander scale. I have written a few pages on my website www.massagepracticebuilder.com, about how to set up and participate in a peer supervision group that you can read yourself, but to really learn how to work in a peer group it is necessary to work with an experienced massage peer supervisor who has at least 5 years experience in doing massage and preferably the same amount of time participating in peer supervision themselves.

One of my basic rules which I have actually adopted from Parker Palmer’s groups which he calls ‘circles of trust’ is “No fixing, no saving, no setting each other straight.” When I inform a new group member of this they often are left wondering what they are going to say or do in a peer supervision group.

A peer supervision group topics is really determined by the participants and their needs. The first few minutes of the group are spent checking in with each person to see how much time they would like to have to speak in that session. While there may not be enough time for everyone to speak, the others often learn just as much if not more from the person sharing their issue or story. ( an in person peer group size is usually from 3-8 people.)

After starting and running my own unofficial and free of charge online peer supervision group (massage_practice_builder at Yahoo Groups ) in the form of an online discussion group (which I started in about 2000 and used for sending out my newsletter and now is open discussions ), I have realized that there are so many lurkers and the group is dominated by a few people who like to speak out that so many are missing out that I have decided to start a private online peer supervision group where participation will be mandatory (well to a certain extent.) The other thing I am seeing from getting regular requests for email consultations is that there are many massage therapists out there who are in rural areas and don’t have a network of support so again the online peer supervision group will fill that need. Having a smaller group will allow participants to get to know each other better and be able to talk about the deeper issues that surround their practice. I will be facilitating the group and also writing a regular newsletter to stimulate conversation. I will be charging a small fee for my time and 20 years experience as a massage therapist and 5 years in peer supervision. To find out more and apply to join please see my website www.massagepracticebuilder.com .

Related posts:

1. Peer Supervision – Who needs it?
2. Peer Supervision – What the heck is it?
3. Peer Supervision Groups

The thing is that the best way to really understand what peer supervision is about is to experience it first hand. Once I participated and understood then I said – yes it is peer supervision.

Of course in my opinion every massage therapist needs to participate in peer supervision groups and I have been thinking about what needs to be done to get it included in legal requirements of becoming a massage therapist – it is that important.

A massage therapist needs peer supervision if they want to become the best massage therapist that they can be. I wrote up some information on my website about who needs peer supervision.

While I think that people who have survived the 5 years in business mark as a massage therapist are drawn to peer supervision more, it can be really helpful for a massage therapist who is still in school or just starting out to get the assistance that they need in setting up and learning to run a massage business. Most people starting out are too focused on things like money and getting clients and think that they don’t need peer supervision. They also don’t really understand articles like “In the Service of Life” or books like “how can I help by Ram Dass. I know I didn’t when I was first starting out and there was no way that anyone could tell me that that was me in the article and book. It isn’t until one has struggled long enough or starts to feel burned out that the seek out peer supervision when it is the exact thing that can help prevent it and help a massage practice flourish.

So I am starting an online peer supervision group that you can read more about at my website – www.massagepracticebuilder.com. It won’t be quite the same as meeting in person because you get so much from hearing people’s voices and seeing people’s physical reaction, but it will be a way that we can start learning and sharing from each other in a much deeper way to help protect the future of the massage profession.

Related posts:

1. Peer Supervision Groups
2. Forms of Peer Supervision
3. Peer Supervision – What the heck is it?

It is really the underlying dynamic in most relationships but because of the power differential that occurs in the therapeutic relationship, the drama triangle can be more evident in a client/massage therapist relationship. There are three positions of the drama triangle -the rescuer, the victim and the persecutor. There is usually a combination of them at work in a therapeutic relationship or any relationship for that matter. One position leads to the next. The rescuer can become the persecutor or victim and any combination of roles.

As massage therapists we are often taught to ‘fix’ a clients pain and injuries. Many massage therapists come to the profession wanting to ‘help’ others. Clients come to us looking to be fixed and taken care of. One of the roles on the drams triangle is the rescuer. We think we need to get the client out of pain.

People who are in pain or sick or injured quickly take on the role of the victim -wanting someone to fix the condition for them. This is the basis for modern medicine. Needing to be fixed they will find a rescuer to help them. As massage therapists we often take on the role of rescuer but we can also move into any of the other roles with clients and also within ourselves. Becoming aware of how we rescue (help, fix) is not an easy process. It doesn’t just stop overnight. When the process occurs internally taking on various roles at different times, it is usually can lead to feeling stuck in building a practice or finding a massage job. We blame the economy or bad spa owners for our lack of success.

Rescuers need to rescue to feel good about themselves. They need victims to be successful. A rescuer thinks everyone needs their help even those who are not directly asking for it. Rescuers don’t know how to take care of themselves so they focus on others. Rescuers usually have deep unconscious beliefs about themselves that they are not good enough so they rescue to feel good about themselves. Rescuers see others pain so clearly because they are filled with pain of their own. It easier to help others with their pain instead of addressing their own pain. Rescuers are not usually aware of their own pain or even think that they have any issues to work through. They are so busy helping they can’t see their own pain. They say things like “I just want to fix this psoas” or “if only I knew more anatomy, I could fix this”. It is a very unconscious process meaning that most are not even aware of the dynamics and their own part in each interaction. Rescuing others tells the other person that they are not good enough or smart enough to help themselves. Rescuers often end up underming others and reinforcing the victim stance. It is hurting more than helping. Rachel Remen MD explains this beautifully in her article “In the Service of Life”.

The early child/parent relationship sets us up for the drama triangle with parents often taking on the role of rescuer. The child isn’t old enough, smart enough and needs to be protected from the world. When are early childhood needs aren’t met ( which they rarely are ever totally met even with the best of parenting) we often are left waiting to be rescued. We fear asking for help because we may be further abandoned and hurt. We begin helping others so that they will become dependent on us and not leave us.

The thing is that every person has within themselves the power to find the answers to their health problems, business building problems or whatever they are faced with. You and you alone are your best source of advice if you can only begin to access your true self and listen to yourself. As a massage therapist our role is to be present for others as they uncover their own answers and true self. The thing is that you have to know your own self first before you can do this with a client.

People don’t even become aware of their rescuing habits until it becomes too painful to bear anymore. This is usually when a career in massage comes to an end but it doesn’t have to end if one can find the courage to begin to get off of the triangle.

The way off of the triangle is to start learning to feel the pain of abandonment and/or the pain of not getting one’s early needs met. It means learning to take care of yourself in every aspect of your life from being financially sound, healthy, eating the right things, exercising and taking car of your internal needs for acceptance, love, appreciation and recognition. It is about becoming more aware of what you are feeling when a client arrives at your door wanting to be fixed. Staying present with the feeling means that you can have the feeling and not act on it but use it to become aware of what you are thinking or what belief you have about yourself that is creating this need to rescue.

Changing doesn’t happen overnight. It is a process and it can be supported by getting regular peer supervision sessions with an experience peer.

Related posts:

1. Drama Triangle
2. The victim and the rescuer
3. A New Earth for massage therapists