I remember the exact moment in 1977 on a train in Chicago.
I was working through the career-hunters book, What Color is Your Parachute?, and heard the words in my mind, “I guess I’m going to become a massage therapist!”
And sure enough, that’s what I’ve been ever since.
Here’s some of what I got from studying and doing massage therapy:
- I got to learn how to touch people in a way that sometimes made a profound difference in their lives.
- I got to learn anatomy that helps me, my clients and students understand how bodies work.
- I got to learn how to move in a way that is both graceful and strong.
- I got to learn physiology that reveals the miraculous processes in the body and mind.
- I got to work with a fascinating array of clients – from spiritual teachers, to bookies, to dancers and bus drivers, actors to day traders, psychologists, politicians, musical and martial artists, and marital counselors.
- I got to start a school that helped me reach out and touch, through our grads, hundreds of thousands of people we would otherwise never have touched.
- I got to study with some of the most wonderful, brilliant, imaginative teachers in the world– Rolfer, Daniel Blake, Dr. Fritz Smith, MD, Paul Brown, Bob King, and so many others.
- I got to feel every day that I didn’t need to question the worth of what I did.
- I got to receive bodywork sessions that triggered experiences that were as close to enlightenment as I’ve ever come.
- I got to meet what must be the kindest, brightest, most hopeful people there may be in any profession – massage students and therapists.
- I got to feel, no matter what missteps the world seems to make around me, that I am on a path that is absolutely positive for me and for others.
There is no good reason to persist in work that makes one less than happy. And there is every reason to begin, now rather than later, a happier, healthier life.