Like most of the best things in my life, Thailand and Thai Yoga Bodywork arrived as surprises.
On a May afternoon six years ago, I sat with a friend and a couple of cappuccinos at The Hungarian Pastry Shop in New York City's Upper West Side. I was a senior at Barnard College at the time, catching up with a former high school teacher who was in the neighborhood. That fall he would be heading over to Chiang Mai, Thailand to serve as the headmaster of an international boarding school. He told me that one of the teachers lined up to join him there had unexpectedly backed out. Knowing both my thirst for travel and that my graduation was imminent, by the last sip of our coffees he had offered me the newly vacant teaching position. "I don't mean to rush you," he concluded, "but I need to know your decision within forty-eight hours."
As an African Studies major, the only things I associated with Thailand at the time were rice fields and elephants. Clearly I had some research to do. A walk down to 86th Street and Broadway's Barnes and Noble's travel section led me to The Lonely Planet. Turning to the chapter on Chiang Mai, I learned that it was a city in the country's mountainous north, it had a yoga studio-and, best of all-I could get a two hour massage for a measly $6. With that, I closed the book, needing to know no more. That evening I accepted the job. This was no mistake; for from this decision evolved an unexpected love affair with Thailand and its healing art, traditional Thai massage.
Upon arriving in Chiang Mai for the first time, I caught onto a few things very quickly: Thailand's cuisine is mind-boggling delicious; everyone seemed to be smiling; and Thai massage is ubiquitous! Within my first 72 hours as an expatriate, I experienced my first Thai massage. Having only received Swedish and deep tissue massages, I didn't quite know what to expect: but as I am never one to decline an adventure, I succumbed willingly. Ensuing were two decadent hours of lying on a floor mat in a borrowed cotton tank top and pants and being pressed, rocked, twisted and stretched into the most ingenious of shapes and possibilities. I left feeling much like I do after practicing yoga: grounded and bright. Amazing! I was hooked-and puzzled, left wondering, "What was that?!"
I soon learned that Traditional Thai Massage (known as nuad boran in northern Thailand) arrived in Thailand approximately 2,500 years ago after its birth in India through Dr. Jivaka Kumar Bhacca, personal physician to the Buddha. Today, Thais continue to honor Dr. Jivaka as the "Father of Healing" in Thai medicine. Once landing in Thailand, this healing art thrived in Buddhist temples, where lay people would come for healing. From there, it spread out into villages where children treated their elders at the end of long days working in rice fields.
Due to its migration, Traditional Thai massage consists of a fusion of multi-cultural healing disciplines such as yoga, Ayurveda, Buddhist meditation, traditional Thai medicine, and Traditional Chinese Medicine. From this fusion arises interactive bodywork that combines deep tissue compression, acupressure and reflexology, energy line work, toning of internal organs, energy balancing, range-of-motion exercises, and assisted Hatha yoga postures. These techniques address muscles, connective tissue, joints, and the more ephemeral 10 major energy lines (or "Sen," similar to the nadis in the yogic system). A typical session runs around 2 hours. During this time, a Thai therapist uses her palms, thumbs, feet, elbows, forearms, and knees on a lucky recipient who is configured in some or all of five positions: supine, prone, side-lying, inverted, and seated. Relaxation, rejuvenation, and well-being follow.
Today, to the delight of many, Thai massage's migration persists. Thanks to an initial handful of pioneers, Thai massage has landed here in the United States where it adapts without compromising tradition. Here, such adaptations assume the names of "Thai Yoga Massage," "Thai Yoga Therapy," "Traditional Thai Massage," and "Thai Yoga Bodywork." One of these initial pioneers, Jonas Westring, serves as the director of Thai Yoga Healing Arts/Shantaya and leads workshops and certification trainings around the world. As a yoga practitioner and teacher, as well as a physical therapist, Westring has spent much of his life traveling and studying in Asia. It comes as no surprise, then, that Westring finds Thai massage to be the perfect container for melding Eastern and Western perspectives. Within his take on the theme, "Thai Yoga Bodywork," Westring reveals, "I marry biomechanics and yoga into the Thai tradition." While his clinical background compels him to keep safety a high priority, Westring laughs that it's really about "yoga, yoga, yoga." "By bringing in the yogic perspective for both recipient and giver," he adds, "It's a great place to introduce people to yoga and to maintain my own practice."
Using Thai Yoga as a self-help modality for the giver makes Westring's approach unique. After waking up at 4:30 or 5 in the morning and then working eight to nine hours a day as a physical therapy assistant in Mattawan, MI, Colleen Potter-Burton, a student of Westring's, still motivates to find time for her Thai Bodywork practice in the evenings. What makes this possible, she urges, is, "When you're going back to diaphragmatic breathing and connecting your breath to the receiver's, by the end of giving a two hour session I feel really wonderful!"
And helping oneself does not negate helping another. Maggie Hopson, also one of Westring's students, is a physical therapist, yoga instructor, and co-owner of High Desert Physical Therapy and Sports Rehabilitation in Winslow, Arizona. Thai Yoga Bodywork, she says, has "added a new dimension to how I approach rehabbing patients. In the past I would work on single joints, but this helped me to look at people more holistically." Patients with injuries such as a torn ACL-- and even those with more severe movement disorders like as Parkinson's, Rheumatoid arthritis, and Lupus-- benefit from Hopson's integrated approach. "These people feel great afterwards," she gushes, "Other patients in the clinic see this and are saying, 'Why aren't you doing that to me?!' "
But Hopson knows that applying advanced body manipulation techniques to injured individuals can be dicey. While her studies with other Thai massage teachers have concerned Hopson due to their lack of emphasis on anatomy, Hopson appreciates Westring's mindful and scientific approach. "Jonas teaches safety first," she says, "and that you need to keep a clear mind so you can sense resistance in the tissues and joints."
On a larger scale, safety is a real issue as Thai massage's popularity soars higher today than ever before. Some practitioners are more skilled than others, and the reality is that people are getting injured. In addition, with so many people practicing, there is concern about the integrity of the traditional form fading into extinction. Bob Haddad, a practitioner in Chapel Hill, N.C., has responded to these concerns by creating the non-profit organization, Thai Healing Alliance International (THAI). THAI aims to build more cohesiveness amongst practitioners and standardize certification. Basic membership requires a minimum of 30 training hours and evidence of an ongoing practice.
Yet beneath the techniques, certification requirements, and rapid growth, the irresistible magic of Thai massage lives on. What keeps an old pro like Westring still going back for more? He concurs with the masses: "It feels good."
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