My mom spoils me with regular massage appointments because she is afraid I will end up a stress ball. I love my my mom. Yesterday I was lying on the table receiving a drool-inducing rub down by a therapist named Nicole who also does neuromuscular therapy as well, when it hit me. A good massage is like really good sex.
Think about it. A really good massage relaxes your entire body, makes you forget everything else in the world even exists and leaves you blissed out on the table when it's over. Now take sex. Really good sex makes your immediate surroundings spin so fast nothing else but you and this other person exists at the given moment, and leaves you breathless and love-drunk on whichever surface you may have ended up on. This is all, of course, subject to personal preferences.
It goes the other way too though. I had a bad massage a while back and it very much was like bad sex. The therapist started out too fast too soon, used too much lotion goo, and didn't go deep enough to relax any of my tight muscles. There were glimmers of hope where it was ALMOST good, but it never quite reached a climax of "aahhhh" and I was left on the table frustrated, having been teased with the possibility of relief and relaxation. It was like being with a selfish lover who isn't paying attention to verbal and non-verbal signals you are giving to say "this? are you serious? this is as good as it gets?" And it may start to feel good, right before they finish, so then you are left mildly turned on and frustrated.
This line of thinking, I decided, can also be applied to the massage therapist themselves. A good massage therapist is like a really good lover. Now, again, this all up for interpretation according to ones own personal preferences, but I don't know yours, so we are going off of mine.
Most massage therapists will tell you at the beginning of a session to let them know if something is too deep or not deep enough. This is a nice little way of saying "speak the fuck up". One would hope that most lovers will at least get this far by saying something akin to "let me know if this is ok." I will admit though, if I were to keep score, half of my former lovers would flunk out right here and now. Hence, they are not still a part of my life. This is a healthy step to take, whether we are talking about the massage or the love-making, but what it doesn't take into account is that some of us were raised in a culture of pleasing others at the expense of ourselves, or really just don't know how to speak up for ourselves. This is unfortunate, and also leads to some unsatisfied customers. Plus, it's like telling a child "let me know how this feels as we go, ok?" when they are at the dentist and getting a tooth pulled for the first time. The child will have no idea what to expect and is therefore so appalled or shocked that they may not be able to say "You ass, that hurts!" Especially with the dentists fingers in their mouth.
Then there are the massage therapists that ask questions like "does this feel ok?" throughout the entire massage because they have accepted the fact that a good portion of paying customers won't speak up when it doesn't feel good, but will suffer through it. Do I even have to translate that into sex? I don't know how many of my friends have said something to the extent of "...so I just kinda laid there and waited for him to finish..." or "she was inanimate, I couldn't tell what was going on so I just kinda did what I thought would feel good and prayed for it to be over." Oy. As someone who does speak up, it is frustrating to watch people suffer through anything that is supposed to be pleasurable, such as massage, or sex. Maybe I should teach classes on how to be as mouthy as me? Now, if you are with someone who is a good match, and are both confident and comfortable in your own skin, there won't be a problem getting your needs, and if we are speaking of sex, their needs as well, satiated. This means though, that all parties involved have no problem speaking up about something the other person/people involved may be doing that isn't quite right, in addition to making an effort to ensure the other person is enjoying their tactics as well. But this does have a downside. I have had massage therapists and lovers alike that were too keen on checking in. I know, I know, I didn't think it was possible either. But it turns out that I can only be asked "does this feel ok?" so many times within the span of a few minutes before my reaction is something like "what do you mean does this feel ok? it did 3 seconds ago and you are doing the same damn thing! get on with it!", which does nothing for setting the mood. Take home lesson here? There is a fine balance...
There are the therapists and lovers that will take this a step further (I love these people) and not only ask, but look for non-verbal signs that point to the degree of enjoyment on your part. Bless these giving, attentive souls. The therapist will notice that when they press on that certain area of my back my toes curl reflexively, or when they grind their fingers into that massive knot on my shoulder, my entire body relaxes. The lover will notice the facial expression, the tenseness of your body, or a change in the noises you do or don't usually make. And the REALLY good ones find a non-intrusive way to check in and make sure they are interpretting you correctly. Yesterday Nicole said "You seem to like a lot more pressure than most in your neck and shoulders..." and I responded with a "yes, I like it deep" and she continued with what she was doing and I am pretty sure I ascended to an upper level of heaven.
There are also massage therapists who have branched out into other specialties that add to their ammo to knock your socks off with bliss. Such as the acupressure, neuromuscular wowie zowie, the back ground in sports medicine that eases my aching "you just made me run 6 miles" muscles. This is like having an adventurous lover I think. One who is willing try different things. This also has ups and downs. And it all depends on presentation. (And again, preference.) Assuming you are an adventurous explorer yourself, you may be pleasantly surprised when your massage therapist starts hammering down on that pressure point in your neck that makes your eyes water and your body sweat, just like when that last guy I dated not only like to try things like having sex free standing in the middle of the room, but could pull them off and end up being mutually beneficial. But what happens if you are not a person who relishes in experiences like this? It's uncomfortable and even a little miserable. In situations like these we would hope that the therapist and lover alike would seek consent before engaging in these specialties of theirs. (And consent is a whole other post of it's own.)
Now, this all led me to another line of thinking. I go through massage therapists like it's going out of style. Faster than I go through lovers, which is probably better (and safer) than going through lovers faster than therapists, right? But for the most part, it's not because I don't like the last, so I move on to the next. They are each unique and wonderful and my favorite for different reasons. Anthony knows how to knock my muscles back into shape after a really long run, Ally was really good at getting the tension in my shoulders to disperse, Dan was awesome all over the place but really good and getting my hips to release the tension and not be so crooked, Nicole makes my shoulders feel like they are strong yet floating. Does this make me a massage-whore? I think I prefer the term connesieur.
And no, I am not making a similar list of lovers...
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