Not long ago I went for a Lomi Lomi massage, the Hawaiian style: warm oil, soft, flowing strokes, like a dance over the body. What could possibly happen after something so tender? A couple of hours later I felt as if a steamroller had gone over me. Everything ached, and there was a heaviness I could not explain. I want to tell you why that was good news.
Three reactions
When we meet danger, the body has three answers: fight, flight or freeze. They are faster than thought and older than language, and they are the reason our ancestors survived. They are not good or bad. They are part of the animal in us, and they switch on without asking.
A wild animal lives each reaction to the end. It runs, it shakes, and the cycle closes. We live among people, and people have opinions about our behaviour. So we swallow the reaction. The fear, the anger, the shock stay in the body as something frozen: a held breath, a raised shoulder, a jaw that never fully opens.
Armour coming off
That heaviness after my gentle massage was armour coming off. In a safe space the body let go of a layer of holding it had carried for years, and then reacted, the way it would have reacted back then if it had been allowed to. For someone else the reaction is the opposite: a surge of energy, because the layer that was holding down anger was also holding down life.
How I work with it
I work in what I call the mother tradition. We do not try to break anything, and we do not try to fix anything. There is nothing wrong with your body. It has always adapted to the situation it was in. We simply let energy move, let feelings rise into awareness, and give them time to be lived through gently.
I never know in advance how a session will unfold or which elements it will be made of. But I know one thing: whatever happens will be freeing for the body. Does that mean it never hurts? I cannot promise that. Sometimes pain is a litmus paper, a signal to stop and see what is hiding behind it.
What to do with the heavy day
Drink water. Walk slowly. Sleep early. Do not plan anything big for the evening after a session. On the other side of the heaviness there is usually more room in the body than before, and more energy than you remember having.
One more thing. The space you come to is already working for you before I touch you. A place that supports, opens and invites you to feel. That is why the room matters as much as the hands.
Want to feel this in your own body?