Shiatsu
Although the term “Shiatsu” is beginning to become known
internationally in recent years, there are still many who are uncertain as to
exactly what Shiatsu is.
A good
translation that has been made for the term is “acupressure”, as a related-in-concept
therapy as acupuncture. Where acupuncture uses needles and/or
metallic stimulation on the human body, Shiatsu utilizes human finger pressure
of the therapist to stimulate some essential points of the human body, which
will in turn cause certain “shifts” throughout the patient’s body.
And yet,
there are terms such as “Shiatsu Massage” giving Shiatsu an impression of a
therapeutic form related to a number of massage therapeutic forms that exist,
which is also true.
The term
“Shiatsu”, which is Japanese, is written by two Chinese characters. “Shi,” which stands for finger, and
“atsu,” which stands for “pressure”.
As the
term expresses, Shiatsu is a therapeutic method consisting mainly of, if not
all, “finger pressure”.
At Energy
Room, the therapist will press “points” all over the patient’s body, in order
to loosen up the muscles just as in massage therapy, and for the ki (chi)
energy to flow throughout the patient’s body, which is just like in
acupuncture. These are the two
major aims.
By locating the “effective loosening
points” of a given muscle, which may be on or between the muscle fibers, the
therapist can loosen the entire muscle simply by applying finger pressure. Once the muscle is loosened, other
muscles within the same body can be loosened in the same manner, thereby
ultimately loosening the muscle groups of the patient’s body. What distinguishes Shiatsu from other
forms of therapy is that it solely relies on the fingertip pressure of the
therapist, and such therapeutic stimulation can be quite intense and is very
effective.
When all
the muscle groups are loosened, it will lead to the entire human body being
loosened, and the mental looseness follows, in the form of stress-relief. There is a therapeutic principle that
supports that if one can truly loosen all the muscle groups within his or her
own body, completely at will, most bodily malfunctions will either disappear or
heal at an extremely fast rate.
This principle, here at Energy Room, is more of a “golden foundation”
than a mere principle. There are
numerous instances of people exerting their true potential, even those
sometimes considered supernatural by others, when they are able to get
themselves in this state.
The
second point of focus is making the ki (chi) energy flow throughout the body
without stagnation. Once the muscles are loosened, the patient will in most
cases feel his or her blood circulate and the extremities become warm. Feeling the ki (chi) energy flow is
quite similar, only that it is very difficult to explain verbally, and is even
more difficult to explain medically or scientifically. However, when valid stimulation is given
to the proper “points” to encourage the ki (chi) energy to flow, the body will
become balanced, and the patient, if focused and sensitive enough, will feel
the “flow”.
