Pro Touch Manifesto and National Massage Day

Manifesto for a Pro-Touch Society and National Massage Day Monday October 1st 18

In 2014 when I still owned a large school of massage (that was why our anatomy and physiology course was created, for our students) I created a Manifesto for a Pro-Touch Society and National Massage Day.

This new venture is being created by the current owner of NMD, Liz Badger - with my full blessing. The Therapist Business Club is sponsoring and hosting all of the public information and on-line activities, which will all be free of charge. This first year, in collaboration with Massage World Magazine, we are celebrating National Massage Day and Pro-Touch Month in three main ways: STEP ONE At Olympia Beauty, London via the National Massage Championship. The grand final and award ceremony in on the 1st October, so we will be encouraging everyone to register for their free tickets and to go and watch the event. 

National Massage Day has been taken up by Liz Badger and this year it is being celebrated on Monday October 1st 18.

Manifesto for a Pro-Touch Society

This manifesto seeks to raise the professional status and recognition of the Massage industry; celebrating its contribution to individuals, companies and the economy. It intends to influence society to become more nurturing, pro-touch and to push for Massage to be more frequently considered as the therapy of choice whenever indicated.

Massage is not a luxury for the few, a reward or treat but an essential, cost effective and often cost saving therapy.

Massage reduces and reverses the effects of stress, soothes the emotions and maintains homoeostasis - thereby preventing or reducing disease and disorders. It has a role to play in reducing absenteeism at work, raises self esteem and self worth whilst reducing medical costs to society.

The current barriers to affective access to massage as a therapeutic and preventative intervention need to be eliminated through improved accessibility; overcoming the fear of touch, meeting the costs of treatment for the vulnerable, increasing professional standards and improving the quality and content of educational provision.

We need to create a cultural shift that recognises the crucial importance of touch for our mental and physical wellbeing and embrace the professional role of the Massage therapist as a catalyst for the release of stress, tension and stimulated good health.

We are currently limited and even damaged by the regulations and ‘duties of care’ that inhibit teachers from comforting a child. Care Homes and Hospitals are struggling to care for the elderly due to regulations and processes that take time away from the patient. Busy working parents have less time to be tactile with their children. As a result, society is displaying unrest through delinquency, isolation, violence, loneliness, stress, illness, mental illness and abuse of others. Not only is tactile stimulation vital for a growing young body to regulate itself and develop; it is equally important for a grown person to stay chemically balanced. Giving nurturing touch to the young whilst teaching them to say yes or no, empowers them to assert themselves to reject unwanted touch, reduce the opportunity for abuse and teenage pregnancies.

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