From Table to Teacher:

Transitioning from Massage Therapy Practitioner to Massage Therapy Educator

There are many reasons to transition from massage therapist to massage therapy educator. Desire to help people, wanting to pass on the knowledge you have acquired, elevating the profession, just to name a few. No matter what your reason, there are some skills you have likely developed as a massage therapist that will also serve you in the role of educator. Here are 6 strengths you can take from table to teacher:

1. A commitment to lifelong learning

You have probably taken many massage continuing education (CE) classes over the years to learn new modalities and deepen your understanding of massage. You continue to practice and improve your massage techniques every day that you go to work or trade sessions with colleagues. You are committed to lifelong learning and that is the kind of commitment that makes an amazing educator. Getting good at teaching requires practice and the more times you teach the better you will get. You can also take CE courses on teaching and while there are limited number of courses on teaching massage specifically, there is a plethora of courses on teaching in general.

If you have not taught CE classes before the first step is to find out what the legal requirements are to teach CE in your location. Requirements are typically established by your state board of massage. Most state boards have a website (often part of the state’s broader licensing department). On your state board website you should be able to find regulations pertaining to teaching CE in your state. If you cannot find the rules specific to teaching massage CE, email or call the contact person at your state board.

Even though most states not require additional certification to teach, as a lifelong learner, you can obtain additional training and in some cases certification as a massage therapy educator.

• The Alliance for Massage Therapy Education (AFMTE) offers courses that provide credit toward becoming a Certified Higher Education Professional (CHEP) and a portfolio review process that allows you to receive a Certificate for Massage and Bodywork Educator (CMBE).

• AMTA has online CE courses about teaching massage therapy.

• ABMP has a series of online courses called Cornerstones: The ABMP Instructor Development Program. It is 25 hours of CE and free to members.

2.Ability to meet people where they are

Massage therapists recognize what clients need by seeing where they are on the spectrum of healing. You know how to modify your treatments if clients are recovering from an illness, a high level athlete, neglect their self care, or have an abundance of stress in their life.

As an educator you will be called to see where learners are on the spectrum of education so you can meet them there. CE attendees range widely in age and education. They might be fresh out of school or a seasoned practitioner. The skill of knowing what modality is appropriate for your clients can also be used to choose the correct educational tool for massage therapists attending your classes.

This skill can be honed by PRACTICE, PRACTICE, PRACTICE. The more you teach the better you will be at choosing appropriate teaching methods. Expand your idea of what practice teaching is. Are teaching your massage clients about self care? Are you training colleagues at work? If you are a parent, you are constantly teaching by modeling behaviors you want to see and telling your children what you expect of them. You wouldn’t teach a toddler to drive and you wouldn’t teach a teenager how to put on their shoes. You are already meeting learners where they are!

3.Knowing how to fill your toolbox

Having a massage therapy practice is about so much more than giving a great massage. You need to know how to give a great massage to a variety of bodies that might have a variety of pathologies not to mention the personalities quirks of each client. Having a toolbox filled with different modalities gives you options in the treatment room. Other tools like marketing, bookkeeping, and office management are vital to massage business owners and CE providers as well.

In the classroom, you will have students with a variety of learning styles, learning abilities, and personalities. You need a toolbox filled with a variety of educational strategies that can give you optional ways to deliver information. This goes back to skill number two: Ability to meet people where they are.

All those business skills you picked up as a massage therapist will also go into your instructor toolbox. Technical, interpersonal, and self-assessment skills are all tools that transfer from treatment room to classroom. If you know how to build a website, or who to ask to build your website, this is part of your toolbox. Knowing how to take registration information and fees, create marketing images and text, or respond professionally to inquiries about your service are all skills you probably learned as a massage therapist that you can add to your toolbox as a massage therapy educator.

4.Talent for creating a safe and supportive environment

Lighting, linens, music, temperature and decor all create an environment that can either support or undermine the services you provide. Other less tangible things like the tone of your voice, how well you listen, and the quality of your presence can also affect the massage. Ensuring your space has privacy and that you employ proper draping techniques also helps your clients feel safe.

The same is true in the learning environment. Depending on where you offer your CE, you may or may not have much control over the physical space, but anything you can do within the space to make it feel safe, comfortable, and supportive will matter. Privacy and proper draping is even more important in a room full of people. And just like in your massage practice, if you are ungrounded, frazzled, or distracted, your students will feel it.

5.Seeing the value of collaboration

The most important person you collaborate with as a massage therapist is your client, but your practice does not have to live in a vacuum. The value of working with mentors, instructors, colleagues, organizations and other business owners is immeasurable.

Teaching itself is a collaboration between instructor and learner. Having students collaborate in the classroom can enhance learning. Collaborating with colleagues in the teaching profession and in other professions is fun and beneficial. There are also opportunities to collaborate with professional organizations such as the National Certification Board for Therapeutic Massage and Bodywork (NCBTMB) and the Alliance for Massage Therapy Education (AFMTE), both of which have directories where you can list your courses. Teaching at professional organization conferences can give you experience and exposure as an instructor. The opportunities for collaboration are endless!

6.Prioritizing self care

Just like massage therapy, being a teacher is a profession of the heart. We want to help people. We want to help people feel better and live better. Helping professions come with the risk of burnout. You know how important self care is as a massage therapist, the same is true for teachers. Teaching for hours a day takes a lot of physical and mental energy. Caring for your learners often means you become privy to the stresses and traumas of their lives. This can be a lot of emotional work on the part of the instructor.

Teaching is not an antidote to being a burnt out massage therapist. Self care is the antidote for burnout in any profession. Massage therapists are self care specialists and we need to remember to practice what we preach and prioritize self care in the treatment room and the classroom.

Why Y’all Mad at Death?

The title is just one of the many profound one-liners Dr. Bre expressed in her workshop Grow Thru Grief last month at the ASHHO Cultural Community Center. I admit I went to the workshop to network. I thought I might meet prospective clients to offer my grief massage services to, or maybe I’d even connect with Dr. Bre herself and embark on a professional relationship where we could refer clients to each other. What I did not expect, one minute into her talk is that I would have tears welling up in my eyes, that I would be so intrigued by what she had to say that I would never even think about “marketing” myself, that I would leave feeling more healed than when I arrived.

All of this was unexpected because I’ve done the work. I’ve been “doing the work” for many years. I’ve finally gotten to a place in my own healing that I feel able to walk with others through their’s. The last thing I expected to hear was grief talked about in a way that I had never heard grief talked about before. I did not expect a 5 minute exercise to take me to a place in my past that I had forgotten about. I certainly did not expect that exercise to then show me that making friends with death is my superpower!

Healing can and often does happen when you least expect it. Healing is not a one and done experience. Healing is personal and communal. When I am in a place of gratitude for and acceptance of my current situation is the time when I experience the most healing. I can’t skip steps. I went into the workshop feeling completely grateful for how far I had come on my healing path. I was in total acceptance that if this was as healed as I would ever be, I would be happy with that and do my best to help others get to that place. I believe it was this acceptance of the present that allowed me to “level up” to a new place of healing I had no idea existed.

One of the first things Dr. Bre said in her introduction was that she loved me. No, she didn’t say it to me personally, but she told a room full of people that she loved them and I believe that she meant it because I felt loved. I am thankful for Dr. Bre and others like her who are willing to talk about death openly, who create sacred spaces for communities to grow, who challenge me with humor and wisdom by asking questions like, “Why y’all mad at death?”.