Known as seated massage, chair massage, or on-site massage, this technique involves the use of a specially designed massage chair in which the client sits comfortably.

The modern chair massage was originally developed by David Palmer, but the technique is centuries-old, with some Japanese block prints illustrating people having just emerged from a nearby bath, receiving massage while seated on a low stool.

Seated massage includes bodywork and somatic techniques, such as shiatsu, amma, and Swedish massage. It is provided to fully clothed clients in a variety of settings, including businesses, airports, and street fairs. Click here to find a chair massage practitioner.

Chi means energy and information, and nei tsang means viscera or internal organs. Chi nei tsang addresses the origin of health problems, including psychosomatic responses, and increases the resilience of the body’s defense system. A chi nei tsang treatment may be self-administered or given by a practitioner.

Chi nei tsang practitioners work mainly on the abdomen with deep, soft, and gentle touch to train internal organs to work more efficiently. All the body systems are addressed—digestive, respiratory, lymphatic, nervous, endocrine, urinary, reproductive, etc. Chi nei tsang integrates applied qigong with the art of abdominal massage.

This technique was created by a Taoist monk several thousand years ago in the mountain monasteries of China. In order for the monks to be able to learn to perform the highest levels of spiritual practices, they needed to generate a very high level of energy. Today, chi nei tsang is still practiced for this same reason, but people in all walks of life who seek greater health and well-being can also use it.

See Tui Na.

A gentle infusion of warm water through the colon is used to cleanse trapped impurities, preventing the recycling of toxins into the blood stream.

A system of holistic acu-light therapy developed by Peter Mandel, colorpuncture applies different frequencies of visible light onto the meridians where needles are typically placed during acupuncture. By using differing colors, energy can be manipulated, either to stimulate or sedate. Gentle, relaxing, and noninvasive, colorpuncture is sometimes used as an alternative to acupuncture for children and adults uncomfortable with the use of needles.

Also known as bindegewebsmassage, Connective Tissue Massage (CTM) techniques are designed to specifically affect the connective tissue of the body. CTM was developed in Germany by Elizabeth Dicke. After diagnosis of a serious medical problem, she experimented with different types of massage on herself. She found when she applied light pressure through the skin and connective tissue in one area of the body, there was a related effect at a distant site.

“The technique consists of the massage therapist subtly hooking her fingers into the skin and superficial connective tissue while performing a dragging or pulling stroke that somewhat stretches the skin. CTM leaves a visible mark that looks somewhat like an abrasion or burn, but which goes away without leaving a scar.” (From Alternative Healing, by Hugh Burroughs and Mark Kastner, Halcyon, 1993.)

In Germany, it is considered a physical therapy technique; in many parts of Europe, it is considered a medical technique. In the United States, connective tissue massage is taught in many massage schools.

Founded by Emilie Conrad, Continuum is a visionary inquiry into our capacity to innovate and participate with the essential, generative, and biological movement processes of life. Much of Continuum explores embryogenesis, allowing each one of us to enter into the great mystery of creation as an existential and spiritual unfolding.

Continuum explores the idea that what we call a body or a brain is actually a creative, nonlinear, unfolding event. Movement is something we are, as well as something we do. All aspects of our functioning—thinking, feeling, languaging, and the very shaping of society—are explored as movement. Continuum provides a nonlinear biological basis for movement education, rather than the mechanistic models prevalent in society, and uses the primary perceptions of sensation, breath, sound, and movement to guide us in both subtle and dynamic explorations.

(Description reprinted with permission, Continuum Movement 2001 Brochure.)

Originated by George P. Kousaleos, Core is a myofascial, postural, and structural somatic therapy combining massage techniques with client-assisted movement. Normally lasting ten sessions, there are four phases of core body therapy organized according to the level or layer of fascia, muscle, and supporting soft tissues that are manipulated: core massage, core extrinsic, core intrinsic, and core integration.

CranioSomatics is a paradigm for understanding relationships between the cranium and its sutures and joints, neuromuscular functions, and meridians throughout the body.

The concept that both functions and dysfunctions of the cranial system are reflected in identifiable and predictable musculoskeletal/somatic responses throughout the body, and that the converse is also generally true, was developed by G. Dallas Hancock, DC, and Florence Barber-Hancock, LMT, in the 1990s. The application of this concept is CranioSomatic Therapy.

Complementary therapies include CranioStructural Integration, developed by Hancock, and Facilitated Pathways Intervention, developed by Barber-Hancock.