First things first: metta

Many years ago, I was on a personal retreat at one of my favorite places, Woolman Hill.  I had wandered into a bookstore in Northampton, MA and was looking for something.  I came across Jack Kornfield's A Path With Heart.  To say that it has changed my life would be an understatement.

With Sharon Salzberg and Joseph Goldstein, Kornfield co-founded the Insight Meditation Society in Barre, MA.  I think their website explains far better (and with fewer words than I would use!) the concepts of vipassana and metta.  

But metta is behind how I live life, and it's a driving force in my career choice.  So let's talk metta.

It's often translated as "lovingkindess"--a deep compassion that one develops for her/himself, and for others.  It is to have an open heart.  Really, it is to choose an open heart, because I think most of us can relate to how easy it is to close ourselves off in the face of internal or external criticism, judgment, fear, anger, hurt, loneliness, etc.  and to react with a closed or broken heart.

And, really, it must must MUST start from within.  You have to start by turning a gentle eye towards all of the things you find so unbearable in yourself.  Cuz the cliche is true: you cannot give what you do not have.  And if you haven't done this, let me forewarn you that it will probably be one of the hardest things you've ever done.

I was in the process of finishing my degree in Women's Studies and applying to social work school when my wife suggested "Hey, why don't you re-visit that old interest of yours in massage?"  (because I'd first considered going to massage school when I dropped out of art school at 19).  One orientation day later, I knew I was on the right path.  Talk therapy has its place, but I loved the idea of being able to work on a somatic level, because we live our lives in these bodies, and we hold everything within them.  On top of all the emotions we store and bottle in our bodies,  so many people are in struggle with their bodies--chronic illness, unhappiness with how we look, etc.  

So Metta Bodywork is about working and being with all of that from a) my own place of respect and compassion in hopes that b) people can rest in that space during sessions.