Polarity Therapy

Polarity therapy is a type of massage therapy that addresses the needs of the body holistically. Instead of seeking to find specific issues and correcting them one by one, a massage therapist who practices polarity therapy seeks to whole the entire body by treating the entire body. This practice recognizes that individual ailments may have underlying issues that need to be addressed before the symptoms can disappear. Polarity therapy was first developed by Randolph Stone and the American Polarity Therapy Association now oversees its practice and individual who seek to train to practice within the United States.

Before you choose polarity therapy as your area of interest for your future massage therapy career, it is important to realize the beliefs and principles of this type of treatment. No two areas of massage therapy are exactly alike, but many different forms of massage therapy use similar principles. Like many other types of massage therapy, polarity therapy is partially based on Eastern theories in how the human body responds to different forms of stimuli.

Polarity therapy is based on the concept of the yin and the yang. In other words, this style of massage therapy is based on the polarity between different forces within the human body. When the energy between these poles is unbalanced, bodies suffer from pain and other ailments. A polarity massage therapist works to restore balance between the yin and the yang to provide overall health to their patients.

Balancing out the energy in a human body involves ensuring that the flow of energy is unobstructed. When there are blockages to the flow, there is no balance but there probably is pain. The flow of energy is measured by the Human Energy Field, which consists of electromagnetic patterns that describe the mental, physical and emotional health. Because blockages or poor flow can occur in areas outside of physical ailments, practitioners of polarity therapy use techniques beyond standard massage in order to treat their patients.

Namely, there are four main areas of treatment that polarity therapists offer. The first is in massage – using various techniques to loosen any potential blockages in order to restore balance. The second is helping patients to achieve beneficial stretching and exercise practices. Blockages can recur without a consistent plan to keep them away, and so various types of stretching and exercise techniques can help to maintain balance once it has been restored.

The third area that polarity therapists offer treatment within is diet. Improper dietary practices can easily lead to polarity imbalances. A balanced diet does not mean the exclusion of many types of foods or the reliance on one particular food source. Instead, it relies upon the careful balance between necessary nutrients to maintain physical, emotional and mental health. The final area within polarity therapy is maintaining a healthy mental-emotional process. Studies have shown that the mind can control the experience of physical pain and suffering – when there is imbalance emotionally, it can express physically. Polarity therapy practitioners can help patients to restore this mental-emotional balance to restore overall physical health.

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