an extraordinary treatment – treating kyo to remove jitsu discomfort

So, today I had a shiatsu treatment – I was rather looking forward to it, though was distracted by increasing discomfort in my poor old shoulder.  I broke the clavicle last year, and after lots of work and various miracles thought I’d pretty much cracked it, or rather got to a point where I could worry about another aspect of my life.

I’ve been playing a bit more tennis in recent weeks, and think that this may have worked into slight imbalances in the new position of my shoulder as a result of the break.  My consultant calmly told me a while back that it would probably be a centimetre of two shorter as a result – I was horrified – that’s about an inch cut off my shoulder. 

anyway, I slithered in rather miserably for my shiatsu treatment and summarised my present feeling – rawness really all in that shoulder area, though pain/ discomfort running along the clavicle, and also in the infraspinatus (lower back shoulder blade area) – apparently this muscle may be not holding the shoulder back properly, such that is what they call ‘dropped’ which actually seems to mean that the shoulder is more forward than it should be.

 

anyway, somewhat to my surprise, even though I’m a shiatsu practitioner myself, my shiatsu practitioner today started off with slow, calm, palming bodywork of my left back area.  I realised that it felt like my right shoulder was calming itself somehow as a result.

I realised that I was experiencing what I often explain to people about chi/ ki/ energy – that we as shiatsu practitioners will often work on the kyo (low energy) areas first, which brings energy into these areas, so that the high energy (jitsu – often noticeably uncomfortable) areas may ease.

wow – I do this stuff all the time, but I was still blown away at the feeling of ease at the end of the treatment.

My practitioner and I had also been talking about how we distinguish conventional treatment (eg physiotherapy) from ‘un’ conventional treatment such as shiatsu.  They both can be amazing and clever and skilful – but this treatment was a reminder of the ‘holistic’ ness of shiatsu.  Wow (again).