Categories: Question and answer
Protected: Kama Sutra
Men and useful aggression
Aggression is something that we learn at an early age. With the curbing of our aggression, we also lose part of our life energy and our enthusiasm. The aggression goes underground and appears to some at unexpected moments, as an unguided projectile.
Jung: It is much better to acknowledge the temptation and to surrender to her violence than to try to escape it by means of all kinds of intellectual artifice or emotional judgments.
Have you, like many of us, suppressed your aggression? Then get to know your primeval man and then tame it. What we refuse to acknowledge about ourselves will always find a way out, sometimes in tragic form. The aggression gets a free hand in our subconscious because we have denied it access to our consciousness. By suppressing our aggressive energy, it gains the power to possess us and to erupt. Because we refuse to “have” aggression, aggression “has” us. If we find an acceptable outlet for it, aggression takes on a healthy, playful form and gives us strength and joy in life.
Our challenge is to become aware of our aggressive nature. Not by reaching for violence, but by allowing and expressing this inner energy. That awareness allows us to control this force. Repressing your aggression leads to violence, while the awareness of your aggression can give you “power”, decisiveness and perseverance.
How can we transform aggressive energy, which often manifests itself in the form of hostile behavior and inner anger?
By examining your negative feelings and irritations, you can find out in which situations you have suppressed aggression. During a body-oriented coaching session there is plenty of room to open up to your fantasy and look at your inner turmoil without prejudice. You can also express this emotion through movement, sound and breathing. The emotion seems magnified at first, but that is why it “takes a closer look”. Truly living it through means a milestone in their lives for many men. You explore its origins and discover what your true need is, which has been compromised. It provides guidance to be more in touch with your aggressive side. You gain a foothold in reality and you know how to relate to the world and its violence differently.
Strength measurement during a treatment?
During a treatment we can safely experiment with our bodies, our strength and physical contact. This can be done individually, as part of a playful “hug treatment“. Also with tantra I often work with playful force measurements as an introduction or interruption of the massage. Many men experiment with strength and power in the form of bondage / BDSM. I do not offer this myself, but I can refer this to colleagues.
What is Playfight?
You can playfully experiment with your strength and aggressive energy with an opponent, with a group of men, in the form of a "Playfight". In a playfight ritual, the circle of attentive viewers is central. Watching the game is at least as important as the 1-on-1 confrontation with a self-chosen opponent, which takes place in the middle. You have a direct connection with your opponent and him in his vulnerability, dedication, beauty and strength. Usually the ritual ends with a joint contact or relaxation exercise.
Be in Nijmegen Playfight Rituals organized within the Meetup Group “Men in Touch NL“. The meetings are in Cordium and are accompanied by Jean Smeets.
Playfight rituals are also organized in Amsterdam by members of the Euro-Faeries and Stretch community, among others by Love Dragon in Okido Yoga.
Protected: Energy Circles
Diabetes and massage
Can I receive patient massages as a diabetic patient?
On this site, diabetes is listed under “contraindications”. This often raises questions. Is anyone with diabetes advised against receiving a massage? No. But caution is necessary.
One of my clients told me that despite having been diagnosed with diabetes on doctor's advice, he had several massages without a single problem. What is wisdom?
Always report that you have diabetes prior to the massage. In the (telephone) preliminary discussion, the joint conclusion can be drawn that a massage is not wise now. And it would be a shame if you come for nothing, so it is better to consult beforehand. I also always recommend to consult with the doctor. In many cases, they will recommend that you receive massages.
Certain forms of massage are indeed not suitable for diabetic patients, for example deep tissue massage or a strong sport massage. But if applied correctly, it mainly has a positive effect: it relaxes, the circulation improves the tissue becomes more elastic. Stress that is often associated with diabetes can also be reduced by massage. When in doubt, you can best choose a soft, sensual massage or a joint massage. With such massages, little pressure is exerted on the muscle and connective tissue.
What does the masseur take into account in diabetic patients?
The effect of a massage for people with diabetes can not be predicted in advance, but there are a number of things that I will take into account.
With a massage, diabetes medication can work faster and people can be overwhelmed by a (too) low blood glucose value during or after the massage. Better blood flow ensures a faster decrease in blood sugar.
If you inject insulin, lipodystrophy often occurs; This is a swelling of the adipose tissue that functions as (unwanted) collection for the injected insulin. The pressure during a strong massage can suddenly release this accumulated stock and you get too much insulin in the blood, which can cause a sudden low blood glucose.
Which massage forms have positive effects for diabetics?
More and more scientific papers describe the benefits of massage therapy for diabetes patients, both Type 1 and Type 2. Relaxation massage can help combat the stress on the body caused by the disease. Improved circulation is important for diabetics who often have disturbed circulation, especially massaging the hands and feet is effective. Foot reflex massage is never harmful and can have a very positive effect.
A massage like Alchemy or Touch is focused on the myofacia (connective tissue). This massage style provides more mobility in the body. This can work against the stiffness and reduced range of motion of many people with diabetes.
So preferably contact the doctor beforehand and report to the masseur that you have diabetes. Then you can discuss this more extensively during the intake interview.
Four hands massage versus duo massage
What is a four-hand massage?
This is a massage given by two masseurs. That is why four hands rest on your body.
What is the difference between a duo-massage and four-hand massage?
With a duo massage you and your partner are massaged simultaneously or in turn in the same room. With a four-hand massage you are only massaged by two masseurs. A combination is also possible: you and your partner both receive a four-hand massage.
What is the effect of a four-hand massage?
The synchronized movements of the masseurs harmonize the left and right sides of the body and of both hemispheres. mind, resulting in a balance between these two.
An important advantage of a four-hand massage is that the mind relaxes more. Because you are touched at more places at the same time, it is impossible for your brain to follow all movements of the hands of the masseurs. This creates a special feeling of surrender. Your mind gives control and there is an even deeper relaxation.
Do tantra and four-hand massage go together?
Yes, a tantra massage is often offered as a four-hand massage. A tantra massage requires surrender to the moment, which happens faster when you are massaged by four hands. Your life energy is generated by one masseur and the other masseur spreads the energy over your body. With so much attention and energy you will feel very vital. Often the touch is combined with supporting your breathing, this ensures that you get even more into your body and your cells wake up. This can deepen the experience even more.
What should you pay attention to when choosing a four-handed massage?
Since a four-hand massage is more intense, the pace of a four-hand massage should be slower than usual. Your brain needs time to process all impressions of the touch. Each stroking or kneading takes about two seconds before the feeling of the touch sinks in. Unfortunately, many masseurs in saunas and spas work at too fast a pace, losing the benefits of a four-hand massage.
It is important that the masseurs who give a four-hand massage are well matched. If the movements are not performed simultaneously, this can feel uneasy. The masseurs must work in the same way in their massage technique, at the same rate and with a similar pressure, so that the synchronized massage feels as if the two masseurs are one. This also makes demands on good cooperation, because a four-handed massage has everything to do with smooth movements. Both masseurs need to feel exactly which touch is needed and they can coordinate this without words.
The importance of cuddling
Maybe you have experienced it yourself: after a hug you suddenly feel another person. Happier, calmer and satisfied. As if all worries just drop away from you. Sometimes you do not need a massage, but just a comprehensive hug treatment.
What is the healing effect of cuddling?
Hugs and other forms of non-sexual physical touch such as holding your hand and caressing your scalp hair act on the physical level to help calm the brain and body through overwhelming states of fear, panic, and shame.
When can a cuddle be useful?
Cuddles ensure that your nervous system comes to rest. The feeling of loss, of unfulfilled needs, disappears and a feeling of fulfillment replaces it.
Recent neuroscientific research also shows that our body reacts strongly when we are emotionally affected or become upset. The emotion settles in your body. These physical reactions bring discomfort or are even unbearable. What can you do about these reactions of your body? is there an alternative to drugs, drugs or psychological protective mechanisms such as oppression? Touch appears to be the most efficient, effective and moreover natural method, according to Hilary Jacobs Hendel (New York Times, sept 2015).
What is cuddling actually?
Hugging is loving or caring pressing against one or more people. The hug is a common way to show affection, just like giving a kiss. A hug offers comfort, security, encourages you to express your feelings and makes you feel understood. A hug also creates a bond of trust.
What happens in my body during cuddling?
During a hug, your body reduces the production of stress hormones (including cortisol, adrenaline and noradrenaline) and releases hormones, including oxytocin, endorphins and serotonin. These hormones make you feel more comfortable. In this way you can relax physically and mentally.
How do you give a good, healing hug?
A therapeutic hug, one designed to calm the nervous system, requires some practice. A good hug should feel genuine and be wholehearted. You cannot give half hugs. You face the other and hug the other. In doing so, you ensure that both bodies touch each other completely. Yes, it is intimate, but certainly not sexual. You give a hug with a different intention, namely from compassion for the other and a deliberate intention to offer the other comfort. It is literally a heart-to-heart experience: your heartbeat regulates the heartbeat of the other. You hold the other until the moment that the other is ready to let go. If you do this earlier, the hug will not be effective.
Can I receive a hug before or after a massage?
Yes, every massage ends with a hug. And in addition to massages and coaching, I also offer more extensive ones cuddly treatments On. During a cuddle treatment I hug and caress you. That caress is aimed at your well-being, so without sexual intentions. During such a treatment you experience a warm touch, relaxation and genuine attention. Besides hugs you can lie in my arms or against each other and I can caress and hold you softly or firmly.
Is it a problem if I get excited during cuddling?
Excitement can happen if touch is exciting to you. It is then a very normal and healthy response from your body. Usually that sensation disappears fairly quickly, after which a feeling of peace and relaxation predominates. If you get aroused during a cuddle treatment, it may just be there. But it is not addressed. It is not possible to have sex during a hugging treatment and no erotic acts take place.
Let go of old emotions
Can massage help to release my emotions?
A massage treatment is a good opportunity to detect, explore and release old emotions in your body. This requires the right attention and guidance. By consciously breathing through a part of the body, you can encounter pavements that form a kind of armor against unprocessed emotions. This unconscious blocked energy is stored in the muscles and often causes unnecessary muscle tension and stress. By becoming aware of this armor, you can let go of the stored old emotional wounds. In addition, energy is released, which you can experience as tingling or chills. Then you feel freer and more relaxed. You have literally left very old behind.
How do energy blockades develop?
Armoring means armor. If something happens in your life that you cannot handle at that moment, you park that emotion in your body. This creates continuous tension, whereby the muscle feels like armor. Your life energy can no longer flow freely in that place. When you recognize these energy blocks, your body has something important to tell you. You can see such a block as a piece of memory. You may have experienced shame, fear, pain or sadness at the time. As you explore this, you may encounter trauma, or an unresolved experience, a recurring thought pattern, or a series of repetitive similar experiences that have caused you to lose something of yourself. You are a bit hardened in that place and therefore less sensitive. You don't feel the pain, but you don't feel the pleasure because of that. A targeted massage helps to allow the feeling (again) and to release the built-up tension.
What is de-armoring?
A de-armoring massage is a good way to release this stored emotional and sexual tension. Pressure is exerted on the paved area, alternated by a gentle invitation to relax. By going to that place with your attention and breathing, the unprocessed emotions can heal. You briefly feel the stored fear, anger, grief or pain, but it quickly disappears like snow in the sun because you experience a warm, soft bed at the same time.
Areas in the abdomen, such as the area around the solar plexus (solar plexus) and “hara” (abdominal center) contain many of those stored memories. The cells in your gut are closely related to our brains and can store these memories for a longer period of time. In our subconscious, these feelings continue to affect your mood if you don't pay attention and push them away. Targeted attention, with warm support from the masseur, makes you feel it with a smile. You will be taught breathing techniques to allow deeper and let go of the feeling.
Can a tantra massage also help to reduce blockages in your body?
Yes, a good tantra massage focuses on the flow of your life energy and the reduction of blockages, especially in the "kundalini" (spine) and the pelvic area. The pelvis, places where fear, sexual oppression, anger and sadness often lie hidden. Especially in the attachments of the pubic bone, the sacrum, but also the sphincter muscles of the anus are places where you can encounter this on almost everyone. We are often not aware of these tensions, but simply have less feeling and contact with the pelvic area. This allows you to experience that during sex you feel less strong sensations than you would like.
Through tantra you will experience more sensitivity of your entire body. If you allow the pain and other feelings in this area, you will also gain access to your sexual energy and the depths of your orgasm potential. This provides greater sexual pleasure when you are with your partner.
Integrating the physical, mental, emotional, sexual and spiritual aspects of your being, redeeming your wounds requires feeling the pain you encounter in your body. This awakens you in your own body, you will experience your own wholeness again and you come to a deeper surrender. By freeing blockages, both physically, emotionally and mentally, you will find more depth and clarity in your relationship with yourself and your partner.
Why is a massage focused on the release of emotions often combined with essence coaching?
Essence coaching helps you to get closer to yourself and to return there more and more effortlessly. Coaching in combination with bodywork, such as this form of massage, helps to get in touch with your intuitive signals from your body, such as your gut feeling. Your inner source of wisdom can give you insights other than what your thoughts tell you. This allows you to shift your focus to what gives you pleasure and happiness. You become more able to effectively create the life you desire. You experience yourself more from your totality instead of from separate parts. In this way you work on your personal development in a relaxed manner.
Connective tissue massage
During a connective tissue massage, the myofascia (muscle connective tissue) is loosened with diagonal movements, allowing energy to flow more freely. What is the fascia? What is chi? And how does a connective tissue massage work?
Myofascia
Most people assume that our muscles and bones keep our bodies upright. In reality, this happens through our connective tissue, the fascia. This system of elastic threads forms a complete structure that can be found everywhere in our body. The myofascia is the connective tissue that is located in the muscles, in the form of, among other things, tendon structures.
The tension of the wires in our fascial system gives the body firmness and elasticity. It forms a three-dimensional web of connective tissue that can be found every corner of our body. Every muscle, every bone, every organ and every nerve is surrounded by this fine-meshed tissue.
The fascia is flexible, constantly changes its shape and structure, but can also densify, stick and dry out. Fascial densities are common and can occur due to trauma, poor posture, inflammatory reactions, surgical operations and stress. Compacting the fascia makes your body less flexible, changes the shape of your body and can cause tension and pain. If a link in the fascia web is broken or damaged, this is absorbed by other parts of this web. These parts condense to become stronger, which can lead to stiffness and pain.
Reduction of tension in the connective tissue
The myofascia is the connection between the fascial system and skeletal muscle. There is often tension in this connection, which can be felt throughout the muscle and also in muscles that lie in the same line. Tension in the muscle connective tissue and muscle tension are not the same, they feel different and they also require a different approach.
With a connective tissue massage, the focus is not on reducing muscle tension, but on the tension in the connective tissue, the fascial network. By gently moving compacted parts of the fascia, stored tension is released and space is created again. That space is necessary so that the moisture can flow smoothly along the wires again. These fluids conduct the electrical charge from one part of the body to another via the fascia wires. The energy (Chi) starts moving again by freeing these channels, which allows an energetic balance to be created in the body. This also has effects on our nervous system, brain and our mental well-being.
I use light pressure, stretching and wave movements. The pressure is increased in case of compacted tissue blockages, after which space is created and tension is released. When you release tension, emotions can be released that you may not have been aware of. After a number of repetitions, you release those old emotions and the fascia in that area becomes softer, smoother and more resilient. By restoring flexibility, combating dehydration and stimulating rejuvenation in myofascial tissue, the pressure of the fascia on pain-sensitive structures such as nerves and blood vessels is reduced. There is also more mobility in the joints.
What is Chi?
Chi is the Chinese name for the life energy that flows through our body. Modern science speaks of electricity and resistance.
The degree of resistance between body parts can be measured at different energy frequencies. If the resistance is higher, your energy level and zest for life will decrease. Chi circulates through the channels of our body, like water flows in a river bed. The energy can stagnate like a rock in the river bed. The river water accumulates and the current decreases. Removing these blockages can release emotion, but then ensures a faster flow and more vitality.
Naturism and massage
You are naturistic and you like it when we are both exposed. Is that possible? I sometimes do naturist massages where both the client and the masseur are both exposed. But whether I am open to this depends on the intention behind that question. Because expose and massage is often associated with sex. That is why I am careful.
Quite a few massage practices and schools are very difficult about the bare body. I see the bare body as a natural given and for me it is paramount that you have the opportunity to fully enjoy the massage.
Massaging is very common within naturism. At the naturism campsite where I often come I am used to massaging. The advantage is that the person on the massage table feels equal to the masseur. Because in order to massage the buttocks, thighs and chest area, clothes are awkward on the massage table. Massaging and massaging in your nude is therefore fine with the right intention.
Some people actually have erotic thoughts about nudity and sometimes hope for 'more'. Or they want the masseur to be naked because they find this exciting. Many men hope for a “nudist massage”. happy ending and they regard a naked massage (and especially a naked masseur) as an invitation to mutual touching or sexual acts. While women fear sexual harassment. This is not the intention in my massage practice. Intimate touching by the client is not the intention. For sexual activities I like to refer to escorts.
For that reason, especially if I suspect such intentions, I usually keep my clothes on during the first massage session. I am not easily shocked by sexual harassment, but I do reject such advances. I deal with your wishes and any desires in an honest, professional and discreet manner. If you experience undesirable behavior, you run the risk that the treatment will be terminated kindly but prematurely.
What do naturism and wellness / massage have to do with each other? That is the overlap in target group. But they are different things.
Wellness: is originally an American 'invention' that focuses on the combination of wellbeing and fitness. So on a healthy lifestyle, attention to health and relaxation for body and soul.
Also naturism pays attention to well-being, a healthy lifestyle and relaxation of body and mind. Naturists do this in balance with nature as much as possible. Nature is left as untouched as possible, and as much as possible goes 'purely on a journey'. At the naturism is something that goes without saying, that comes from the pursuit of equality and that gives shape to 'being open to others', 'exposing yourself' and 'one with nature'.