Medium of Touch: Restoring the Body to Health 

Therapeutic touch and manual therapies have become a popular modality for complementary care to western medicine, and as a holistic approach to health care, pain management and restoring the body to health. Therapeutic touch is based on the theory that the body, mind, and emotions form a complex energy field. Good health is an indication of a balanced energy field, while illness represents imbalance, and is based on the idea that good health requires a balanced flow of life energy. These therapies are often referred to as energy healing and are practiced by therapists who offer reiki, acupuncture and tai chi. Manual therapy is a clinical approach based on skilled “hands on” therapy to decrease pain and improve the mobility of joints, soft tissues and nerves, and is practiced by physiotherapists, occupational therapists and osteopaths. Although licenses vary between the therapies, there is one thing in common, they both use touch for diagnosis and treatment. As more research is being done to prove techniques and benefits of touch, we are learning about the power of touch and its effects on the body, mind and spirit. Touch can be used as a medium of physics and quantum physics blended with intention to heal. 

Medium, as it relates to physics, states that a medium is a material that moves energy or light from one substance to another, or from one location to another, or from one surface to another (wiki). In this case, the medium serves as a carrier. Any type of energy, including sound waves, light waves, and heat, can be transferred through the medium. The foundations of matter and energy are understood deeper in quantum physics, which states that material can exist in a number of states and helps to explain the microscopic world as subatomic particles, atoms, and other small bodies. Light waves can carry small packets called quanta, and each color of light has a specific amount of energy associated with its wavelength. Using Max Planck’s (originator of quantum theory) equation, Einstein proposed that light is both a wave and also a particle, existing in multiple states. Einstein hypothesized quanta of energy could either be generated or absorbed, as a whole, specifically by an electron that wants to jump from one quantum state to another. 

As therapists, we can use intention to convert matter, using the concepts of physics and quantum physics. Entanglement is a term known in quantum physics which is a phenomenon that occurs when two or more objects are connected in such a way that they can be thought of as a single system. The state of one object in that system can’t be fully described without information on the state of the other object. Entanglement as it relates to touch, describes a theory of blending and melding with your client. Dr. John Upledger describes blending as consciously envisioning the boundaries between your hands and the other person’s body dissolving. Hands can also be trained to act as electric sensors. Currently science and technology fields are studying graphene as an electric field sensor to assist with prediction of lightning, and are effectively using graphene as an electric field sensor that can detect both positive and negative electric fields. Graphene and humans have something in common, carbon. Carbon is the second most abundant mass within the human body and the fourth most abundant element in the universe (by mass), after hydrogen, helium and oxygen. 

Another related effect in physics and quantum physics is called the observer effect. The observer effect states that by observing a situation or phenomenon necessarily changes it. Ethan Seigal said, “We impose our preferences on the universe at our own peril. The only path to understanding is to listen to what the universe tells us about itself.” As it relates to therapeutic touch, the outcome you get depends on how you look at the individual quanta that are part of the client’s experience. Whether and how you observe your client’s process, really does change the outcome. This explains why it is best to stay completely neutral so that the client can experience an authentic process. By observing the client’s process, we allow the client to re-experience their trauma as an observer, not as the victim of the trauma. Just by witnessing someone’s therapeutic process, the process changes. While the effects of observation are often negligible, the experience still changes. This blends with the findings of Dr. Upledger and Dr. Karni, who showed us that intention, and the therapist’s thoughts have an impact on the treatment by changing the polarity of your hands using your intention. Serving as a medium of touch, we can offer grounded energy, without judgments, or intended outcomes. Allowing the client’s inherent body wisdom, or intelligence to activate, results in increased potential for healing. The client is able to receive exactly what they need from us as therapists and from the universal energy available. 

Upledger’s scientific approach blended with kinesthetic, therapeutic touch and intention as he worked with a biophysicist and bioengineer named, Dr. Zvi Karni, to measure the effects of using intentional touch and manual procedures on a baseline of electrical potential of the human body. The research clearly supported that the inherent energies made by the placement of therapeutic hands and strong intention, had positive effects on foreign energies in a client’s body. Obstructions could be released with a combination of directing energy combined with body position and intention. Dr. Karni was able to record patterns of electrical potential changes that were regarded as indicative of positive change in the function of the craniosacral system. 

Each of us is made up of many trillions of cells and each of them has a consciousness, which in this example, is the blending with the matter around you. The consciousness of a single cell has an effect on the entire person, and the environment has an impact on each cell and its consciousness, creating what Freud termed collective consciousness. By becoming aware of the body on a cellular level in probabilities, and events in the terms of probabilities, and the effect of an observer changing the probabilities, we have an endless amount of information and conscious awareness that we can incorporate with polarity, energy and intention into our healing process. Acting as a medium of touch can be a resourceful healing tool. With more research and acceptance of quantum theories, science is proving the body’s innate ability to heal and touch as a healing modality. 

Written by Catherine Chavarria

Catherine has over 25 years of experience in the massage, spa, and wellness industries. Working as a massage therapist and esthetician since 1997. 

linkedin.com/in/catherine-chavarria-bb495a1a9

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8. https://www.iahe.com/docs/articles/2735_001__2_.pdf

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