Stay in touch

I use the phrase "Stay in touch" when ending an email or letter. It's a heartfelt suggestion that has implications far beyond "Respectfully yours," or "Sincerely." It's a call to become aware of the power of touch ; to appreciate the gifts of touch and to get "in touch" with the responsibility that goes with that power.

Touch is woven intricately into our human culture . We use touch intuitively for self-help . When we itch, we scratch. When we cramp, we knead and stretch. When we need comfort, we ask for a hug. When we're stressed, soothing strokes over the brow provide relief. For good luck, we say " touch wood ," or " knock on wood." Children are taught early on that as long as they are touching a predetermined "safe" place, they cannot be tagged out. Baseball runners have to touch each base.

When we say, your words have "touched my heart," touch has spiritual implications . Media advertising implores you to, "Reach out and touch someone." The phrase, " touched in the head " historically implies that someone has become crazed by the overwhelming forces of intention when they were graced with the touch of God.

"Touching" with hands or with human intention, as used in PetMassage_™, brings an animal's awareness to each part of his body. On the physical level, the sensation of touch engages his/her mind. Light touch brings awareness to the coat, the upper layers of connective tissue and surrounding superficial muscles. Stronger pressure draws conscious awareness to deeper muscles, tendons, joints and ligaments.

If I were to rest my hand on my arm, I would be touching, making physical contact with, my body. Resting my hand on an animal's body would be the same. If I switch my awareness from feeling my arm with my hand, to feeling my hand through the tissues of my arm, I am able to sense both sides during an intentional conversation in body language .

Moving my awareness from arm to hand and back again, I observe the interplay between the two. Hand presses in; Arm receives, perceives and reacts, accepting the pressure. It recoils, resists and expresses pressure back against Hand. Hand yields to the pressure, moves off for a moment and gently requests permission to recover and reconnect. Arm responds to the request by softening its resistance and re-allowing the acceptance of Hand's touch, but only to the depth that it senses is comfortable. The relationship continues back and forth. As it develops, it cultivates understanding, respect and restraint. Each listens with appropriateness and the intention to honor and support the other's needs. Questions are asked and choices, made. Observing the conversation, we note that the intentional responses within the tissues demonstrate awareness.

When Hand and Arm interact, each speaks from a point of independent reference. Within the tissues are all of the memories of training , socialization , love, abuse and fear . Memories of past responses within their body's cells recall what feels comfortable and what doesn't, as well as the degrees of comfort and discomfort. Each memory influences the perception of whatever is given, accepted, received, absorbed and how it ought to be replied to.

Each of these memories is about how the tissues are intuitively intentioned to move toward their individual and collective " places of comfort." Holding patterns are the habitual ways that an animal carries his body and responds to sensory and emotional stimuli that he/she has invented to minimize physical or emotional discomfort. They are the bodies', " places of comfort ." Once these are established, energy is directed toward maintaining comfort. This supports the underlying drives for every organism: survival and the wellness that maintains it.

Holding patterns source from the interconnected memories of conversations and relationships held within the cells and tissues throughout the body. Every one of the cells of the body is individual and also has an essential relationship with the rest of the body. For the organism as a whole to be complete each cell is essential. In addition to retaining every physical and emotional experience in this lifetime as cellular memory , cells hold all the genetic information and all of the cultural-memories inherited from their species from previous generations. Each shares a responsibility for the well-being of the whole. Each becomes a hologram of the whole. During a PetMassage_™ session the provider continuously requests and gets permission . The intentionality established is a continuous channel between animal and human. This bridge is a channel for the sharing of energies, feelings and insights. We know that the simple act of observation of events, witnessing them, has an affect on them. PetMassage_™ witnesses and affects these privately meaningful interactions within and around the spiritual cores of tissues. The PetMassage_™ super-intentioned touch reinforces the magnified effects of relationship on the deepest levels.

The obvious responses that we can see in our dogs during and after PetMassage_™ are the aftereffects of deeply rooted relationships and discussions. We may see variations in the sheen of the coat, in the vitality and spring in the gait, or a zoned-out dog experiencing an Alpha state of mind. We may see that our client is beginning to exhibit signs and symptoms of a healing crisis. We may see no spontaneous changes in behavior. Often, these changes will become noticeable after the dog is given time to integrate the inner dialogues into their physical bodies.

Intention is a subtle sensation, occurring within the intuitive . It engages the animal and the provider at profoundly comfortable levels. The revitalizations, reeducations and reorientations are deeply subconscious - cellular -- far beneath our limited scopes of awareness. providers and clients have no idea how, what, why on what level or even whether their bodies are responding. Whatever happens though, forms the foundation for our emotional and physical bodies. Shifts on these levels initiate micro-variations, chemical reactions, and twitches of enlightened awareness in deeper tissues and long-term memories. Once initiated, they have the potential to surface affecting the superficial tissues and more current physical and emotional conditions.

You and your client are the culminations of two lifetime vectors of thoughts, feelings and experiences. Each touch is shaped by your perceptions of who you are and how you think you are doing. Your clients, busily experiencing their own perceptions of their lives, have touch responses steeped in the rich matrix of their own personal histories. The "you" that each of you bring to the table for each massage is different. What influences created the "you" that you are experiencing, now? Whoever and however you are, that's the source for the intentionality that you bring to the table.

Sensitivity, respect, restraint and the willingness to "yield" are essential elements of PetMassage_™ touch. They are goals. Sometimes, we're not capable of being open, sensitive or yielding. At these times , breath-work and Chi Gung grounding exercises help to become more open. The frequencies of your touch can be consciously influenced by visualizing colors , replaying music in your mind or simply smiling . If you sense that you are not connecting effectively, that there is a distancing from your client, it usually stems from your lack of grounding. Shift your weight from one foot to the other. The act or even the intention to reposition creates changes in spatial and Etheric relationships . It allows your body to feel more like a conduit for the flow of energy to and from your client and the ground.

The touch conversation is a means for you both to give and receive, experiencing each other's physicality, while effecting deep awareness within. Each touch redefines your uniquely spontaneous - subconscious --conversation. Your emerging relationship between you and your pet client develops as your energies, thoughts, feelings and responses to accessed memories merge.

Dogs , horses and cats each have species-specific reactions to touch as do octopi and dolphins . Each response to touch suggests a unique perception and conversational approach within a biological and psychosocial universe . PetMassage_™ providers learn to respect the uniqueness of each individual within the various specie personae. Does the response stem from a place of fear, aggression, joy or love? With the exception of "love," all animals experience these and act with them as motivators. "Nurturing," may be substituted for "love."

We have seen how when the spirit of PetMassage_™ intention touches an animal's body, it accesses not only the body -- mind; it influences our spiritual cores as well. PetMassage_™ is highly effective in connecting to the obvious intentions within all phases of animals' visible lives: physically with rehabilitation and wellness maintenance, emotionally, with grieving and depression and spiritually , with seizure disorders, separation anxiety , aggression and shyness . It is a spiritually based, psychosocial connection .

PetMassage_™ is a human body touching and connecting with an animal's body in an intentional and meaningful way. The language of our bodies is the basis of all of our mundane and profound communications. The language of massage -- touch - is the real body language - and it is always understood. Stay aware of the power of your intentional communication.

Stay in touch.

Jonathan Rudinger