Shiatsu is amazing
Ethics, Marketing and Advertising
I am glad that my post Can shiatsu heal anything? prompted some reaction. It was interesting reading your views on how shiatsu should be presented.
Gary’s response to the examples on the Shiatsu Society may be typical of a lot of people reading them:
OMG, shiatsu like TOTALLY CUrED MEEEE!…
Very MySpace.
In recognising there is good research and positive results around for various disorders what I wanted to highlight is how people who see success stories like this and because
they are being presented by an alternative therapy dismiss them out of
hand. All alternative therapies are seen as quackery by a lot of the population we want to attract as clients.
Shiatsu is an incredible healing therapy, of that I am in no doubt. But there is always a real danger that the claims we make shiatsu a miracle cure. As Trace says we should not give false hope and I agree that is important to stress that some therapies work differently for some people. Part of the point of complementary therapy is that we give each client treatment and advice aimed at them as an individual.
Bevan reminds us that is not shiatsu that cures but the body. As practitioners we can only work with the Ki as it presents itself. We can guide it but never force it. For example, in reply to my post about a frozen shoulder Linda uses the idea of approaching a small, scared animal. Most of the time shiatsu is about spectacular results and is about the small steps making a real difference.
My title shiatsu is amazing actually comes from a regular receiver of shiatsu although not one of my clients. The work she experiences is never hard but always elicits a deep response. She is beginning to release many deep seated issues but the practitioner has never made outlandish claims about cures. She went with chronic neck pains and is gradually opening out to new possibilities.
Small steps but they are amazing.
Tony Brown @ August 8, 2007
I see it as a continuum, from people who will wholeheartedly accept alternative therapies without question on the one hand to people who will wholeheartedly reject alternative therapies without question on the other. Once people start saying “quackery” I tend to give up the conversation — they’re jammed hard against the reject side of things and there’s no way you’re going to win them over whatever you say.
Having said that, I’m wary of testemonials. From the quackery-sayers’ point of view testemonials are what alternative therapists (God I hate that term) use in the stead of proper clinical trials. Check the Criticisms of the term section of Wikipedia’s Alternative Medicine page for a taste of the jammed-on-reject attitude. In a sense testemonials are just fuelling that fire.
But what is the opposite? “Properly controlled double-blind trials”, according to Richard Dawkins on that article. And I can’t see how you’d double-blind trial shiatsu. Double-blind requires that neither the therapist nor the client knows whether the client is given the placebo or the treatment; easy when it’s pills, but for shiatsu?
Linda,
Thank you for that link. Very interesting research.
I agree with you that it is better to use language that a client responds to. I already have clients who are interested in the concept of Ki energy but others who are not. Engaging at the right level is good shiatsu and having a sceptical past myself and an exploring attitude to the subject is helpful in his respect.
Tony