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Casual Contact

2/3/2017

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I guarantee each and every one of you has, at least once in your lives, touched someone without their permission and, quite likely, in a way that was upsetting to them. Have you ever shaken hands at a first greeting or given someone a farewell hug after a first meeting? How about pats on the back – ever give one of those? Casual intimate encounters – ever had one? How about a non-sober intimate encounter?
 
Oh the whole, we are neither a touch-centered nor consent-fluent society. Some cultural groups within the U.S. maintain different touch norms and communication than others but our wider mixed social and professional circles are lacking in touch and consent skills. We touch out of habit but not mindfulness. We touch for procedural purposes but rarely with full consent. Many of us don’t know how to give or receive intimate touch outside of a romantic or sexual relationship.
 
If you’re currently hanging out in a human-suit, odds are you fall into one of three groups: those who enjoy and seek first physical contact in a social/professional encounter, those who avoid or tolerate socially required touch just enough to get by, or those who feel indifferent but might discover an affinity one way or another if they shed the habit of casual contact and became mindful touchers instead.  
 
Here’s what you can do to become a more intentional citizen of touch:
 
Ask! Ok, I feel almost silly writing this because it should be so obvious but… just ask. You can ask with your words and with your body language. Let’s say you’re being introduced to someone for the first time. Hesitate just a moment before reaching out to shake hands or opening your arms for a hug. This slight delay allows the other person to initiate or not initiate touch between you. It gives you a chance to see how they respond and collect information about how willing or reluctant they are to touch you. This hesitation is where mindfulness forms. The other person may initiate physical contact with you out of habit or out of a genuine desire to touch. If they do not initiate and you feel a genuine desire for introductory touch, you can initiate. Now it’s time to use your words (May I shake your hand? Would you like a hug? Etc.). Be prepared to warmly accept their answer and move on.
 
Decline. Let’s say you become more self aware through this process and discover that you don’t authentically want most casual touch offered at a greeting or departure. You get to say so! When other people reach out for socially/professionally habitual touch, you get to decide if you want to meet them there or not. Now it’s time to use your words again! (Let’s shake hands later. I’m not quite ready for that hug.)
 
But… won’t all this feel awkward and sound weird? Yup. It sure will. Until it becomes a habit and you’ve done it and said it enough times that you’re 100% comfortable with the words and physical cues, you’ll likely feel awkward and might even sound weird. What happens next though is amazing!
 
Set the Example. About half the time that I ask if someone is huggable (my way of phrasing it) I get an exclamation of enthusiasm and a hug. The rest of the time, I get very interesting comments. Usually the comments are on theme of surprise at having been asked, liking it, and thinking that they should try asking, too. Now, I think I can count on one hand the number of times that someone has turned me down for a hug. I’d guess that even after I ask, some people accept the hug simply because it feels socially expected. I still consider that a win. They leave the encounter with me aware on some level that they had the option to decline even if they didn’t take it. There is a chance the next time they are offered the option to touch or not touch, they will be able to give their authentic answer because my encounter with them laid the groundwork.
 
This way of being mindful, even about casual greeting/departure touch, creates change! You change how people think and behave around touch simply because you model an example of comfortable and casual consent. It takes a little practice but it is so very worth it. Please join me in the practice of asking, accepting, declining and setting examples for how we can take care of one another out there in the world. 
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Cleared to Land - Yoga Adjustments

1/24/2017

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Here are two resources for making your hands-on yoga adjustments safer and more effective. And why I love each of them:

The Yoga Flip Chip
I love the Yoga Flip Chip because it is first and foremost about establishing and maintaining consent between yoga instructors and their students. This consent tool works for me in the following ways:
  • Puts all the power in the hands of the client 
  • Client may easily change consent mid-session
  • Visual cue for practitioner (instead of relying on memory, show of hands, etc.)
  • Practitioner can easily adjust to a change in client request for touch/not touch
  • Visual cue for client (reminds them they are in control of what happens to their body)
  • Brings up the topic of consent between practitioner and client at every session (so long as the practitioner explains it every time)

Click here to check out the Yoga Flip Chip.

Chopra Center Rules
I love the Chopra Center's rules for hands on yoga adjustments because it first and foremost addresses consent between yoga instructors and their students. This article works for me in the following ways:
  • Asking permission is the first rule on the list!
  • It addresses lack of touch when touch was wanted as well as touch when it is not wanted
  • Subtle cues are incorporated - paying attention to client's breath, etc. 
  • Includes practitioner skills like intention, mindfulness, breath, approach, verbalizing, etc.
  • Encourages starting at a level the practitioner is qualified and comfortable with 

​Click here to read the article. 

Comment below to share your favorite tools, articles and resources about safe hands-on yoga adjustments!
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The Enthusiastic Yes

1/20/2017

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This is what we want, right? For our clients to be enthusiastic about what we offer. That's the dream - the person we are about to lay our hands on is SUPER excited about what comes next. They understand what to expect and they are INTO it. They are ready to receive. We are ready to give. They aren’t just going along with it, they really want it!

Isn’t it mind-boggling how sexual all of that sounds?!?!

No wonder we have a giant consent problem in the bodywork industry. Dialogue around consent has been relegated almost entirely to the arena of sexual engagement. Phrases like “touch me there” have become suspect in and of themselves. So how can you ask your clients the most important questions:
  • Is it alright if I touch you here? 
  • How about there?
  • How do you like to be touched?
  • What kinds of touch do you not like?
  • May I touch you now?
  • Are you ready?
  • Do you want me to touch you?

Words that describe the quality of touch are likewise tainted to varying degrees: stroke, press, rub, massage, manipulate. We are afraid of a lot of words. We are not practiced in how to comfortably alter them for either a platonic or sexual context, personal or professional meaning, depending on the person and situation at hand. We’ve lost the ability to contextualize consent, clarify what is meant and talk openly about touch without sounding like we're talking about sex. We are therefore limited as bodyworkers in how we can talk with our clients and ask for their permission to touch their bodies. As long as we are tentative or limited in the words we use, as long as we skate along with the barest bones of a consent dialogue, the possibility for the wrong kind of touch exists and increases. 

The majority of practitioners who I receive bodywork from and mentor have a bare bones consent form, talk very little about consent before beginning treatment, and treat consent mostly as a formality. To put it more bluntly, for most of us, getting client consent is a cover-your-ass move. This is not because we are bad people nor because we want to touch our clients in ways that cause harm. It’s because we have become a  country of people who are more and more wounded by touch, suspicious of touch, skeptical of touch and avoidant of touch.

Touch based professionals are cautioned to protect themselves from their clients. The majority of practitioners we’ve interviewed about how consent is handled in training programs confirm that the subject is limited and almost entirely addressed through a liability lens. But consent, true consent is a tool. A powerful tool we can use to increase client safety, agency and receptivity to healing. I once heard someone say that the number one indicator of whether or not an employee sues after being fired is how they get treated as they are packing up and walking out the door. Being kind and compassionate and treating someone like they matter directly decreases their likelihood of litigating. How we treat one another matters. And I think it must be the same for bodywork - caring about your client’s safety, treating them like they matter by asking explicitly for their consent and assuring that you have tools in place to maintain it… this is the greatest liability protection of all.


Let’s change the trend, people. Start using all the touch words in all the appropriate contexts. Be clear and open with your clients about why you are doing so. It’s up to us to lead the change, be the change and grow the change in others. Client consent can be enthusiastic. Client consent should be enthusiastic. And client consent is not the absence of a no. It is the present of an enthusiastic YES!
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    Heather Lenox

    Heather is a Healing Touch Certified Practitioner and the founder of Touch Me There™

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