Through massage, Chinese medicine and movement we seek to bring you into the present moment with your body and begin to build the foundation for self acceptance and true happiness within yourself.
This principle that guides Watershed has two elements:
First, the cultivation of presence…
What does this mean? It simply means that a person is able to stay within themselves with consciousness and openness. In other words, you are aware of your body, your thoughts, your surroundings and you still have the ability to allow for the way that things just keep happening! This is the kind of state that is achieved by practices like yoga and meditation.
In the often hectic, multi-tasking, multi-pressure world that most of us live in, this idea of presence has practically vanished!
Unfortunately for us, it is also probably vital to health. In the last ten years, several studies have come forward indicating that mindfulness practices like yoga, meditation and even just plain old “idle time” confer significant obvious health benefits on those who engage in them. Lower blood pressure, increased ability to think, lower rates of behavioral and psychological problems and many more surprising benefits have all been demonstrated by scientists.
Massage, acupuncture and Qigong all play a significant part in increasing patients’ ability to cultivate presence.
Even if a patient never starts a regular meditation practice or any other “typical” presence increasing activity – the simple act of lying on a treatment table, focusing on breath and body, and having someone to talk to about one’s growing awareness seems to have a beneficial effect.
The second element of this Watershed principle is self-acceptance.
In our experience, there is no force more corrosive in a patient’s healing process than self-criticism and unbelief in one’s own ability to heal. At Watershed, we seek to be accepting of ourselves and our patients so that we can help patients to realize this ability within themselves. While it is a little bit mysterious just how this self-acceptance is demonstrated and shared, most Watershed patients gradually come to recognize that they are becoming a little more compassionate with themselves and others – improving their outcomes.
