Traditional Thai Yoga Massage can look back at a long history of therapeutic healing. If one traces the evolution of the techniques of healing-massage practiced in Thailand, one discovers the astonishing fact that the earliest roots of Thai massage lie not in Thailand but in India. The legendary founder of the art is believed to have been a doctor from northern India. Known as Jivaka Kumar Bhaccha, he was a contemporary of the Buddha and personal physician to the Magadha King Bimbisara over 2,500 years ago.

 

The giving of massage was understood to be a physical application of Metta, the Pali (and Thai) word used in Theravada Buddhism to denote 'loving kindness.' A truly good practitioner performs his art in a meditative mood. He starts with a Puja, a meditative prayer, to fully center himself on the work, and he works with full awareness, mindfulness and concentration. There is a world of a difference between a massage performed in a meditative mood and a massage just done as a job. Only a practitioner working in a meditative mood can develop an intuition for the energy flow in the body and for the Prana lines.

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Contrary to Western style massage, traditional Thai massage does not primarily work with the physical body but rather with the energy body. The kneading of muscles, which dominates in Western style massage, is absent from Thai massage: energy points are pressed or general pressure is used instead. There is a lot of stretching involved and many exercises might well be described as 'applied Hatha Yoga' or 'applied physical Yoga'. Rather than using the term 'Thai massage', it wouldn't be a bad idea to actually call it 'Yoga massage' since that's what this art essentially is.

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Taken & edited from The Sunshine School website. Chiangmai, Thailand & written by:

Asokananda (Harald Brust, born in 1955 in West Germany) From 1978 onwards he spent most of his time in Asia, where he was involved in the research into and teaching of yoga, Buddhist meditation and traditional Thai yoga massage.