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1. Massage is the process of restoring a 'living body'

Humans recognize their own bodies, but their 'body' is mostly set in everyday life. In other words, we are 'living through our bodies, but we are not conscious of our bodies'. Massage is a sensory experience that calls this unconscious body back to the front of consciousness. In other words, massage is an experience where the subject meets his or her living physicality again. 마사지

This is in line with the concept of "Le corps vécu" by French philosopher Maurice Merleau-Ponty. A massage is a passage that makes me experience my physical existence as a subject** rather than an object. 마타이

2. Massage is a 'reconstruction of body sensations'

If the massage was simply pressing and rubbing the muscles, it would be just one exercise. However, the reason massage acts as a healing experience for a person is that it induces a 'reconstruction of the senses'.

Modern people's sensory system is in a state of debalance amid excessive visual information and digital noise. Skin sensation, deep pressure, and interception of muscle tension are gradually suppressed, resulting in separation of the body and mind.

The slow, continuous, directional stimuli provided by the massage enable:

Reactivation of suppressed body sensations

the cognitiveization of muscles that were unconsciously tense

resetting one's boundaries through touch

The restoration of this sensory system goes beyond simply restoring physical function and contributes to coordinating the relationship between the self and the world.

3. A massage is a way of regressing the sense of time

Modern people are dominated by speed. This speed is not just a physical speed, but acts as psychological pressure, a torrent of thought, and social immediacy. Massages change the structure of this time.

During massage time, the person enters the state of accepting the senses from the passive state, which induces the 'currently central time experience' commonly referred to in meditation. The stimulus does not pass quickly, but is given slowly and repetitively, and the body deeply accepts it. This state appears as an alpha wave dominant state in cognitive psychology and a parasympathetic nerve dominant state physically.

Massage is, after all, a return from psychological time to sensory time, and only then does the body and mind converge to the present.

4. Massages are the most basic form of nonverbal communication

Before language was created, humans exchanged emotions through contact. In the massage, this pre-linguistic communication method is restored. The massage's touch understands, interprets, and responds to objects in the language of senses, not words.

This nonverbal communication is an important healing route, especially for people like:

an old man with a poor language ability

a person whose verbal expression is blocked by post-traumatic stress

a child with a developmental disability

a patient with depression or attachment disorder

The touch of the massage is the most basic medium that conveys emotional signals such as 'I'm safe', 'I'm being cared for', and 'I can exist'.

5. Massage is both a cure and a ritual

In many cultures, massages were not just body care, but ceremonial acts. Abianga in Ayurveda, India, traditional Thai massages in Thailand, Chuna in China, and Horseracing in Korea were all acts to balance the body and harmonize the order of the universe, not just to press the muscles.

These massages were combined with religious and philosophical worldviews. The act of applying oil, applying pressure in a specific order, and concentrating on a specific area was itself a ritual to purify the body's circulation and organize the flow of energy.

Even in modern times, massage needs to be re-examined as a ritual act of restoring the rhythm of life, not just maintaining health.

6. A massage is to meet yourself again through the other's hand

Humans cannot reach their backs on their own. This is simply the limitation of body structure, but philosophically, it symbolizes the existential condition that one cannot look at oneself from the outside.

Masajisa allows me to 'discovery' of parts of myself that I cannot reach through the hands of others. When a touch touches a part that is not conscious of itself, such as the back, neck, and scapula, it emerges as the realm of existence. This is a physical experience, but at the same time, it is also an experience of ontological recovery.

After all, massage is an act of deep self-awareness that 're-experiencing oneself through contact with others'.

Conclusion: Massage is medicine, philosophy, and space for sensory thinking

Massage is not just a means of relaxation, pain relief, and circulation improvement. It is a place of sensory thinking that reconstructs how human beings perceive their bodies and relate to the world through them.

There are anatomies, psychology, anthropology, and philosophy. But it all eventually converges to one thing. The art of making a living body alive, that is massage.