The Rub: a podcast about massage therapy

Healwell
  • 4.8 (13)
  • Medicine
  • Updated Monthly

Join Healwell in examining and bringing context to the world of massage therapy beyond the table. We have ideas. We have opinions. We want change, and that will only come with an understanding of who and what massage therapy truly is. A variety of topics are up for grabs: history, philosophy, development, and all the other shiny things that fascinate us.Healwell is a non-profit based out of the Washington DC area.  Check us out at www.healwell.org 

  1. 3d ago

    Substack: Massage Therapy Needs Pigs with Wings

    Send us Fan Mail The next two articles will only be available for our Substack members, and will not be posted to this podcast. To subscribe to the Substack and receive the articles and audio to your email, click here. I spend many of my days lost in thought. It isn’t unusual for me to lose track of a conversation because a stray idea occurred to me.  Sometimes I get overwhelmed when I read a paper or a book or listen to conversations. It feels like a waterfall of ideas comes crashing down in my head, and my senses fritz as my brain frantically tries to create a cascade of new neural connections in a single moment before the revelations slip away. The thoughts that consume me are about my intellectual project, and I think it is time to let you in on it. Here is the question that hijacks my days: Why does massage therapy– a profession that does profound human-centered work– remain undervalued, misunderstood, and mistreated; both internally and externally?Support the show Subscribe to our Substack: "More Than Hands" Send us an email: podcast@healwell.org Leave us a voice message:  703-468-1799 Check out our interview-style podcast: Interdisciplinary You can support Healwell and the cool things we make by donating here! Ways join in: Leave us a review on  Apple PodcastsCheck out Healwell’s live and online classesContinue the conversation with a free 3-day trial of the Healwell CommunityFind a copy of Rebecca Sturgeon's book: "Oncology Massage: An Integrative Approach to Cancer Care"Thank you to ABMP and AMTA for sponsoring us! Healwell is a 501(c)(3) non-profit based out of the Washington DC area.  Check us out at www.healwell.org

    7 min

  2. May 14

    Substack: Are We At the Table, Or On the Menu?

    Send us Fan Mail Read the article here There are many massage therapists who have worked incredibly hard to open doors in clinical settings. We have spent decades building trust, demonstrating value, and carving out space for our work in environments that didn’t initially (and often still don’t) understand or welcome us as practitioners of a uniquely valuable discipline. That pioneering work has created real impact for patients and laid groundwork that others have built on. And somewhere along the way, I think we started accepting terms that don’t fully honor what we can contribute or who we are. Support the show Subscribe to our Substack: "More Than Hands" Send us an email: podcast@healwell.org Leave us a voice message:  703-468-1799 Check out our interview-style podcast: Interdisciplinary You can support Healwell and the cool things we make by donating here! Ways join in: Leave us a review on  Apple PodcastsCheck out Healwell’s live and online classesContinue the conversation with a free 3-day trial of the Healwell CommunityFind a copy of Rebecca Sturgeon's book: "Oncology Massage: An Integrative Approach to Cancer Care"Thank you to ABMP and AMTA for sponsoring us! Healwell is a 501(c)(3) non-profit based out of the Washington DC area.  Check us out at www.healwell.org

    14 min

  3. Apr 9

    Substack: Wishes, Surveys, and Ken Burns

    Send us Fan Mail Read the original article here There’s no way for the associations to know our wishes if we don’t say them out loud. If we want the power to come from the bottom of the pyramid, we have to accept responsibility and ownership of that power. That doesn’t mean saying “I demand you fix my problem” it means saying “I need this specific thing from you in order to fix this problem.” Links: Articles where we describe problems can be found here: The Price of Free, Massage Therapy Has a Labor Problem, The Secret Health Crisis of Massage Therapists, Why Massage Therapy Needs a Divorce, Not Another Debate ...a special combination of skills that few people have. (Luckily, we have one.) Support the show Subscribe to our Substack: "More Than Hands" Send us an email: podcast@healwell.org Leave us a voice message:  703-468-1799 Check out our interview-style podcast: Interdisciplinary You can support Healwell and the cool things we make by donating here! Ways join in: Leave us a review on  Apple PodcastsCheck out Healwell’s live and online classesContinue the conversation with a free 3-day trial of the Healwell CommunityFind a copy of Rebecca Sturgeon's book: "Oncology Massage: An Integrative Approach to Cancer Care"Thank you to ABMP and AMTA for sponsoring us! Healwell is a 501(c)(3) non-profit based out of the Washington DC area.  Check us out at www.healwell.org

    11 min

  4. Mar 12

    Substack: The Designation is Not the Destination

    Send us Fan Mail What exactly do we mean when we call ourselves “healthcare providers”? “Healthcare provider” does not mean the same thing everywhere. Depending on the state, it might mean defined scope and enforceable accountability. It could relate to insurance participation. Maybe it means elevated liability standards. Worst case, it might mean mostly vibes. These variations aren’t trivial. Once the label of “healthcare provider” or “healthcare service” enters statute, it stops being branding and starts carrying weight. Or at least, it should. Across the United States, that weight is distributed unevenly. Support the show Subscribe to our Substack: "More Than Hands" Send us an email: podcast@healwell.org Leave us a voice message:  703-468-1799 Check out our interview-style podcast: Interdisciplinary You can support Healwell and the cool things we make by donating here! Ways join in: Leave us a review on  Apple PodcastsCheck out Healwell’s live and online classesContinue the conversation with a free 3-day trial of the Healwell CommunityFind a copy of Rebecca Sturgeon's book: "Oncology Massage: An Integrative Approach to Cancer Care"Thank you to ABMP and AMTA for sponsoring us! Healwell is a 501(c)(3) non-profit based out of the Washington DC area.  Check us out at www.healwell.org

    18 min

  5. Feb 5

    Substack: Massage Isn’t Complicated, It's Complex

    Send us Fan Mail Why we don’t need to get along to get along. Not all problems are created equal, and the methods that will solve one kind are very different from what you need to solve the other. Oftentimes problems are a combination of simple, complicated, or complex; or vacillate between the distinctions with time. Thinking about the features of each can help us decide how to approach them. This article is a companion to this one written by Cal. These articles represent each author’s independent perspective, and were written without our usual collaborative input. We are super excited about them.  Most of the information and images in this article come from the Complex Systems Framework Collection website. It’s delightful and simple, and I highly recommend you explore it. You can read the original article here. Support the show Subscribe to our Substack: "More Than Hands" Send us an email: podcast@healwell.org Leave us a voice message:  703-468-1799 Check out our interview-style podcast: Interdisciplinary You can support Healwell and the cool things we make by donating here! Ways join in: Leave us a review on  Apple PodcastsCheck out Healwell’s live and online classesContinue the conversation with a free 3-day trial of the Healwell CommunityFind a copy of Rebecca Sturgeon's book: "Oncology Massage: An Integrative Approach to Cancer Care"Thank you to ABMP and AMTA for sponsoring us! Healwell is a 501(c)(3) non-profit based out of the Washington DC area.  Check us out at www.healwell.org

    11 min

  6. Feb 5

    Substack: Why Massage Therapy Needs a Divorce, Not Another Debate

    Send us Fan Mail It’s Time to Stop Going to Aunt Tricia’s This article is a companion to this one written by Corey. These articles represent each author's independent perspective, and were written without our usual collaborative input. We are super excited about them.  Every technical debate in massage therapy is displacement activity. Every. Single. One. We argue about measurement systems (clock hours vs. credit hours), terminology (but we call it taxonomy… all fancy-like). Is it bodywork or is it massage? And don’t get me started about how our knickers twist when it comes to credentialing language. We have online arguments that last longer than some people’s actual training programs. All of this “activity” allows us to keep evading the fundamental questions: What does this field want to be? And what will we do when we realize that, perhaps, it’s a field that actually contains more than one distinct pathway? Read the original article here.  Support the show Subscribe to our Substack: "More Than Hands" Send us an email: podcast@healwell.org Leave us a voice message:  703-468-1799 Check out our interview-style podcast: Interdisciplinary You can support Healwell and the cool things we make by donating here! Ways join in: Leave us a review on  Apple PodcastsCheck out Healwell’s live and online classesContinue the conversation with a free 3-day trial of the Healwell CommunityFind a copy of Rebecca Sturgeon's book: "Oncology Massage: An Integrative Approach to Cancer Care"Thank you to ABMP and AMTA for sponsoring us! Healwell is a 501(c)(3) non-profit based out of the Washington DC area.  Check us out at www.healwell.org

    20 min

  7. Jan 15

    Substack: The Myth of the Gift

    Send us Fan Mail Recently several of Corey's projects have come across the same stumbling block: a lot of people believe many skills can’t be taught. This has come up in my poking around the topics of therapeutic relationships, compassion, supervision, writing, and emotional labor.  In each of these areas, there is a pervasive fallacy that the reason a person is good at a skill is the result of a mystical innate genius. Some je ne sais quoi. Some indefinable essence. This is not only untrue, it’s a limiting perspective. Read this article here Support the show Subscribe to our Substack: "More Than Hands" Send us an email: podcast@healwell.org Leave us a voice message:  703-468-1799 Check out our interview-style podcast: Interdisciplinary You can support Healwell and the cool things we make by donating here! Ways join in: Leave us a review on  Apple PodcastsCheck out Healwell’s live and online classesContinue the conversation with a free 3-day trial of the Healwell CommunityFind a copy of Rebecca Sturgeon's book: "Oncology Massage: An Integrative Approach to Cancer Care"Thank you to ABMP and AMTA for sponsoring us! Healwell is a 501(c)(3) non-profit based out of the Washington DC area.  Check us out at www.healwell.org

    6 min

  8. Jan 1

    Going Forward

    Send us Fan Mail What's the plan for The Rub and Healwell in 2026? Support the show Subscribe to our Substack: "More Than Hands" Send us an email: podcast@healwell.org Leave us a voice message:  703-468-1799 Check out our interview-style podcast: Interdisciplinary You can support Healwell and the cool things we make by donating here! Ways join in: Leave us a review on  Apple PodcastsCheck out Healwell’s live and online classesContinue the conversation with a free 3-day trial of the Healwell CommunityFind a copy of Rebecca Sturgeon's book: "Oncology Massage: An Integrative Approach to Cancer Care"Thank you to ABMP and AMTA for sponsoring us! Healwell is a 501(c)(3) non-profit based out of the Washington DC area.  Check us out at www.healwell.org

    4 min
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4.8
out of 5
13 Ratings

About

Join Healwell in examining and bringing context to the world of massage therapy beyond the table. We have ideas. We have opinions. We want change, and that will only come with an understanding of who and what massage therapy truly is. A variety of topics are up for grabs: history, philosophy, development, and all the other shiny things that fascinate us.Healwell is a non-profit based out of the Washington DC area.  Check us out at www.healwell.org 

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