Q&A on Reflexology Techniques from the YouTube Channel

hello and welcome Adam Thomas from balancing touch reflexology so good to see you and thanks for joining me today today I've been getting a lot reading through my comments on my YouTube and um I get quite a few comments lately on technique so I want to try and Bunchies all together and answer some questions that you have on [Music] technique I just want to talk a little bit about sort of um a little bit of my uh thinking on technique right so first of all um I don't believe there's one way to do something right um you know we're not like working on a car where we you know take out a part and you know flip it around and put it in and it's the wrong way and it won't work right it reflexology doesn't work that way our Focus here is to balance the body and loosen tension and you know relaxation basically right and stimulate the kind of nerve endings and all those things in your feet to get your brain and your your whole body connection right it's a holistic practice so that's what our focus is so doing something a certain way um I is is fine right um but there's other ways to attack the same goal it's kind of the same theory is if you're trying to climb the mountain right to get to the very top um you know the top might be one single point but there's an infinite possibility of ways to reach that one point right so you can go around and round and round and take like you know three days four days to get to the top or you can be like no I want to go this way and you go up this way um and get there but the end result is the same right so the end result in reflexology is to relax and um bring that body you know sort of back to um a sense of balance right so um that's our goal there and so I think that there isn't one way or a certain technique that's better there are certain reflexes that work in a certain direction right so the digestive system you know in your body comes down and then it works in a clockwise Direction um you know large intestine follows the same thing clockwise Direction so there are some certain things that um you should be aware of that they they work in a certain Direction but other than that it's all technique right so if you go and look around the world you see different massage techniques for example and some people their technique is completely different but the end result is the same is to relax the muscle right so that's sort of my little Spiel on uh technique there so um so yeah let's get into answering the questions and uh let's see the first question I have here is do you do you have to walk your hands or can you use oils to Glide right and uh hope that makes sense so yeah totally makes sense um yes you can use oil you can use cream you can use anything that you think um you're comfortable with oh that's another thing too back up a little bit to the technique thing I wanted to just mention something too um none of us are the same so our bodies are built different we operate our bodies differently so one technique that works for somebody might not work well for the next person right so if we say something simple like okay yes it's good to have biomechanics where you're sitting up straight in your spine and everything's relaxed and your arms come out at a 90° and all this stuff so yeah that's good and and all that but if you've been you know have bad posture your whole life and you're kind of like this and you get up and you do that and then you force yourself okay I'm doing reflexology now so now I have to get into proper biop panics and do that and then you're all stiff and it's hard to breathe because you're you're trying to um have this perfect kind of posture well that's not going to translate well to the feet right so my point here is and yes it's probably good to have better biomechanics um when you're working better posture yes but if you're uncomfortable when you're doing it then it's sort of defeating the purpose so outside of the reflexology would probably work on your posture right and then when you can bring your good posture into the reflexy session uh when you're ready to to work that way right so um that's a little bit there so yeah getting back to this question um yes you can use oils for sure um personally I do not like to use oils or creams or things like that at the beginning of the session because I use my thumbs and fingers and everything as my eyes and my sensors if there's a layer of oil over top of that it takes away a lot of the information that I'm wanting to um get right so that's my um take on it but some people do a sliding technique the entire time like when I went to Thailand they have their um Thai reflexology thing and they use something like Vaseline and some kind of um green balm and that's what they use the entire session and it was fantastic and it was great so again the end goal was to relax my feet and my body and that's exactly what happened um personally I don't like to do that at the end of the session I do add oils and stuff like that so yeah I I would say again if using oil and cream and stuff is your thing then do it do your thing because that's what speaks to you right so yes um that doesn't really answer your question as a yes no response and a lot of these questions are not going to be a yes no a lot of the answers are not going to be um yes no response because there isn't I really believe that it's up to you right so if you like using oils you like experimenting with that and there's a lot of oils and stuff that you can use that will really help benefit people right um you know in ayurveda uh they have a specific bunch of different oils that work different body types and stuff like that so that's really fascinating so yeah like it it can be a really great um benefit for you so anyway blah blah blah next question is on this video of how to work the head in reflexology okay and this is part of my tricky reflexes series um so there's a bunch of comments here uh we were taught to go up five zones horizontally then vertically is there a reason for this one person was taught to go uh sorry they they were taught horizontally so to work across here so obviously we're talking about the feet here in this video but the hands are the same um and then so work all the way across here I believe something like that maybe on each each zone right or maybe they worked all the way across this way and then moved down and work all the way across that way but the the point here was when they were taught is to work in the horizontal fashion work all the reflexes to the head and then to work vertically right so what this technique is teaching you is to really focus your attention I believe so working up and down first and working across first or a second right so what I'm doing in this technique is I'm actually showing you to go up vertically and then across horizontally and then you move those over a little bit and go up and up so if you take these two patterns and overlay them um what I'm doing in my technique is just combining the way that the commenters um was taught right so again this comes down to um a technique thing and a preference right so if you were taught that way and that feels comfortable for you then that's the way to do it right um for me I tend to forget uh when I'm working on small areas how many times I did things so by doing this little pattern I know that I started over there and then I work this way so that's the reason I do this is so that it helps me remember and stay focused on the area that I'm doing I think if I was to separate it the way that that was it's um and think okay I'll go up this way or go across this way and then go across this way yeah I could come up with a pattern that would make me do that but I would um I think I would maybe lose counts especially if I was talking with the client and stuff so this technique um really helps me Focus where the the other technique might actually help you focus a bit better but the point here is that you are focused on working the head so if we look at the head here there's something you know there's there's areas in the head and stuff that that don't need to work in a specific direction right there's tons of stuff in here going on um so that is really important to realize as well is that there's no certain pattern so what is essentially happening here so I would have to cut down my head in half right because that would be one side and so I would be working lines across this way and then I would switch and work lines this way right and then I would probably come over to the other foot or they would do on the other foot um horizontal lines horizontal lines and then vertical lines right so that's fine that's great keep it up if that's what works for you um again try other techniques right that's why I'm out there on on YouTube and stuff because I want to learn more and I'm probably going to take this technique and try it and see how that worked but when I was taught reflexology I was taught to do that right I was taught to go in one way and then switch and come across the other way I just wanted to uh Focus my attention a bit more uh for me for myself right so I hope that helps I hope that answers your question um but yeah there is no real reason that I do it except to keep myself focused this next question that I get um is quite similar I get it asked a little bit different ways and stuff but the question is how often can you perform this process right so this is related to the the digestive system so if somebody's having digestive issues that's what they're asking about so how often can somebody um have this happen so if I find an area that is quite sensitive and things like that um I will give it to the client as homework right as to bring home and you know these are the areas that you kind of work and um I usually go by how sensitive it started and how it has decreased right kind of like like the same way that you go and work out at the gym you don't work your arms every day um for example right uh or else you're going to kind of like burn out your arms right so same thing you don't want to just be over stimulating of the area so there's a kind of a fine balance and this is where you know the art of reflexology comes in um but as for home playay for homework um I would just give them the the way to work it and tell them to just notice if there's a difference like a couple times a day see if they can you know reach down to their feet or their hands and work on that area and just notice if there's any change in the sensitivity levels when they do it right so yeah it's kind of a hard question to answer here but if we're talking about like sessions I really like to have about three sessions within two weeks okay so every couple days right um and that way it gives a nice you know break in between sessions you can kind of the client can notice if there's been any changes how their mood is how they're feeling right that sort of thing there um if it's something that we want to really work on I might do it a little bit uh closer together like every couple days right but personally I don't like to do every day um me working on a client I find that if I give uh something to the client to work on themselves an everyday process can be okay because I know um at least for me my human nature is if somebody gives me homework to do every day I'm probably not going to follow the rules and I might do it every second day or something like that so um I really encourage clients to do something a couple times a day if possible right so I don't know if that answers your question but um that's sort of how I would approach it um obviously if there's some kind of um adverse um effects you know where they're not feeling good and it's making them feel worse obviously stop doing that and let the body kind of just adjust um its own way right so yeah and just to add a little something else on to the end of that I was reading another comment and it said basically like how much time do you work on each um reflex okay so I really like to work um at least three times on the same area right if it's a sensitive area I'll work it and um I'll come back do some other reflexes and I'll come back to it see how it's feeling um and you know go do some other reflexes and come back and see how it's doing a third time if not I'll probably work it another three times or at least another couple times to see if that area has changed at all so yeah that that would be the way that I do it but I really think um groupings of three is a real um good sort of FOC and you just will get you'll you'll work the area really well if you do something three times okay so I think I've been blabbing too much here but um I think I'll just answer one more question on technique and it's actually more of an observation on your Technique right so it's more of a visual not visual but uh feeling sort of uh cue right so this one is related to how to work the nervous system and in it I mention that I feel tension on the toe right and so so uh the commenter here was how can you tell there is tension in the big toe so in the video what I was feeling was around and it was also in comparison to the right and left um was around this area here on the big toe I was just feeling there was tension there um how did I feel this tension well first of all it wasn't really bending As Nice and flowy as the other side right there was a little bit of a that there was also K uh um callus buildup here so it was kind of stiff and hard and you can kind of just at least after time you've been working on a lot of people you can notice that there's um tension there it's sort of the same as if you you know um it's kind of neat my my wife's a hairdresser and uh she can feel tension in people's head right by the way that that this kind of moves right like some people's this doesn't doesn't move at all and they they have quite a a tense Cranium right and so um the the less movement there so that's sort of like a bigger sort of visual that you can get when you're working on smaller areas is that you can feel just the tension in that and then also when there's tension on the big toe in on the pad of the toe or just under the toe so I was feeling it under the occipital Ridge here which is related to here right um it the tension was also kind of down the whole toe right all basically Zone one right I felt it was tense and so that's how I was kind of feeling the tension there and so when you're working and using your Technique right so for example if I was using oil I might not be able to pick up on that kind of attension right um because there's there's another layer there and then my technique would be different that I wouldn't be so focused on a little area right so just like the comment before uh working horizontal and and then switching to work vertical when you do that you get a lot more information because you're focused on One Direction how does that feel when I'm walk walking my thumb all the way around this way right and then I switch to go up and down right you can really get focused in on feeling tension and working the little points there right so that's why it's really good after a while I trained myself to to be able to move back and forth this way but I'm still focused on feeling for tension in that area that I'm working on right so I hope that kind of makes sense your Technique I really think needs to be such so that these become your eyes and your ears right so whatever technique you use even if you're using um I don't have one here like a massage massage stick right that's a totally different technique right I have used a massage stick I do use a massage stick to push on certain points right again in Thailand when I was there at the end of the session they have I believe it's 26 points of relaxation that they hit um and they hold and that feels really really great right and then they sort of rub around this way and I was not 100% sold on it but of course it felt good and it stimulated my feet in a different way but that's a totally different technique and is it wrong no it's just different and it's for a different purpose right so when I use a stick and stuff it's for a different purpose and um just to get at something to work the same thing a different way right so I hope that makes sense to you out there if you have any comments on the way that you uh work that you know your techniques and uh that sort of thing just let us know in the comments below um thanks for watching today and um of course remember to keep your feed happy thanks for watching bye-bye if you're interested in learning more about reflexology you could subscribe to the channel below it's also very helpful to hit that like button and feel free to share it with anybody who you think might be interested in it you can find my online courses reflexology charts and other reflexology goodies over on my website which is balancing touch.com Thomas from from balancing touch.com