Massage therapies, hard and soft styles

The same attention is needed whether you work deep or superficial. I use which ever is most suitable to each individual at the time of their session. Each session is unique but therapiests will also have their own style which suits them best and clients will gravitate to that.

Hi I am Julia Rhodes , principal colon hydrotherapist at West London Colonics.
Theres deep massage , and then there is really deep massage.
Colon hydrotherapy might be classed s the latter . Interested ?
Have a look at WLC s page on link underneath

every one have different opinion about the massage practices. Now the real thing is to know what is the correct way of massage.

their is some ttruth to the above answer and some false. ive been teaching massage therapy for about 20 years, i think the main observation i see, why peolple, who do soft styles dont perhaps change to deeper styles? the main reason, is that to become a good technical, proper body mechanical, long lasting therapist requieres skill! not only cordination, but the very good, good sounded anatomical and kinesiology skills, and this for a lot of people truth of the matter, is not easy!!!! i do osteopath, and deep tissue sports therapy, for i find it greatly stimulating when you have to treat a chronic lesion. but this comment can also many times reflect a young therapist, meaning, fresh out of school, or still in the phase of learning. with proper technique and body mechanics you never get hurt, or tire, but that may dear therapists takes sometimes yearsssssssssss to learn. good luck to all! ricardo.

yesss

Andy, I think you already answered the question yourself.
Therapists who do real deep tissue massage (the word deep tissue means nothing these days, since anyone and their dog uses it for soft style massage...) end up feeling tired, stiff and in pain, yet they get paid the same as the swedish/aromatherapy guys. So in the end they switch to the fluffy stuff. For those reasons, I also attempted a few times to do fluffy stuff but failed because I found it so boring and pointless, and also because my clients complained...
I think most clients want medium strong massage, with a minority wanting soft style and another hard core minority wanting very deep work. The solution for therapists is to do the medium strong massage and from time to time to adjust to the soft or heavy duty work, according to the clients' needs
Doing very deep work for a long period of time is unadvisable as you will end up damaging your body to heal other people's bodies, which is utterly stupid. I know people who are constatntly exhausted because they offer proper deep tissue/sports massage 5 days a week (e.g. they work for football or rugby clubs where "fluff" is not allowed)...
I believe that we, massage therapists, offer massage not for the money but for the satisfaction we get from helping other people and from the feeling of achievement when we offer a quality service. So I wouldn't do the soft stuff because I find it boring and because I know that It's a bit pointless. In a few words soft massage offers me no moral satisfaction. But some people are happy to rub oil for 60' and get paid for it, and if clients are happy that's also fine, isn't it?

That's quite a generaisation there, but, answering on my own experience I have found that I get results from both types of massage but generally speaking my clients prefer the gentler styles. I do have cliients who prefer a deeper massage and I always ensure that that is what they get.
The deeper, harder massage can be more wearing on the joints and there are different types of massage that can be learnt to help ease this.
I think in the end it is about client preference and market demand.
Hope this helps answer your question. Best wishes