What is Tui Na?

Tui Na is one of the traditional branches of Chinese Medicine alongside the better-known disciplines of acupuncture, herbal medicine, and Chi Kung.  Tui Na is an ancient medical massage art that is based upon the same conceptual foundation as all Chinese medicine – but the main tool is the practitioner’s hands. Tui Na practitioners use a repertoire of over 25 different hand techniques to restore harmony to the body by removing blockages and obstacles to the normal flow of blood and chi – vital energy. There is no healing art in the West that directly corresponds in scope and depth to Tui Na but it unifies elements of what in the West are compartmentalised into various disciplines such as massage therapy, chiropractic, acupressure, osteopathy, kinesiology, psychology and occupational therapy. 

Tui Na is based upon touch – the most essential form of human contact, and more than any other healing art, Tui Na is an elaborate science of touch. When we have injury or pain, our first instinct is to touch it. Touch is the basis of human connection and when compassionate intention directs skilled touch, this contains the profound essence of all healing.  

A skilled Tui Na practitioner must be equally good at using touch to ‘listen’ to the patient’s body to sense and diagnose as well as actively using touch to ‘speak’ to the patient’s body to help it let go of blockage and return to a state of joyous flow. The Tui Na practitioner should be ‘soft’ and use minimum effort – it is nature that heals and we are only the agent of change. 

Tui Na is a zen art – it is said that the lineage goes all the way back to the sage Bodhidharma, the founder of both Shaolin Kung Fu,  Zen and the Tea Ceremony. Indeed Tui Na bears the hallmark of all zen arts – it is simple, direct and effective. Although, as patients attest, it can operate on apparently sublime levels, it is not an ethereal art and remains always grounded and extremely practical. 

The patient is conceived as a whole, using the classical Chinese concept of the ‘Three Treasures’ – jing, chi and shen (roughly – body, energy, mind). Illness and injury are approached both based on a deep understanding of physical anatomy and bio-mechanical structure and function of the body (jing) as well as through the lens of cultivating healthy flow of life force (chi) through the meridians and organs. Finally, it is understood that the key to long term health is the mind (shen) – helping the patient to identify the internal and external causes of disharmony and make appropriate changes. In the spirit of zen the outcome of a Tui Na session should be decisive – the patient should feel noticeably improved and the condition should make clear progress forward after each treatment. 

Like all zen arts, the Tui Na experience is not possible to describe in words. In the spirit of the Buddha’s saying, ‘Do not believe anything I say until you verify it  yourself through experience,” I invite you to come and try Tui Na for yourself!