The definition of massage that we use today comes from a French word that means “friction of kneading,” the literal way your body experiences a massage. The practice has been around even longer than the French language. There are hieroglyphics dating back to the year 2300 BC that shows people attending to their hands and feet with what appears to be a massage, and there is other historical evidence of massages in such far-flung cultures as China, Mesopotamia, India, Korea and Japan.
In short, massage is part of our human culture, a way to experience the intimacy of human contact while bringing some level of stress reduction. But there’s more than pleasure involved – there are believed to be actual health benefits to massage.
One thing is certain – getting a massage is an increasingly popular thing to do. The American Massage Therapy Association, a non-profit organization that advocates for the benefits of the art and serves as a trade organization for its practitioners, estimates that nearly $12 billion was spent in 2014 on massage therapy. The AMTA estimates that between July 2013 and July 2014, an estimated 32 million Americans had at least one massage.
DIFFERENT STROKES
There are various types of massages that you can obtain. The most popular in the U.S. is the Swedish massage, a deep-tissue rubdown that used to work out the kinks in your muscles and bring relaxing endorphins rushing through the body.