The Trager Approach

Change the Mind to Change the Body

E-book

The Trager approach is a type of somatic movement education, not a type of massage, although some massage therapists learn Trager work and incorporate it into a massage practice. You can experience this technique in two ways: one in which you are passive (tablework) and the other in which you are active (Mentastics).

Tablework

During the tablework session, you lie, comfortably dressed, on a padded table while the practitioner moves you in ways that you naturally move, without using oils or lotions. A session usually lasts from 60 to 90 minutes.

The practitioner uses a quality of touch and movement such that you experience the feeling of moving effortlessly and freely. These gentle, non-intrusive, natural movements help release deep-seated physical and mental patterns and bring about deep relaxation, increased physical mobility, and mental clarity. The movements are never forced so that you do not experience pain or discomfort.

According to an article in the May/June 1997 issue of Massage Magazine, "Trager work intends to break up inhibiting patterns in the body/mind, and to place in the body/mind pleasurable, positive experiences and memories that can be accessed by the client in the future."

Mentastics

Principles

Trager work uses motion in the muscles and joints to produce positive, pleasurable sensations that enter the nervous system and begin to trigger tissue changes through the sensory-motor feedback loops between the brain and the muscles. Thus, practitioners are not changing the condition of your body's tissue with their hands but are communicating a quality of feeling to your nervous system.

In fact, Milton Trager believed that if practitioners try to relax the muscle tissue, they fail, according to Deane Juhan in "The Trager Approach: A Comprehensive Introduction." Trying is an effort that creates tension, while the goal of a Trager session is to create relaxation. Juhan writes, "The kinds of reflex responses, tissue changes, and behavioral changes [Trager] is able to elicit are possible because of the intimate neurological association between sensory stimulations, emotional feelings, attitudes and concepts, and the body's motor response to all to them."

Practitioners

Certified Practitioners have successfully completed the program provided by The Trager Institute, and have maintained continuing education and other requirements of the institute.

Milton Trager said the key quality for anyone wanting to become a practitioner is receptivity, according to the Massage Magazine article. Practitioners must learn to enter a meditative state called "hook-up" where they can maintain a relaxed, quiet, non-reactive emotional state while working. This state lets them listen to any tensions or inhibitions they encounter in the client's body.

Practitioners must also develop a quality of touch that is soft, light, and gentle, and always be asking: What can be lighter? What can be softer? What can be easier?

Sources

Deane Juhan, M.A., "The Trager Approach: A Comprehensive Introduction."

Don Schwartz, Ph.D., "What Could Be Lighter?: The Work of Milton Trager, M.D." Massage Magazine, May/June 1997.

Roger Tolle, "The Trager Approach," Massage Therapy Journal, Spring 2005.