“Once I stepped into Ohana it was like I had come home.” Minter said. ” I joined the practice just as Ohana was expanding, and it felt so wonderful to be part of the growth. I could feel the connection between the practitioners. I knew I found not only a great place to work, but also a great place to learn and expand my knowledge.”
At the young age of 9 Heather said she received her first massage from a close family friend during a time when she had needed it the most. She said she was home from boarding school for the holiday–being away from home had been hard for her.
“I felt transported.” She said. “Honestly, it changed my life. When I returned to school I taught my roommate about massage and we began giving each other back rubs every night before bed. It enabled us to provide nurturing touch to each other while we were away from our families.
Heather said that struggles in her own life brought her back to bodywork and inspired her to go to massage school. She’d been dealing with loss in her life and chronic pain that made it hard for her to get out of bed most days. She said she sought out help from a doctor.
“Once they sent me on my way without answers, I turned to bodywork.” Heather said. “Finding acupuncture was the gateway back into my body, back into feeling, back into being me. Realizing that bodywork had been the answer all along, and because life seemed all the shorter and more precious than before, I enrolled in massage school that same year.”
Heather said that having a healthy body also comes form having a healthy body image.
“We are living in a culture with a very narrow idea of beauty.” Heather said. “The first thing we can do to have a healthy body and body image is to stop berating ourselves about how we don’t fit that ideal and love our bodies as they are.”
Heather went on to say that we must be careful about the media we consume because some things can have a negative impact on our self worth. Self care includes the mind and the body. In Heather’s opinion, massage is a good tool for learning how to love your body.
“Massage enables people to feel safe in their bodies,appreciate their bodies and more capably use their bodies to do the things they dream to do.” She said. “When you are living this way, you can’t help but love your body!”
