The Massage Therapy Foundation is one of our industry’s best assets. Full disclosure: I have been volunteering for the Foundation since 2010 and have the honor of serving as a Trustee since March 2017. Through my service to the Foundation, I realized that there are many people who don’t know its potential just as I didn’t when I first started my massage career.
I thought of the Massage Therapy Foundation as the organization that does research. As someone who doesn’t identify as a researcher, I was happy to contribute a few dollars a year toward efforts to do so on my (our) behalf. But I soon learned the Foundation was far more than this.
I have the privilege of serving as the chairperson for the Community Service Grant Committee and get to see how Foundation dollars – our dollars – bring massage therapy to underserved populations all over the world. Imagine that. Because of my donation, Veterans with opioid addiction in Fayetteville, North Carolina can receive the compassion and pain management benefits of massage, victims of domestic violence in Chicago, Illinois are offered a safe place where massage helps their healing, children with cancer in Nevada are comforted and sleeping better during their treatments, the list goes on.
Because of the Massage Therapy Foundation and the partnerships we have cultivated, not only are we able to support communities in need, we are able to do exciting research that is catapulting massage therapy into a more integrated health care system, and we can help teach our educators and future massage therapists the benefits of an informed practice. Let’s keep going!
There are approximately 330,000 massage therapists in the US.[1] [2] If every LMT in the country gave $1 to the Foundation today, we could fund up to 11 research grants (or maybe one really, really big one!), 66 community service grants, and/or 9000+ classes of The Basics of Research Literacy. Imagine all the people we can help. We can change the world!
My personal pledge to the Massage Therapy Foundation in 2018 is 1.5% of my proceeds. Donate what you can. Your contributions truly make a difference.
Visit massagetherapyfoundation.org for donation instructions and for free resources to help inform your practice.
Thank you from the bottom of my heart.
[1] https://www.amtamassage.org/infocenter/economic_industry-fact-sheet.html
[2] https://www.abmp.com/updates/blog-posts/expect-more-les-massage-therapist-population-still-growing-very-slowly
