A bit of background part 1 :)

Hi everyone -
Hope that you are all enjoying your evening :)

I figured that it was time to finally do a post giving everyone a bit of background about me as well as how "Phoenix Rising Massage Therapy LLC" came into being.

Hmmm.... where to start though?

This will be
Ah! I know - how about a little bit about me first - as that will hopefully help & make it easier to explain how I got into massage therapy.  Becoming a massage therapist was honestly something that I never really thought about as a career until January 2010 when I literally had the "light bulb" "aha!" "This is what I need to do with my life" kind of moment. So when people speak of having the proverbial "light bulb moment" I can say - I understand and I know it very well!

All right - time for me to back up and explain how I got to that moment :)

I am not just a licensed massage therapist and body work therapist (my official title with the state of Wisconsin), I also have a double bachelors degree in German and Humanistic Studies with an emphasis in Ancient and Medieval History (mouthful, yes, I know!) that I received in May 2009 from the University-Wisconsin at Green Bay. Which in retrospect is a feat in itself as I completed a double bachelors degree in 3 years when many students at UWGB were averaging about 5-6 years to complete their degrees. My whole plan in life, post undergraduate graduation, after spending 4 weeks at the University of Kassel, was to start graduate school and get my masters' degree in German translation from UW-Milwaukee.

However, life and reality caught up with me.

Burn out - by this time I had been studying German going on 13 years, and doing classes in some shape or form for three years without a break, as well as getting sick with what started out as a sinus infection spiraled into really nasty migraines. Which due to the severity of the migraines lead me to make the decision that I needed to withdraw from graduate school to focus on my health.

And honestly, studying German, wasn't fun anymore.

In retrospect - it was a very good decision that I stopped graduate school when I did. During the span of the remander of the 2009-2010 school year, I ended up having all four of my wisdom teeth removed (which surprisingly took care of the migraines), as well as slamming the car door from the right baby toe all the way up to my knee - which led to arthroscopic knee surgery as well as almost a year of rehabbing my knee and ankle.

Why might you ask, do I bring all of this up?

It was January 2010 - ironically just before I slammed the car door on my leg - that I ended up - as I like to say - literally knocked over the head, innately knowing that "you need to go to massage school." So I started looking into the two local massage schools and ended up applying (and being accepted at) Blue Sky School of Professional Massage &  Therapeutic Bodywork with plans to begin in March of 2010.

Slight problem though - my arthroscopic knee surgery? It was scheduled for March.

So - I ended up deferring my start at Blue Sky until August of 2010 when I entered the program choosing to follow the energy track during the ten month program.

I will not lie - it's a very intensive program.

 Two nights a week, 5 hours each night. And that is not counting the countless hours of outside the classroom work that I had to put in. One of the first things that I was told -I think it was at orientation - was that once you start the massage therapy program, you literally have no life. Totally true in that regard - from just before Halloween weekend 2010 through two weeks before Christmas - I only had 1 weekend off from the various weekend seminars.

But with all of the many hours of studying and hard work - I found myself enjoying it.

I was rediscovering why I loved learning and my passion for helping people.

To sum it up - this is what I wrote that appears on the Phoenix Rising Massage Therapy LLC's website:

"I was first introduced to Reiki & Energy Work at age 8. Intrigued at the possibilities of what energy work could do— I expanded my knowledge to be trained in Cranial Sacral Therapies by the time I was  16 years old.   I chose to experience the “traditional” college experience—and completed a double bachelor’s degree in German & Ancient/Medieval history in three years, graduating from UW-Green Bay in May of 2009.  After experiencing health related issues in 2009 & early 2010, I had the proverbial “light bulb” moment when I realized that I needed to return to practicing Energy Work. That  moment is when she made the decision to go to school to become a Massage Therapist.  I have  experienced the benefits of massage, and wanted to be able to give back and help others the way massage has helped me."

Long story short, through all the hard work - blood, sweat, and tears, I finished my education at Blue Sky on August 3rd 2011. Five days later, I sat for nationals ("sat for nationals" - taking the exam on the computer at a testing center with I think 40 other people who were there for other exams), and found out I passed the same day. By that weekend, I had an overnight trip to just outside of Madison to complete my last community service event (4 hours of giving chair massages at Lands Ends Corporate Headquarters for the Dairyland Dare" bike race). And by the end of the month - I was a graduate - again for the 2nd time in 2 years!

So - this concludes part 1 of the 2 part posts - as this is a summary of how and why I got into massage therapy. In the next post - I'll explain about the origins/ how the name "Phoenix Rising Massage Therapy LLC" came into being.

Have a good night!
Amanda@Phoenixrisingmx