For over ten years, Shiatsu therapy has been one of the most grounding forces in my life. As someone who is highly sensitive, easily overstimulated, and living with post-viral fatigue, Shiatsu has always done something no other treatment could do: it speaks the language of my body directly — no translation needed
My best friend—who’s also been my Shiatsu therapist for the past 13 years—has walked this healing path with me, and you can explore her practice here. (most photos made by yours truly).Her treatments have seen me through some of the darkest, most chaotic phases of my health journey. There were times when my system was so far from baseline, those sessions were the thing that brought me back. Back to center. Back to breath. Back to me.
But here’s the beautiful part I want to share today:
That dynamic is changing.
From Crisis Mode to Maintenance
For years, I went to her because I had to—I had reached my limit, and I needed help now. But lately, something has shifted. As I’ve been going deeper in my healing journey—treating the Epstein-Barr virus, understanding my body’s electromagnetic sensitivity, reconnecting with my authentic self—I’ve noticed my energy field changing.
I no longer walk into a Shiatsu session feeling like I’m shattered. Instead, I arrive grounded. Curious. Calm. I’m not coming in to be rescued; I’m coming in to maintain the flow.
That’s a huge shift. And honestly? It feels like a quiet, powerful win.
What is Shiatsu Therapy, Exactly?
Shiatsu is rooted in Traditional Chinese Medicine and works with the meridian system—those invisible channels of energy (Qi) that run through the body. When these pathways get blocked or stagnant, we start to feel it: fatigue, tension, emotional overwhelm, and sometimes even pain.
Shiatsu practitioners use their hands, thumbs, elbows, and even knees to apply gentle pressure along the meridians. The goal is to restore balance, stimulate energy flow, and support the body’s natural ability to heal.
It’s like acupuncture, but without the needles—and for sensitive people like me, it’s the perfect energetic tune-up.
One specific area we focus on in my sessions is my chest area. She focuses on opening up the chest area, because a lot of emotional and energetic stagnation builds up there. It helps release grief, tension, and repressed energy held in the lungs and heart—two meridians that are often impacted in people who are energetically sensitive or healing from chronic illness.
Body as Messenger: What Shiatsu Has Taught Me
Through Shiatsu, I’ve learned to understand my body’s cues in ways I never could before. For example, I’ve noticed this bubbly, fizzy sensation under my skin or in certain organs. At first, it felt weird—like something was shifting inside me—and then I realized:
That was stagnant energy clearing out.
My body was speaking to me. It was saying:
“Thank you. This was stuck, and now it’s moving.”
And that kind of awareness is priceless. It’s not just a physical release—it’s an emotional recalibration, a frequency shift, a return to flow.
Shiatsu During Deep Healing: A Lifeline, A Lighthouse
During the most intense part of my healing, Shiatsu was non-negotiable. It was how I re-entered my body when I felt completely untethered. In fact, I wrote a blog post recently about the pain in my meridians that started when I began doing deeper healing work. That post shares more about the growing pains that come with real energetic transformation—and Shiatsu was a huge part of how I navigated it.
👉 You can read that post here.
Final Thoughts: From Survival to Flow
To me, Shiatsu is not just bodywork. It’s soul support with biological roots. It helps me stay grounded, balanced, and more attuned to my body’s needs. But even more importantly, it’s been a mirror—showing me how far I’ve come.
I used to need it to survive.
Now I receive it to thrive.
And that shift? That subtle, powerful shift from “I need this to keep going” to “I choose this to stay aligned”? That’s the result of transformation. That’s what healing—real, embodied healing—looks like.
Join the Vibe!
I’m Tani — writer, educator, and someone who has spent fifteen years learning to read her own body like a map. Based in Amsterdam, I navigate the crossroads of EMF awareness, post-viral healing, and nervous system regulation. Not from theory — from lived experience. This space exists for the ones who feel things deeply, who sense what others miss, and who are done being told it’s all in their head. If that’s you — come find your people. Follow me on Instagram @tanistates, tag me when something here lands, and let’s build something real together. Your story might just be the one someone else needed to hear.
🎧 Listen to this article on Spotify:
The Indigo Healing Guide
Fifteen years of living with Epstein-Barr, post-viral fatigue, and quantum sensitivity — distilled into the guide I desperately needed and couldn’t find anywhere. Part memoir, part manual. Written for anyone navigating the invisible gaps where medicine ends and embodied wisdom begins. I made it because I needed it. And because you might too.