Polarity therapy is a form of holistic healing or, more accurately, energy medicine. It's similar in nature to cranial sacral therapy, both involving the use of touch on the body to alleviate physical and emotional ailments. Polarity therapy is specifically based on the theory that your body has an inner flowing energy, or energy field, which is crucial to your own emotional and physical well-being.
Problems occur when this inner energy flow is hindered, blocked or imbalanced in some way. An imbalance means there's too much energy in one area of your body which results in too little energy in another. The outward symptoms of this could be, something like, when you're feeling stressed or in pain. An energy blockage or imbalance could even be a sign or cause of disease within your body.
Polarity therapy is a way of restoring the natural flow and balance of your body's energy. Energy blockages are identified though discomfort in a particular area of anatomy or other signs such as muscle spasms. Once problem regions have been identified, there's a variety of ways to restore your body's energy balance.
To begin with, simply being aware of your body's energy flow can be positive. Diet, in regards to what specific food and drink you have, is another important factor in keeping your inner energy balanced. Exercise, known as polarity yoga, can likewise have a positive effect. Perhaps the most significant method of practising polarity therapy however, is through subtle touch to certain areas of the body. This method is known as bodywork.
Similar to massage, bodywork involves a polarity therapist applying pressure with their fingers to a certain area of the body, either in a circulating motion, gentle rocking movements or through cranial holds. There's three levels of touch involved with bodywork, 'light', 'stimulating' and 'deep'. The skill of the polarity therapist lies in how and where the pressure is given, in addition to the amount of pressure applied.
It's important to note that polarity therapy isn't just to do with the physical body. It's very much about the relationship between body, mind and spirit. Your energy field or the energy flowing within you is seen as an important connection between these three aspects of your overall self. This is why when your energy flow is hindered, any one aspect or all aspects of your mind, body and spirit can suffer as a result. There's a more general belief that energy fields don't just exist within individuals or living things. Rather, everything that exists, living and non-living, is made of energy.
As mentioned earlier, polarity therapy has much in common with cranial sacral therapy, although there's important and significant differences between the two. Nevertheless, with both therapies having many similarities, you'll find practitioners of polarity therapy often practise cranial sacral therapy as well.
Polarity therapy was first developed in the late 19th century by Austrian-American chiropractor and osteopath Randolph Stone. A combination of eastern and western healing techniques, it came about through Stone's particular interest in the link between human anatomy and illness. Nowadays, polarity therapy is used by a number of medical professionals such as doctor's, nurses and physiotherapists.