Having Weird Off Days As A LMT
Does anyone else have weird off days where you can feel you are not giving a good massage or able to connect with the client or be present? I can't figure out what causes it, sometimes lack of sleep, sometimes personal issues at home, but sometimes there's just no rhyme or reason and no matter what I do I can shake it. I either have to just push through the feeling and give mediocre massages or call out "sick" so I don't lose any clients. I even apologized to my last client last night, who I've seen before, because my first two massages felt awful and I could tell I wasn't giving them the same great massage I did the first time. Now I feel like I may have lost that client for saying I was having an off emotional day, even though they seem like a really good person who understood and was even telling me what we should work on next time. Does anyone have any advice for getting through these days? We also do couples massages at my work, which I hate (especially when they request no talking other than checking in on pressure) because I feel like I can't connect with the client at all. I'm not much of a talker during my sessions anyways unless they are talking/asking questions the whole time, but it would be nice to feel like I can ask them questions throughout the massage to help them let go better. Sometimes these mental days are so bad I feel like I'm a horrible massage therapist and I should just give up, even though I love my work and have been told many times how great my massages are. I'm also very introverted and when I get these off days I just shut down and literally want to climb into a hole and hide from everyone. Also sometimes I lose all my confidence with certain clients, which makes things worse because then I'm stuck in my head the whole massage. I'm sure therapy would help figure out what's causing this but any advice would be lovely.