We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Roland Ryan Carrizal a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, Roland thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. What’s the best advice you ever gave to a client? How did they benefit / what was the result? (Please note this response is for education/entertainment purposes only and shouldn’t be construed as advice for the reader)

Every client is different just like every persons lifestyle is different. One thing I try to get through to all my clients is to never stop moving.

How many times a day do you find yourself in a position that creates a postural habit? How natural do those habits feel to you? Do you get comfortable?

It is important to utilize all movement when staying still to allow optimal mobility & stability in those muscle groups being used. Just like it’s very important to continue moving every single day and not just loosely but deliberately. Too often do we just move body parts because we feel everything’s going to work naturally as it always does.

But, here’s where habits and movement come into play.

Let’s take the idea of technology at our fingertips.
Too many times a day do we find ourselves texting and looking down at our phone. The weight of the head increases the stress on your neck and upper trunk muscles. These habits cause instabilities we refer to as holding patterns, usually in shortening of the anterior muscle groups and elongation of the posterior muscle groups (Imagine the muscles have to work overtime to hold a bowling ball up). These are reasons a lot of people who are on their phones or working at a desk have symptoms such as upper neck and back pains, discomfort, and overall dysfunctions (very common).
Now, imagine you’re trying to utilize those same muscle groups to go for an overhead movement such as catching a ball or looking back over your shoulder. These muscle groups that are affected will create holding patterns and in turn limitations and dysfunctions that can sometimes result in pains and irritations such as pulling or strain due to the stress on the active or opposing muscles. In return this makes it harder than normal to get full range out of your upper body.
After your session with a well skilled and knowledgeable therapist whom has assessed and targeted your issue, it is important to maintain your increased range and relief through deliberate movements and proper posture.

This is the 80% of the work that we as therapist don’t get to help you with and is completely up to the client to continue on their own through creating better habits for themselves.

A great therapist would hope maintaining the work would allow you to go longer periods without pain and discomfort.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

I started my career in Massage Therapy journey back in 2013. Graduating from Texas Center for Massage Therapy in 2014 with over 650 class hours, over 100 clinical hours and 12 modalities under my belt. Though, I officially started in 2013, I like to say, my journey began when a seed was planted after injuring myself while pitching when I was about 12 years old. I was diagnosed with lateral epicondylitis/tendonitis from trying a new pitch that caused my elbow to turn unnaturally.” Because of that, I had to go through Physical Therapy with a resistance band to strengthen my elbow and surrounding muscle groups. This would be my first encounter with Therapy in general and I knew that if I were going to continue sports, Therapy would be an important aspect of maintenance for my body. Especially more as I grew into Skateboarding at the time, due to consistent injuries. Just so happened Sports Massage Therapy was part of the curriculum and so I took that journey.

There are many aspects that set me aside in my practice from other therapist such as a drive to help others. Too many times do therapist stick to one modality or strictly the same pressure for every body. To means likeminded therapists, utilizing multiple modalities such as Clinical Assessments, Swedish, Trigger Point Therapy, Craniosacral Therapy, MET, acupressure, Sports/Russian Sports, Lymphatic Drainage, Shiatsu, cryotherapy, etc in one session to optimize results. Important to remember everything is useful and each body can be worked many different ways.

Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?

During my last 100 hours of clinical my father ended up getting really sick from uncontrolled diabetic issues and falling into a vegetative state which put my schooling on hold and of course created many doubts in my mind about everything I was doing. He ended up passing away and that same week I decided to go back and finish what I started. It wasn’t easy but I know he wanted me to always finish what I started no matter what obstacles got in my way so I did just that.

As I progressed through jobs first starting at franchises like Massage Heights and Envy, I soon realized these companies really don’t care too much about the therapist. They only care about making money. So my journey became finding my right place. Ultimately with no luck I decided to start my own on call company in 2022 called, “The Massage Connect LLC” with a goal to reach those that are in need of massage therapy and find it hard to get out of their homes. But it’s more that that, the fact that I can attend to all kinds of people on my own time and give the amount of attention I see fit without restraints from cooperate and people that don’t understand the depth of Therapy helps it make my decision even more exciting! I’m always taking new clients from the Houston/EaDo/ Second ward area. If you’re in need feel free to look me up!

Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?

Coming straight out of school working for companies that have a specific modality you have to stick to per paid session. Put an oppressive block on the way I worked every individual. I went from doing specific Swedish or specific sports or deep tissue on every client to breaking out of it and fully customizing every session. All modalities are tools and for some people you may have to use more than one.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://Www.themassageconnect.com
• Instagram: Themassageconnect
• Facebook: THEMASSAGECONNECTLLC
• Linkedin: Roland Ryan Carrizal
• Yelp: The Massage Connect

Image Credits

Photo credit:
Cassandra Lopez
&
@lovelucyy__