Shiatsu: The Listening Hand

The hand is not a tool for pressing. It is an organ for listening. This app holds the full text of "The Hand Is for Listening — Anatomical Flow Shiatsu and the Philosophy of Mushō," a book by Kazuhiro Kurosawa, a licensed anma-massage-shiatsu practitioner (a national license in Japan). Twenty-seven chapters, some 220,000 words in English, with the Japanese original alongside. It works offline, with nothing further to buy. ■ What is different here Most shiatsu books in English map the receiver's body — meridians, points, where to press. This one begins a step earlier, with the body of the one doing the pressing. Where does pressure come from? Not from the arm. Whatever you press into the floor, the floor returns — ground reaction force — and that force is threaded, like a single string, from the soles of the feet to the tip of the thumb. Threaded pressure, the "play" in the joints, the extension relay, the reaction-pressure method: Part II sets these out in the language of anatomy and biomechanics. It is written as much to protect the practitioner's own thumbs, wrists, and shoulders as to reach the receiver. Alongside it runs an ethic. The one who touches is always the stronger. Mushō — taking no shō, the diagnostic patterns of East Asian medicine — is not the abandonment of knowledge. It is the refusal to let knowledge stand in front of the body: a silence permitted only to those who have learned all there is to learn. Hahagokoro — a mother's heart, Tokujiro Namikoshi's word — is reread here as the ethic of restraining one's own strength. Neither mystification nor mechanistic reduction — the precision of the middle ground. ■ What is inside • 27 chapters — introduction, Chapter Zero, Chapters 1–23, closing chapter, appendix • 134 practice drills — type, aim, steps, and how you'll know • The reader's map — three routes: home, student, professional • A safety quick-reference for home and care • The source library — the author's lecture materials and essays, kept as they were written (in Japanese) Written for practitioners of the manual therapies, for students of the body, and for anyone who lays a hand on someone at home. ■ Two layers The main text reads straight through. Beneath it lie the scholarly notes — sources, reservations, and a line kept clear between established findings and what is still hypothesis. Read only the main text, and you can lay your hands on someone today. Climb down into the notes to see how firm the ground is. ■ English and Japanese Both texts are in the app, and the interface reads in either language. Switch in the settings; your reading progress carries across. ■ Reading • Text size; serif or sans-serif • Three themes — Soft, Sepia, Night • Scholarly notes fold away — safety notes always stay open • Chapters marked as read, drills marked as done ■ Safety Shiatsu is not a substitute for medical diagnosis or treatment. This app is an educational reader. It is not intended to diagnose, treat, or prevent any condition. If a symptom concerns you, see a doctor. The first principle of safety in these pages is one line. When in doubt, do not touch. Signs that forbid touching, and situations that call for medical care, are set out in the introduction, Chapter 20, and the appendix. ■ Privacy The app makes no network connection of its own and collects nothing. Your reading progress and display settings stay on your device. No account, no advertising, no analytics. ■ The author Kazuhiro Kurosawa — a licensed anma-massage-shiatsu practitioner. Director of Tsumugu Shiatsu. Part-time lecturer in the anatomy practicum, Faculty of Health Sciences, Tokyo Metropolitan University, and at Tokyo Kuretake College of Medical Arts and Sciences. Member of the Japanese Association of Anatomists. President of the Kanagawa Shiatsu Association. Shokushinkai — shoku, to touch; shin, the core — is the small study and practice circle he leads. This book and app are its doorway.