New Career Goal: Massage Therapy?

I think it's a great path to choose.
 
Keep in mind that you're not going to have your hands all over beautiful women all day, if ever. Are you comfortable giving the rub-down to a hairy old man? It's the type of job that you'll always have work for, and if you decided to get deeper into it, you could take a more medicinal route and go into private business for physical therapy. Big bucks, brother.

 

actually massage therapist have terrible hands, after a while, so yes it is hard labor on your hands..  45 minute massage, thats cool, 5-6 45 minute massages a day, not cool....

 

Hey, conveniently enough for you, I'm a massage therapist!
 
It's a really chill job and as long as you're okay with doing the same thing every day you're pretty much good to go.
Don't worry too much about working on men, in my experience women tend to prefer male therapists and vice-versa.
Depending on where you are (I'm assuming you're in the states) you'll need anywhere from 400-750hrs of school, pass the national exam, and the state exam(if your state has specific licenses)
 
Smoking on the job is okay as long as you're not a spaz, in fact it tends to make me give better massages ^_^
 
If you have any questions pm me or post them here, I'll respond later as I'm actually at work now and am answering this between clients
 
Also you won't wreck your hands, that's bullshit. As long as you use proper posture and technique you won't 'burn out' as it's called

 

imagine rubbing people down for 10 hours a day..... some people like ALOT of pressure also. it's like mixing dough with you're hands all day lol

 

Nah, my hands are fine and if they ever are sore...well I'm a massage therapist...I fix them lol. I do work out on a regular basis though, so I don't know if that effects it at all
 
Decently so, your school won't let you keep any of the clients you work with during practicals(hands on practice) It took a bit of advertiseing, but once you have a few clients it mostly spreads through word of mouth.
 
Both, I work in an office with a chiropractor and I also travel around to peoples houses. You can absolutely run a practice out of your apt, just make sure it's nice and inviting and, for lack of a better word, "zen" It is a lot easier to just travel TO people though, just tack on a travel charge.

 

Only if you do it wrong lol, if people want a lot of pressure you lower your table and basically just lean on them  :lol:
 
Giving a massage is nothing like kneading dough-.-
 
and assuming he has no need for extravagance he can work 30 hrs a week(lol 10 hours a day) and still make over$1800/wk

 

step by step what did you have to do to get where you are now? my bad if this was already answered but whats the pay like?

 

Well First off I had to pick out my school, I personally got my certification through an ASIS school in Illinios.
 
Then I had to pick whether I wanted to go through part or full time classes(550 hour course either way), 1 or 2 year course. I wasn't doing anything else with my time so I did the 1 year, I was in school for 6 hours every day mon-fri.
 
Then I had to pass the national exam, pretty easy to do if you pay attention in class.
Then the state exam (this may or may not apply to you) which is significantly harder. I would advise taking it IMMEDIATELY after your national exam, the more you remember the better. Studying doesn't hurt either. Even then 67% of the people who took the state exam the same year as me had to retake it. (yes, you can retake the exam, but you have to wait 6 months)
 
from there it's just like hunting for any other job, resumes, job hunts, the works. 
Building a personal business is a little different, it's easier to start with family friends and branch out from there and once you have the money start advertising. 
If you go for an office they'll do the hard work for you, but they also take about half of your pay.
 
Speaking of pay, it varies. home massages you can charge whatever you want, I start with a base rate of $50/hr+any specialty massage charges(hot stone, cupping, anything that needs more education and supplies)+travel fee(+tip if your client isn't an ass.)
 
at an office you look at anywhere from $25-$60 an hour depending on who you work for. At the office I work at I make $35/hr +tips. I mostly work at the office so that my clients can charge their visits to insurance though.

 

ok thanks for the insight and luckily i live in Illinois to so maybe ill go through the same stuff you did

 

Truth. If you're good you can become private message therapists for athletes.. Same goes with physical therapy. Big $$$$ but also requires time and adequate schooling