“Skin to Soul, that’s a great name!” My colleague said to me, as she passed by my paper of scattered words in our Massage Business Class.

It was 2005 and there I was, sitting in class, writing down words that I knew represented massage to me. Soul was immediate and yet also a risk.

Back then, it was creepy to talk about your Soul. I knew in my heart how deep bodywork could go, but I had no idea how much that name would truly represent what I have come to create today.

A recent Northeastern University Engineering Graduate, massage was supposed to be my little hobby. My Dad had taught me how to work out his trigger points from various injuries and bodybuilding and I liked helping him feel better. He was a strong man inside and out, made tough from a stint in Vietnam and coming home with PTSD. Despite the horrors he had witnessed, he made it a mission to teach my sister and I that happiness came from within and that we had the power to design our lives in whatever way we wanted to.

“My parents tell stories of how I used to massage my kindergarten teacher and create a fake “massage office” during the Holidays, to massage my aunts and uncles.”

I had a psychic reader tell me once that I would quit my job and become a healer, and I laughed at him. “QUIT my CAREER? You must be joking”.

After getting out of an intense 5 years of studying engineering, I still had the learning bug (and also an intense need to constantly improve and I will admit….work myself into a burned out state of being all in the name of ACCOMPLISHMENT!) I set up shop in a tiny little closet of a room and worked part time at it for about 5 years.

I excelled in both careers. I knew how to work hard, and produce! What I didn’t know how to do, was fill that missing void I felt, in the car ride between jobs. . .in the evening hours when I was left alone to my own devices. I stared at the clouds and remembered my Dad’s voice “Nicole, happiness is a choice. If you are looking at the beautiful clouds in the sky and you are not feeling the gratitude and happiness, then it’s time to evaluate what you’re doing with your life”.

It started to become my little litmus test. And I realized, despite all I had accomplished, my straight A’s, my engineering graduate degree, my management promotion and my flourishing business, I was still not happy.

In 2009, in the midst of the Recession, was when I decided to make a change. In a fit of insanity and overinflated ego, (because honestly, if I had really written a fancy business plan I might have quit before I ever started!) I left my engineering job and decided to focus on Skin to Soul full time. I started taking John Barnes Myofascial Release and realized I had finally found that missing piece. John Barnes Myofascial Release starts at your skin, and, connecting through your fascia, touches you deep in your soul. It helps you dig up the stuff you always tuck away for a rainy day. It helps you and your body express those deep seated issues that are preventing you from being able to function pain free, to be able to look at the clouds in the sky and feel happy to be alive.

Once I started, I didn’t look back. Since then, I have studied over 400 hours with John Barnes and practiced Myofascial Release for over 5 years. I am an Expert Level Practitioner and the majority of my therapists are trained in John Barnes Myofascial Release. I now assist teaching John’s Myofascial Release Seminars and facilitate a Study Group for Myofascial Practitioners in the North Shore Boston Area.

What I realized was that the answer to void I had been trying to fill externally came from within. Now, my passion is to help my therapists and my clients to love themselves, love their lives and enjoy themselves. So if you feel like you are working too hard and at the end of day feel that missing piece, we are here and honored to help you find it again.