Exploring Life & Business with Ashten Tullar of Illuminate Massage Therapy and Wellness

Today we’d like to introduce you to Ashten Tullar

Hi Ashten, can you start by introducing yourself? We’d love to learn more about how you got to where you are today?
I first began massage therapy school in 2008 at the Virginia School of Massage in Charlottesville, Virginia. Not really knowing where it would take me, I became licensed in 2011 after moving to Nashville, TN. The beginning of my career, like many massage therapists just out of school, was spent in a spa doing therapeutic massage. After relocating to Ohio and taking off a couple of years to be home with my two young daughters, I decided to go back to school and get my massage therapy license in Ohio. After getting licensed in Ohio, I started working in a chiropractic office before deciding to go out on my own and eventually started my own practice, now called Illuminate Massage Therapy and Wellness. Shortly after starting my massage practice, my husband and I bought a building in downtown Canton and I relocated my practice to that building and named it “405 Wellness.” After several years of doing clinical massage therapy, I began training to become a Craniosacral Therapist. I am now in the process of becoming certified and have made that the focus of my education and practice over the last 2 years.

We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
I have felt very honored to have massage therapy clients since day 1 of Illuminate Massage Therapy and Wellness with very little energy or effort needing put into marketing. My belief has always been that my therapeutic presence and my congruent nature with the therapy I offer in my practice will speak for itself. I have always been fortunate to reach new clients through word of mouth and have grown the business from myself to the recent hiring of my first additional Massage Therapist to help reach more clients on their wellness journey.

Great, so let’s talk business. Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
Illuminate Massage Therapy and Wellness is committed to helping our clients on their path to feeling well. We offer clinical massage therapy as well as Craniosacral therapy to assist our client’s well-being. Craniosacral therapy (CST) is a gentle, non-invasive hands-on technique that aims to improve the function of the body’s Craniosacral system, which is a fluid-filled system that protects and surrounds the brain and spinal cord and plays a helpful role in regulating the central nervous system function.

While we don’t view other holistic health businesses as competitors, we do feel that by offering craniosacral therapy it provides our clients with a unique resource on their healing path. Integrating craniosacral has given me the ability to reach clients I would have not otherwise reached with just massage therapy.

Do you have any advice for those just starting out?
One piece of advice I wish I would have known when I was fresh out of massage therapy school and starting on my own in 2011 is that each client is on their own path to feeling well in their mind and body. At first, I felt like I could use the same protocol with each client and expect the same positive results. Now I know that each client brings their own different set of needs and means to wellness. By having that understanding, I have been able to work with each client specific to their needs and it has proved to be more helpful in my practice.

Contact Info:

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