You can't do that.
You won't make any money like that.
You'll go broke trying to help us.
These are a few examples of the things I heard when I started sharing my vision for my business ideas for what I could do with massage therapy. Healing for me is part of who I am. It's part of my lineage. In many ways, healing…being a healer has been my life.
Massage and Bodywork Therapies are healing modalities that I absolutely love. In addition to becoming a Licensed Massage and Bodywork Therapist, I'm also an Energy Healing Practitioner, Master Spiritual Life Coach, and an Oracle. I've been using these gifts to support myself, my friends, family members, and clients through my coaching practice for years.
In fact it was my previous work that introduced me to massage as a career. As The Spiritual Love Healer, I rented office space from Linda, a phenomenal prenatal massage therapist. I offered Reiki Energy Healing and Intuitive Readings to clients and one day Linda shared with me that I would make a great massage therapist. I took those words to heart in 2018 and now here I am a Licensed Massage and Bodywork Therapist.
I remember printing out a tiny massage therapist template and writing my name on it. I added it to my vision board, along with a few other things and I manifested that.
Helping my community, Black Folks like myself has always been my mission with the coaching and healing work that I've done. It's the reason why I decided Kulture Massage & Bodywork was the way to go.
In my time working as a massage therapist I noticed many things. The majority of people who receive massage services are non-Black. Most of the owners of the businesses I've worked for are also non-Black. And that's okay, but also it's not.
I also noticed that when People of Color did come in for a massage, they often didn't know what to expect or they were treating themselves for a special reason. And that's okay, but also it's not.
These seemingly small things that I notice like the relief on my clients face when they see I look like them. The ease in asking “silly” questions because this is their 1st massage. The comfortability with having a scalp massage because we have the same hair.
When I had the idea to focus my business on the Black Community, I did lots of research to see if I could find a business with the same concept that I had in mind and to my surprise, I could not. I did find Black owned massage businesses, but not anyone specifically targeting our community.
I decided that I would fill that spot because of things I saw while working as a therapist and the fact that there is a need for this to exist.
In my excitement, I shared my idea with others and the response I got was shocking. Many people questioned me, what about non people of color? This is something that I must do because the first response was wonder about other people instead of us.
The Kulture Spa is For Us, By Us, and About Us. This doesn't mean it's exclusive, in fact that's the exact opposite.