Julie Dean is setting up reflexology courses for Whanganui people. Photo / Paul Brooks
Julie Dean is setting up reflexology courses for Whanganui people. Photo / Paul Brooks
Julie Dean is setting up courses for Whanganui people interested in learning reflexology, and otherwise getting people interested in the ancient healing art.
Reflexology is a therapy using mostly feet, but also hands and ears to stimulate the body’s own healing response.
“Everything that’s going on in the body isreflected in the feet,” says Julie. To illustrate this, she has a large diagram of both feet, showing how each part corresponds with a part of the body.
“It’s fascinating really, and it can be quite effective.”
Julie discovered reflexology about 29 years ago when she studied as a naturopath. “I then integrated it into the therapy that I provided, because I found it so effective. Since then, I did my own Diploma in Reflexology.”
Now she has been offered an opportunity to teach it.
“People will end up with a Diploma in Reflexology, so they can be a practitioner under the Reflexology NZ framework. It’s popular with a lot of nurses and therapists because it’s a great add-on to what they already offer.
“I offer two different courses: the foundational course is a weekend course where they learn the basics and a little bit of theory; and the actual diploma is 400 hours’ work — 12 weekends over the year.” She says the first often gets people interested in the latter.
Reflexology is a hands-on therapy involving a sequence of moves, using mainly the thumbs. “You want to cover every area of the foot, top, bottom and sides. The right and left feet are completely different.
“We also deal with hand reflexology and the ears, too, have more than 200 points.
“I just want to spread the word and get as many people learning about it as possible. I think it’s exciting for Whanganui.”
