Dear Prospective Student:

We hope this website serves as a window into the experience at the Florida School of Massage that helps inform you as you choose your educational path.

Inquiry Based Education

Self-awareness and communication are foundational in our programs. When offered in a context of awareness, massage can be a vehicle for personal growth and transformation. Through touch we are invited to inquire into the process of our tension and when we attend to that process, we change.

Massage Therapy Training as Empowerment

Massage can be empowering, opening the doors to greater clarity and creativity in our lives. Our charter as massage therapists is to provide a safe space for our clients to let go and reorganize themselves as happier, more functional beings. Our charter as a school is to provide the nurturance and guidance that facilitates our students in creating that space.

Learn to Cultivate Sensitivity and Skills in Touch

We learn to cultivate the sensitivity and skill to offer touch in a way that empowers, invites self-inquiry and is available without being intrusive. The way to develop this kind of skill is to touch and be touched with awareness and sensitivity, creating a safe space for personal awareness. Through the sense of community that arises out of mutual caring, you may discover your own potential for growth ... If you come here, you may leave changed.

Our Campus Fosters Change

The physical beauty of the grounds engenders a place that fosters change. Our campus is immediately adjacent to the 21,000-acre Payne's Prairie wildlife preserve. The prairie is a wetland that hosts an array of creatures ranging from baby gators and otters to night heron and wood storks. It is one of the largest wintering grounds for sand hill cranes in North America. Words fail.

We are located on ten acres in the raised hammock area that surrounds the prairie. The hardwood canopy is the home for barred owls, bald eagles, red-tailed hawks, peacocks and armadillos. There are gardens, wooded walking paths, a fire pit, and picnic tables under live oaks draped with Spanish moss. The kitchen and counseling center are located in a little Florida "cracker" style house in the middle of it all. This is where we eat and play together. Dancing and drum circles around the fire, frisbee in the open field, introspection and meditation along the trails all nourish the sense of community that is the ground for awareness and transformation.

Do You See Yourself Here?

We've been helping people to change their lives through massage education for over 35 years. We invite you to make us part of your personal path. We hope you will join us in our process together as sensitive, caring, and whole human beings subject to the magic that can occur when we agree to learn, communicate and touch with healing intention and consciousness.

Best Wishes,

Paul D. Davenport, Director