VAUGHN PREFERS USING BARE FEET TO APPLY PRESSURE

FARMINGTON — When it comes to giving massages, Misty Vaughn of Prairie Grove lets her feet do the talking.

Vaughn uses bars installed at the ceiling in her massage room to support her while she massages her clients using her bare feet.

She works at the Funky Monkey Boutique in Farmington.

“Your feet are like big hands,” Vaughn said. “Just about everything you can do with your hands, you can do with your feet.”

Massage using the feet is called “Ashiatsu” (pronounced au shee ot su). Vaughn said “ashi” means foot and “atsu” means pressure.

“I’m using my bare feet to apply pressure to the client’s body,” Vaughn said.

Vaughn has practiced as a licensed massage therapist using her hands since November 2012. She said she saw some information about Ashiatsu massages and found it interesting. She attended a 12- hour continuing education class in the practice and earned her certification to perform Ashiatsu massages.

“After taking the class, I fell in love with it because of the benefits it can bring to the client. It allows me to do massage therapy longer without wearing my body out.”

By using the feet, she said she can massage with longer, gliding strokes, cover more area and increase the circulation for the client. The technique allows the therapist to use a gravity-assisted pressure and to more evenly distribute the pressure on the body, she added.

“I can do more work to get deeper into the tissue,” she said.

Terry Davis of Prairie Grove gets a weekly massage from Vaughn. If he has exercised and worked out a lot during the week, he said he wants the Ashiatsu massage because it goes deeper into his tissues.

“The deeper one is a lot better if I’ve been working out a lot,” he said. “It gets deeper into the muscle and does a good job of loosening the muscles up.”

Davis gives one word of advice if someone wants to try a Ashiatsu massage.

“When you get up, take a few minutes. You’ll be like you’re drunk because your muscles are said.

Vaughn can be reached at

so loose,”

he the Funky Monkey, 95 Southwinds Dr., Suite 4, in Farmington, 479-267-9400.

LYNN KUTTER ENTERPRISE-LEADER Misty Vaughn, a licensed massage therapist, gives an Ashiatsu massage to a client at the Funky Monkey Boutique in Farmington. Ashiatsu is an ancient form of barefoot massage.

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