Here is the Full Set with Green Yoast optimization and no em dashes, in the new order: WORDPRESS EXCERPT Amuure Holistic Health founder Kenisha Ama'anii brings nearly two decades of wellness experience and a trauma-centered approach to massage therapy in the Twin Cities. SUBTITLE Kenisha Ama'anii grew up in Jamaica not knowing what massage therapy was. Today she runs one of the Twin Cities' most intentional wellness practices rooted in trauma-centered care. MAIN TITLE Black Business Spotlight: Amuure Holistic Health Founder Kenisha Ama'Anii on Massage as Medicine and Community Care
Kenisha Ama'anii, founder of Amuure Holistic Health in Bloomington, brings nearly two decades of wellness experience and a trauma-centered approach to massage therapy, serving clients navigating everything from athletic injuries to cancer treatment to the chronic stress that Black people carry in their bodies every day.
Kenisha Ama’anii didn’t grow up knowing what massage therapy was. Raised in the mountains of Jamaica in what she describes as a sheltered childhood, bodywork was, in her words, “a foreign language.” Today, she is the founder of Amuure Holistic Health, a thriving wellness practice in Minneapolis with nearly two decades of experience behind her, and a calling she said she didn’t see coming.
“Spirit, I guess, puts you where you need to be,” Ama’anii said.
Her path into the industry began after moving to New York to live with her parents. She and her mother would work out together at a local gym, where the manager noticed something in the way she moved and suggested she became a personal trainer. She studied for and passed the ACE certification exam, and he hired her as promised. It was at that gym, stretching clients and working with her hands at the end of sessions, that something unexpected began to emerge.
“Each client would be like, ‘Oh my God, you have such an amazing touch. You should become a massage therapist,'” she recalled. “I had to Google what that was, because I had no idea.”
What she found drew her in. After visiting a school in New York several times, and being invited by a front desk worker to sit in on a class, she was hooked within minutes.
“When I tell you, within a few minutes, I was like, ‘Oh my God, I love this. I am home.'”
She applied that week, was accepted, and went on to earn an Associate Degree in Occupational Therapy with a Massage Therapy focus from the Swedish Institute, College of Health and Sciences in New York City. She has been in the health and wellness industry for over 19 years, with 10 of those as a licensed massage therapist. Amuure Holistic Health has been in its current Minneapolis location since September 2020, and Ama’anii took over the lease for the space in May 2023.
Walking into Amuure, the first thing many clients notice is the smell, lemongrass and cedarwood, a deliberate choice.
“When you step through those doors, I want you to forget that you just parked in the parking lot of a strip mall,” Ama’anii said. “I want you to feel so welcome and relaxed just by stepping in.”
The practice offers a variety of bodywork modalities, including deep tissue massage, myofascial release and ashiatsu, a technique where the therapist uses overhead bars and their feet to apply pressure. Ama’anii also specializes in mat skeletal muscular alignment, an active release technique she uses primarily with athletes and those recovering from injuries. She additionally provides oncology massage for clients navigating cancer treatment.
“I have clients who are beating cancer’s ass, but they need a little support in the meantime,” she said.
At the core of everything Ama’anii does is a trauma-centered approach, one shaped in part by her own lived experience.
“Recognizing that your body is your temple, you get to say what it is that you want out of your session,” she said. “Even though I am the professional, I never get to dictate what that looks like for you.”
She said the body holds trauma in ways people often don’t recognize, and massage can surface it. She’s had clients burst into tears on the table, others into uncontrollable laughter, and many who walked in carrying what felt like 1,000 pounds and left smiling.
“I’ve had clients that came in going through some really intense things, and I can feel it coming off of them,” she said. “Mid session, they’re like, ‘I’m going through a divorce.’ And I’m like, that’s what I felt.”
Ama’anii is also candid about why she believes her community in particular needs this kind of care. Black people, she said, often carry chronic stress in their bodies without realizing it.
“We walk around with our shoulders up to our ears because we have to fight the world, and we don’t realize that our cortisol levels are off the charts,” she said. “Massage helps to combat that. It lowers blood pressure. People need to recognize that massage is not just a luxury thing, it’s really health care. It’s mental health care.”
She also addressed the guilt that can keep people, especially parents and caregivers, from prioritizing rest and self-care.
“Sometimes, if you take care of yourself, then you’re now able to take care of others better,” she said. “You have the tools to take care of someone else versus running on empty, which we do a lot.”
For Ama’anii, every session is a reminder of why she does this work.
“I can’t imagine my life without doing this,” she said. “I am happiest when I’m in a session with a client.”
Amuure Holistic Health is located in Bloomington. For more information or to book a session, visit www.amuureholistichealing.com/.
Jasmine McBride welcomes reader responses at jmcbride@spokesman-recorder.com.