Sauna Steam Spa: The Evolution of Spa by Sara Firman

The Evolution of Spa by Sara Firman

This article by Sara Firman of Vision Spa Retreat is based on a conversation with her friend Jonathan Paul De Vierville. It discusses some history of spa, the current state of spa and thoughts about the future direction of spa. Sara Firman welcomes your comments and insights below the article.

Very few think of SPA in its broadest terms, as a cultural form encompassing all the things we consider important for our wellbeing. It's a rich cultural legacy that has in many ways been increasingly obscured by the tempting commercialization of what was once sacred and shared. At times of upheaval, such as that which we are experiencing now, a willingness to reflect on our cultural evolution and the symbols of that - spa being one - may offer some insights into our predicament and our recovery.

'Spa Industry, Culture and Evolution' was the title of an excellent article Jonathan Paul De Vierville wrote for Massage and Bodywork Magazine back in 2003. Jonathan, along with Marion Schneider and Barbara Harmony, strongly influenced my expanding view of spa a decade ago now (for more go here). Recently, I spoke to Jonathan about his abiding interest in the concept of spa and asked whether his focus has changed over the years.

Jonathan's involvement in spa stretches back 40 years to when he was working in Europe as a tour director for American Express. His tours often included spa towns and he found himself especially attracted to these, noticing how spa as therapy was always set in a social context. Spa was part of a healing system that included elements like kur parks (celebrating nature), and theaters (expressing community). In the article mentioned, Jonathan wrote:

'A spa is a place with the purpose of facilitating whole human health care, wellness and social well-being.'

That statement might slip by easily in spa marketing language today, but perhaps this elaboration of it in the same article would not: 'Fundamentally, a spa is an eco-socio-cultural learning community and civil institution that attempts to bring together and truthfully integrate all the dynamic dimensions of time and space, temperatures, touch and therapeutic treatments within a supporting context of goodness, beauty, harmony and wholeness of nature.'

Jonathan has persistently invited spa colleagues to deepen their appreciation of spa.

Spa as culture

Our conversation kept returning to the way in which industrialization of aspects of human culture, and in this case spa, has so often resulted in the loss of our connection with the depth of meaning and purpose that Jonathan discusses in his article, and the sense of connection provided by elements of the 'commons' (belonging to everyone or shared resources). Culture is a blending of four areas, and, for Jonathan, spa as culture encompasses all these:

Art - in terms of beauty and esthetics
Science and technology - what is repeatable and provable
Politics (including economics and law) - relationships and values
Spirituality - the mystical, invisible

When viewed like this, as Jonathan points out, industry (or economics) contributes less than a quarter to the overall significance of spa culture. It is the general trend towards commercialization in the 1990s that he thinks has brought great change to our culture as a whole; the effects this has had on spa in particular have saddened him. The emphasis has shifted from spa culture to spa industry, slowly consuming and diluting the other three areas through commoditization, and the marketing of that which was previously sacred.

Spa organizations

Jonathan's interest in history (he currently teaches World and American History and Western Humanities at St. Philip's College, San Antonio) and his involvement in spa business (as Owner-Director of the Alamo Plaza Spa at the Menger Hotel in San Antonio) make him no stranger to the tensions of human necessity at work here. With training in Jungian psychotherapy and massage therapy, he also has the perspective of the body-mind healer, and is well placed to see where the different aspects of 'spa' do or do not integrate successfully.

Having been involved in four major spa-related organizations with different emphases over the years, Jonathan has witnessed at close quarters how the perception of spa has changed, and is about to change again. I am sure he will continue to influence the changes through his knowledgeable presence and his unerring call for a deeper connection to the roots of spa. 'Associations usually meet the needs of people and who knows what this recession will bring ... I'm OK with it all,' my friend declared.

Jonathan began his influential involvement with the International Society for Medical Hydrology and Climatology (ISMH), an old association, started in 1921 by R. Fortescue Fox, MD from England after the war. This was the original British spa association, and evolved into a very scientific organization promoting evidence-based research, with most of the early spas being government funded. There is now, he says, a small American contingent but its focus is more on aquatic fitness than spa therapy.

Jonathan was also actively involved with the International Spa Association (ISPA, originally the International Spa and Fitness Association). Although fully aware of the challenges of spa business, he notes with concern that ISPA is mainly a managing and marketing group with a very commercial approach. He helped start the ISPA Education Foundation and contributed the concept of the Ten Domains of Spa, later reworked by Robin Zill as the Ten Elements of Spa - more on this later.

But, from Jonathan's point of view, ISPA or spa industry is not conveying the true heart of spa.

Jonathan is more hopeful about the leadership of BISA (the British International Spa Association) which, he says, has not lost its appreciation of the centrality of water. He's delighted to note that the current chairman of BISA is German (Marion Schneider), and that as we speak she is launching a chapter of BISA in Japan. 'They [BISA] still have a commercial side,' says Jonathan, 'but Marion will steer it to deeper meaning.' I agree with him, though I would like to see BISA make issues of sustainability an overriding concern.

More recently, Jonathan has lent his support to the Green Spa Network - an organization that is just emerging and that is fully focused on sustainability. 'They are very authentic, they are really getting a deeper message, more spiritual, very committed; [they] see beyond profit, triple bottom line; [they are] more than just commercial'. We talked about the overuse of the term 'green' and how it has largely fallen into the clutches of marketing and branding gurus.

A paradigm shift for spa?

'What has been mainstream was sustained on credit and illusion and will now be shaken out, the rug has been pulled out,' Jonathan notes. So much of spa business - branding, packaging, signature treatments, etc. - attempts to make 'artificial, simplistic handles for what is authentic'. Jonathan believes that this change has to come from the inside, which brings us to 'soul'. He believes that 'spa loses it soul in retail and sustains it when the focus is on service'. Vision Spa Retreat's tagline 'soulful and sustainable' reflects this focus too.

When I asked where Jonathan finds his 'spa tribe' these days he was quick to say 'with collaborators not competitors'.

I'm reminded of Seth Godin, a web 2.0 marketing guru, who was recently interviewed about the music industry and made a distinction between music itself and the music industry which he suggested could really be applied to all industries. In the context of my discussion with Jonathan, I was curious as to how Seth's message would read if I replaced his 'music' with 'spa':

'The spa industry is really focused on the ‘industry’ part and not so much on the ‘spa’ part. This is the greatest moment in the history of spa if your dream is to distribute as much spa as possible to as many people as possible, or if your goal is to make it as easy as possible to become heard as a spa venue. There’s never been a time like this before.

'So if your focus is on spa, it’s great. If your focus is on the industry part [the glamor] it’s horrible. The shift that is happening right now is that the people who insist on keeping the world as it was are going to get more and more frustrated until they lose their jobs. People who want to invent a whole new set of rules, a new paradigm, can’t believe their good fortune and how lucky they are that the people in the industry aren’t noticing an opportunity'.

The opportunity Godin seems to be talking about has to do with finding people who share a common culture (a goal or a mission) and then connecting with them and leading them in the direction they want to go. Just as there is no such thing as pop music anymore (what everyone is listening to), there may be no single formula for spa. Instead there is a myriad of different ways to look at the world and people will seek out and support the one that they feel most aligned with.

Spa as community wealth

If you make it clear to your tribe and to yourself what you stand for, says Seth Godin, if you are transparent and tell the truth to your audience then you'll earn trust and interest. If you try to be a 'pop-spa', you won't. Seth's view relates to the emerging commons paradigm - one that replaces the competitive, mechanistic, profit-centric mindset that has ruled Western civilization since the Industrial Revolution with a more humanistic, environmentally aware and holistic world view.

One example of commons is public space - any place where people freely gather for social or civic interaction. While usually defined as parks, streets and sidewalks, plazas, libraries and public institutions, the concept can be expanded to include congenial privately owned settings such as a coffee shop or corner grocery - or a spa. Public space contributes significantly to the health of local communities and democratic societies.

Appreciation for the enduring or sustainable value of commons - wealth that belongs to us all - has developed over the last decade, especially among people involved in the politics of water issues, the internet, the over-commercialization of culture, and public spaces. This view is reaching into many other arenas, including economics, the environment, social justice, and numerous citizens movements around the world. It might also reach into spa, which is at it's roots about culture and, in my view, also about commons.

The commons offers not only an affirmative vision of a more equitable, eco-friendly society: it also serves as a countervailing force to keep excesses of the market and government sectors in check. Economists tend to regard 'value' as a quantifiable object with a price tag. But as commoners realize, 'value' can also be something intangible and not available for sale. An example is the social satisfaction of belonging to a community and contributing to a shared goal.

A commons can also create economic value as efficiently as a market (there are many internet examples of this, including Wikipedia, the online user-generated encyclopedia, and Craigslist, the online advertising service). The difference is that a commons usually does not convert its output into a marketable commodity. These ideas lead me to wonder what new operating paradigm, what new set of values, might be adopted for spa.

Authentic spa

Over the many years of his interest and involvement, Jonathan's perspective on spa culture has both deepened and broadened. He recalls formalizing his general ideas on a plane journey back from Bad Wörishofen, Germany to the US in 1994 after discussing them at a Congress of the ISMH and his notes began to fall into place as something he called the 'Ten Domains of Spa'. He wondered, regards spa culture: 'what can Europe offer America and vice versa'.

The first of these Domains was Water. 'Water is central, I don't see how anybody can spa without water - [it] has to be there for it to be spa,' says Jonathan, affirming my own belief and the emphasis Vision Spa Retreat gives to this life-essential element. The origins of the word spa have been long argued over. Jonathan continues: 'My best reading on the meaning of spa [the word] is a fountain, a pouring forth; there is the sense of water and movement and flow. But it is all water based. So, any spa that doesn't have water is not a spa.'

We both know that the current use of the term spa has drifted away from this, in large part he says 'to fit consumer perception'. I asked Jonathan how he thinks the current economic recession will change consumer perception and the spa trade: 'I think there will be a shake out, and I think that true spas, authentic spas, will have sustainability because they [will] understand the mystery and wonder and miracle of water... and it is not going to be glamorous and high-end luxury, corporate products and all of that ....'

'Another fundamental aspect of spa is its setting in nature and water, ritual use of these two elements for regeneration,' Jonathan reaffirms, and adds with his signature play on words, 'Technology generates, Nature regenerates - and there is a very big difference'. Jonathan does not share the awe of some of his spa colleagues regards 'tools, techniques and technologies' (see 'Spa Industry, Culture and Evolution'), which are notably absent from the Ten Domains that expressed his own vision of spa.

The 'Ten Domains' were first presented to the International Society of Medical Hydrology in 1994. In 1998, when he was on the Board of ISPA for a 6-year period, and chairman of the Educational Committee, he brought the concept to the spa industry. With some disappointment in his voice he adds that 'ISPA saw value and used it [the 10 Domains] but didn't really understand it'. By then the drive to 'brand' - to own or possess - marketable ideas was taking off in all industries, and the spa industry has been no exception.

This trend is really antithetical to the origins of spa in natural water-based settings and supporting a deeper human drive to renew our sense of connection with our own being, with others, and with the world upon which we depend.

We both see appeal in the sustainability movement which encompasses alternative economies. Jonathan would like to see a shift from 'Green ... to Sustainability in the sense of sustenance and survivability; maintaining; how are things sustained and from what is one's sustenance built'. The current recession coincided with some extravagant spa launches and I asked him what he thinks: 'Some of the new launches will crash .... what we need to be concerned with is the landing of spa, not only getting it off the ground.' A look back in time may help.

A spa legacy

After his early European cultural immersion as tour director, Jonathan returned to the US and continued with a career in social work and psychotherapy. In his studies, he was inspired to learn of the Asclepian healing temples of ancient Greece where the whole person (mind-body-spirit) was attended to in a manner and setting that could well have set the stage for later versions of spa. In fact, social therapeutic bathing was an important part of Mesopotamian, Egyptian, Minoan, Greek, and Roman cultures.

From the Middle Ages through the Renaissance, bathing and healing places developed around thermal springs in Europe and the strong legacy of spa culture was established. Jonathan explored this cultural theme further on home territory when he later presented his PhD dissertation from the University of Texas on 'A History of American Spas and Healing Waters'. Long before colonization of the New World, Native Americans had gathered at thermal mineral springs for physical health, spiritual, and social purposes.

They also sought spiritual purification through their sweat lodge ceremonies. Locations like Hot Springs in Arkansas were pilgrimage sites - places of sanctuary not places for dwelling. 'The fundamental thing with spa,' says Jonathan, 'is the power of regeneration, initiation into birth, death, rebirth'. As such, spa has a very ancient place in the human psyche. It is associated also with what he calls 'the archetype of pilgrimage to sacred sites', as these sites were ones of natural beauty and invariably associated with water.

One might envision a reclaiming of the idea of pilgrimage to, and sanctuary in, natural settings where services are provided in the context of regeneration and restoration of common good.

Spa mysteries

Like Jonathan, I see in the Asclepian sanctuaries of ancient Greece a model for spa (as a culture that belongs to the people) that can be updated to suit our modern needs. I met Jonathan in fact through his fascinating workshop incorporating Jungian dreamwork and Asclepian healing methods in the spa context. He's been offering this for 10 years now at Toskana Therme in Bad Sulza, Germany, where the Liquid Sound Temple, cultural context, and natural surrounds, provide an ideal setting.

This unique seminar is not something for everyone, and it hasn't been easy to market he says. 'It is not so much spa training as true spa education. 'It's for people who want to explore the unconscious for a variety of reasons from therapeutic to creative, and the right people find out about it mainly by word of mouth. The authentic spa experience prepares people for deeper exploration', says Jonathan. The seminar might be described as a spa mystery school but, he emphasizes, it is open and safe, and not in any way cultist.

The beauty of the cultural perspective, 'is that seeing spa in four parts [see earlier reference to the four parts of culture] allows you to be inclusive - mystery plus proof - floating and flowing like water - which never runs in straight lines'. 'You want people to know and experience mysteries,' he adds, 'but you can't just lay it out there .... sharing and protecting information is challenging - that relates to the mysteries too'.

When you read about 'dream spa' in a glossy magazine it's likely referencing 'marketed wishes' whereas Jonathan's seminar really is about dreaming.

We talked more about spa language. 'How many ways can you script the word spa?' asked Jonathan. The deeper meanings of words like 'spirit', 'soul', and 'ritual', so often now get lost behind trademarks and one-liners. I suggested that it is valuable to keep raising the consciousness about origins. Jonathan agreed, '... both consciousness and conscience, in other words one's awareness as well as one's ethics and morality ... to really say that what I am doing is authentic, true and beautiful and not just for the dollar.'

'I see authentic sustainable spa connected with water in nature as sanctuaries for transformation not only for individuals but also for society and culture and there's a lot of work there but it can be done and has to be done in terms of the planet,' he says. For Jonathan spa is a 'threshold'... a 'means of entering a portal, of going through to an altered state'. The question is how do you reveal this information, this legacy, at the right time and in a good way such that it is not taken for a quick sale and turned into just another trademark.

Preserving what is scarce and sacred

We live in an information age where 'information patterns our consciousness'; an age where what is personal quickly becomes public, with no boundaries and no sacred spaces. Again, Jonathan invokes water and the idea of its proper use - a water ethic that reflects the natural cycles and rhythms of nature - that might also help us to understand how to survive in a time of scarcity. This reminds me of something Daniel Pinchbeck wrote in his book 2021: The Return of Quetzalcoatl (p.389):

'According to Victor Masayesva, a Hopi filmmaker and executive director of the Black Mesa Trust, "It is our water ethic that has allowed us to survive and thrive in one of the most arid areas on planet Earth. It is the knowledge and teachings of our elders that have sustained us. This water ethic that has been handed down to us by our ancestors we are eager to share with everyone. ...it occurred to me [Pinchbeck] that we have much to learn from tribal people like the Hopi - about sustainability, initiatory ritual, and nonhierarchical social organization based on trust and telepathy - as they might from us, if we stopped trying to force our worldview upon them.'

A few paragraphs earlier, Pinchbeck noted that 'in the middle-class New Age culture ... much lip service is paid to Native American traditions .... Despite this sentimental interest in indigenous culture and spirituality, precious little, almost nothing, is done by us - those of us with the leisure for yoga and raw food and sweat lodges, who often consider ourselves especially "conscious" or "spiritual" beings - to repair relations with the Native Americans on this continent.' This does mirror, uncomfortably, the modern luxury spa scene.

In a Flying Adventures Magazine a couple of years ago, I came across some write-ups for southwestern spas that I found to be distasteful examples of the kind of sentimentality and superficiality we've been hinting at here. The following is an extract from text that must have been written by a marketing person on a mission to include as much new spa verbiage as possible in what quickly reads like a parody of experiences of initiation that were hard earned and brought with them a level of responsibility not conveyed or offered here:

A journey of the senses, an adventure of the soul, .... 80-minute indulgence inspired by the Native American Medicine Wheel begins with desert sage smudge ceremony to purify the body and mind of negativity. After creating a "prayer tie" of wishes and desires, and drawing an animal totem to befriend you on your journey, you are led around the Medicine Wheel's four direction via heavenly rituals and treatments. With a nod to the East, a blue cornmeal and tobacco body scrub; to the South, a purifying shower rinse and drink of desert sage tea; to the West, a full-body massage with sacred cedarwood oil; and to the North, an herbal wrap of tea of precious sweetgrass. All along this sense-stirring round, your therapist/guide will share the powers, animals and gifts of each direction, empowering you with insight and knowledge as you thrill to a sensual and spiritual adventure.

Why are people paying (often very high prices) to have experiences that were never intended to be commodities? In 'commons' language, these experiences are 'inalienable' meaning that they derive from a social consensus that certain things and behaviors are so precious and basic to human identity that they are degraded if they can be freely bought and sold in the marketplace. Though many Native Americans are disturbed by this selling of the sacred, those not connected with or distanced from this heritage see no issue.

Or perhaps it is just that they are so impoverished in their own relationship to spirit that, like those without love in their lives, they must buy it. As the scope of market activity expands, consuming more of nature and daily life, it does seem to yield less and less happiness and wellbeing and cause more and more unintended problems. In market logic, the expanding output has been regarded as 'progress' and 'wealth'. But the unacknowledged, unintended or disguised costs of market activity are beginning to show themselves.

Jonathan's workshop 'Spa Cultures, Dreams and Healing Waters' carries with it the hope that a few people willing to dive deeper into the mysteries of spa might bring back new ways of celebrating and sharing its healing potential. The commons concept recognizes a new economy where people give time and creativity to the community and benefit in return, though the currency is not just money-based.

Can we envision a truly sustainable modern spa culture instead of an elitist luxury spa market? As I (Sara Firman) sit here in my forest haven living what some might consider a radically simplified life, is this a pipe dream or are there others who are willing to imagine a world that is abundant in human spirit and creativity but not at the expense of the planet?

Explore related posts on Vision Spa Retreat here.

I am delighted to add that this article is featured on the website for the British International Spa Association.