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Self Massage

Of all the forms of massage, self massage is probably the most important, simply because you need no one else to do it and you can treat yourself anytime you like.

Here is some advice about how to massage yourself. Do as many massage exercises as you can at one time and get to know your body. Don’t be afraid to explore and develop your own self massage techniques. Always try and warm up muscles before pressing on them; friction created by quick light rubbing movements will do this.

There is a lot that is spoken about regarding stress and quite rightly so because it plays a big part in our lives. Chronic stress is something we quite easily learn to endure and tolerate, so much so it almost becomes a part of us but it doesn’t have to be this way. We can learn ways to alleviate it a little and make us feel a whole lot better. Gentle indulgent self massage is a great way to help alleviate stress. Self massage

The office & self massage

Many of us these days spend a lot of time in front of computer screens and it can be pretty demanding, not just on our backs but on our arms, wrists and hands. I believe that the incidence of RSI - repetitive strain injury could be greatly reduced by performing regular arm and hand stretches throughout the day. Sitting in front of a computer monitor also puts stresses on our eyes and our nervous system.

Our backs have to tolerate us sitting badly in badly designed chairs; our hands, especially the mouse hand has to do the same thing over and over when we work at a computer; our eyes have to work hard looking at an unnatural bright picture at close quarters and our mind is constantly active as we bang away at the keyboard or flick between pages to search for that vital piece of information we need. What we should do is take more short breaks and spend a little of that time doing self massage and stretching. It doesn't have to be done in front of your colleagues but then why no? - Set an example of good practice.

If you feel yourself getting tired, or your back or wrists are tense and/or aching, do this seven-point self massage - it won’t take long. Even if you only do a few, it will help relieve tiredness.

1. Self massage - Hands and wristsThis is a very important set of exercises for anyone who spends a lot of time working at a computer, whether at the office or at home. A lot of tension can get locked up in our hands and we need to treat them to a firm massage every so often. Tension in the hands/fingers will likely cause you to make typing errors because the fingers do not go as fast as the brain demands.1. Link your hands together; fingers grasping fingers but keeping them straight, then squeeze your fingers together, rotate them while doing this.2. Still with fingers clasped, push your arms straight out in front of you, so your fingers are strongly extended and your shoulders are pulled forward.3. Now squeeze each finger, starting near the palm and gradually working back to the tip; gently rock your finger as you do this.4. Squeeze the little flap of skin between the fingers; it might be a little tender but that does not matter.5. Supporting the back of your hand with your four fingers and massage the palm with your thumb. Press in deeply with your thumb around the palm.6. Now grip the whole hand and squeeze, work your way up the hand to the wrist and continue squeezing up your forearm.7. Continue with the same squeezing back down the forearm but stop before your reach the hand. Grip the wrist and then rotate your hand a few times in both directions.Your hands should feel a whole lot freer after this.

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2. Self massage - Scalp and head
Run both hands through your hair like two big combs from front to back, either together or one at a time as much as you like. Make sure you push your fingers into your skull as you do it. It might spoil your hair (if you have some) but that can be put back in place. Brushing your hair this way, you’ll not only bring fresh blood to your scalp but more importantly you will also bring fresh blood into you brain. This will help you to feel less tired and think more clearly.
3. Self massage - Eye sockets and eyes
Next place the palms of our hands on your face and rest your three middle fingers on the ridge of each eye socket just below the eyebrow. Then press gently upwards and in small circular movements (you will have to bend your fingers a little) massage the area under your eyebrows. Take care not to press heavily on your eyes. This exercise will bring fresh blood to your eye sockets and eyes, helping you feel refreshed and your eyes won’t feel so tired.
4. Eyes
Now for the eyes, do what is called palming. You need to sit at a desk and lean forward so you can rest your elbows on the desk. Now put the soft fleshy part of your palms gently on your eye sockets so that you block out all light. Rest your face gently on your palms, so that your eyeballs are being gently pressed. DO NOT PRESS TOO HARD. Stay in this position for about thirty seconds or more and enjoy the light images that fly into your mind. When you’ve had enough take away your palms but keep your eyes close for a little while and enjoy the sensation of blood rushing to your eyes. Do this several times. This is not only relaxing but very good for your eyes. This is also a good exercise to do outside (maybe during your lunch break?), sitting with your knees up and elbows resting on them. When you have stopped gently pressing your eyes, keep your eyes closed and look toward the sun (if its there) but KEEP YOUR EYES CLOSED and do not open them until you are looking away from the sun. Repeat this several times. This is called sunning and palming.
5. Face
Again place your palms on your face but this time firmly stroke your forehead from the centre, down over each temple, down your checks and over your chin so your fingers fly off the end of your chin. This will bring lots of blood to your face and massage away some of the stress lines. Do this a few times, it is very refreshing.
6. Jaw
Now massage your jaw at the hinge point. We often store a lot of stress here by clenching our jaw. You can help to release the tension by firmly massaging the joint of the jaw.
7. Shoulders
Next you’re going to release some of that tension in your shoulders. Cupping both hands like solid hooks, grab hold of that fleshly lump of muscle at the top of your shoulders, at the base of your neck and dig in. It will more than likely feel quite firm or even solid. This muscle (supraspinatus) gets really tense, so give it a good rub, digging your fingers firmly in and search around for lumpy bits! Yes it is probably going to hurt a little but it will release quite a bit of tension in your shoulders. Another way of massaging this strong muscle is use the left had for the right shoulder and vice versa. Rest your palm on the top of your shoulder and curl your fingers to grasp the top of the scapula (there is a ridge to catch hold of). As you compress your hand press down on the muscle, it may feel very tight and if it does, it needs a lot of kneading. Note: it is best to warm muscles up first by means of friction; rubbing the muscle quickly.
Lastly shrug your shoulders big time! Really push them upwards and hold them there, then let them go. Do that three or four times and you can also rotate them if you wish but do it slowly and do it purposely. You might feel a whole load of crunching going on but don’t worry, it’s quite normal in tense shoulders. One last point, if you sitting at your desk; try to sit up straight and keep your feet flat on the floor!Now that you’ve done this, you should feel like getting on with your work. Oh! Don’t forget to rearrange your hair! Self massage

At home

In the privacy of your own home, you can self massage what you like!! And of course there is a lot of the body that can be reaching and massaged, in fact it is possible to reach just about everywhere if you try.

When to massageYou need to make time self massage; yes you can massage your feet, shoulders and hands while you’re watching TV but it is best when you have time to yourself, perhaps straight after having a bath. Warm muscles are more pliable than cold ones and respond better to massage.

It is not possible to explain in this article how to massage the whole of the body. If there is interest shown, I will write more on the subject. For now, I will explain a few good parts that are easy to massage and are very beneficial.

Self massage - Feet – be your own Reflexologist.I’m not a practitioner of Reflexology[GW3], so I don’t intend on discussing the therapy in detail but I do believe it to be a very good therapy. What I do know for sure is that our feet have to put up with a great deal; not only supporting our entire body weight but enabling us to walk, run and jump. Not only this but we keep them cooped up in shoes all day, which are often tight and don’t allow our feet to breath. And how do we thank them? We probably don’t, in fact until they hurt us we probably ignore them.

self massage feet Reflexologists tell us that the feet represent the body, in that pressing on certain points of the feet will create reflexive healing responses in the relevant point in the body. I have wondered if we were to always walk around barefoot (as our ancestors did), how much natural reflexology we might get daily? Anyway, massage is good for your feet and your health.

It is best to massage your feet naked - naked feet that is!

1. Grasp your foot and use your thumb to press firmly on the sole; move your thumb up and down and search for sore spots – you’re bound to find them. Press on the sore spots and hold in for a few seconds; the pain should dissipate after a little while. Also use the knuckles of your clenched fist to press on the soul; roll your knuckles over the curve of your sole. 2. Massage around the protruding ankle bone on both sides and then rotate your ankle slowly in both directions about five times. Press quite deeply around the Achilles’ heal.3. Squeeze your foot along its length.4. Pull on your toes one at a time and slightly rotate them as you do.5. Massage the little flap of skin between the joints.6. Supporting the ball of your foot, flex your foot by pressing downwards over the toes with the other hand.

Self massage - Hands and wristsLike our feet, we probably take our hands for granted but a lot of tension can get locked up in our hands and we need to treat them to a gentle massage every so often; especially if we’ve been doing a lot of typing.1. Link your hands together; fingers grasping fingers but keeping them straight, then squeeze your fingers together, rotate them while doing this.2. Still with fingers clasped, push your arms straight out in front of you, so your fingers are strongly extended and your shoulders are pulled forward.3. Now squeeze each finger, starting near the palm and gradually working back to the tip; gently rock your finger as you do this.4. Squeeze the little flap of skin between the fingers; it might be a little tender but that does not matter.5. Supporting the back of your hand with your four fingers and massage the palm with your thumb. Press in deeply with your thumb around the palm.6. Now grip the whole hand and squeeze, work your way up the hand to the wrist and continue squeezing up your forearm.7. Continue with the same squeezing back down the forearm but stop before your reach the hand. Grip the wrist and then rotate your hand a few times in both directions.Your hands should feel a whole lot freer after this.

self massage back Self massage - Back
It is possible to self massage most, if not all of your back and if you feel you have a lot of tension there, you should do this everyday. You can massage your back through your clothes and it can be easier to do this as your hand will slide more easily over the material than over your skin, unless you use oilMany people suffer with discomfort and weakness here and it is not surprising, considering the stresses this part of our body comes under. Our waistline centres around our lumbar spine, five large flexible vertebrae which sit on the non flexible sacrum and hips. This part of the spine not only bares a lot of weight but has to endure being forced to bend into an unnatural shape. It is supposed to bend in toward the belly button but is often force in the other direction when we slump or sit on soft seats like car seats. It is no wonder so many people get bad backs in this region and I have been one of them. Prevention is better than cure they say but often it is the need for a cure that draws our attention to our lower back after we have suffered the pain of something going wrong and that something is muscle spasm but this section is about prevention, not cure. Go to Treating Back Pain

Self massage - Buttocks and lumbar
To massage the back, it is best to start at the bottom and one of the simplest ways to loosen up these big buttock muscles is pummel – stand up, make a fist with both hands and thump your bottom with quick rhythmical movements. Keep your wrist loose and you can also open your hand and thump with the side of it. I suggest you don’t do this while the family are watching the TV; you will only leave yourself open to complaint and ridicule! After a minute or two of pummelling your bum, pummel your lumbar region. What you are doing is sending shock waves through the muscles and forcing blood through the fibres of them; it will help to loosen them up. Keep pummelling as high as you can up your spine to your thoracic region, the mid section.
Thoracic region.
Running the length of our spine on both sides are long bands of muscles and their job is to ensure we stand upright. These muscles have to exert a great force to do their job and a lot of undue forces can be exerted on them, especially if we suffer from chronic anxiety and add to that poor posture.To massage the muscles on either side of the spine, I have found that it is best to again make a fist and press your knuckles along the muscle. Don’t press too hard, just enough to feel the muscle yield under your touch. Press and rotate your knuckles as far as you can reach up and down a few times. You can do this quite quickly to generate heat in the muscles and so soften them. This is a very good exercise if you have been sitting for long periods or feel stiff in that area.
Muscles on the upper back
This part of the spine is called the cervical spine from which hangs our upper rib cage and shoulder girdle. Here there are so many muscles performing so many tasks relating to the neck, head, shoulders, arms, spine and rib cage. It is no wonder these muscles can get under all sorts of stress.You can do the grabbing technique I mentioned above (self massage in the office) or you can simply reach as far as you can over the opposite shoulder, above and below and massage the muscles you find. Press in and find the tight and tender spots, and when you find one press a little firmer and circle your fingers round and round. The intent here is to force fresh blood to the muscle and force toxins out; not only that but to break down fibrous tissue (tissue that has adhered together).

Note: It is always best to warm up muscles first, so massaging after a bath is a very good time to massage self.If you’ve been exercising hard, treat those hard working muscles to a massage after your shower and clear out the lactic acid which can accumulate in tired muscles. Your muscles and you will recover much quicker.

And if you really want to indulge yourself, get some massage oil and enjoy yourself!


Stretching

As part of your self massage routine, incorporate firm but slow stretches. When you stretch, always breath into the stretch and you will feel your muscles give a little more. Put your focus on the muscles yielding to your stretch. Never try stretching when you have a muscle strain or muscle spasm; you'll only make it worse. Go slowly with your stretches and never force your body to move further than is comfortable. Stretching helps to loosen muscles are relieve some tension.

To find out more about stress, visit What is stress? Why not learn to massage? Find out a list of training establishments at Massage Therapy UK


"Chronic stress is something we learn to endure and tolerate but it doesn’t have to be this way"

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