Tag Archives: calm relaxed state

The Consequences of Stress

Experts estimate that 80 percent to 90 percent of disease is stress-related. Massage and bodywork is there to combat that frightening number by helping us remember what it means to relax. The physical changes massage brings to your body can have a positive effect in many areas of your life. Besides increasing relaxation and decreasing anxiety, massage lowers your blood pressure, increases circulation, improves recovery from injury, helps you to sleep better and can increase your concentration. It reduces fatigue and gives you more energy to handle stressful situations.

Massage is a perfect elixir for good health, but it can also provide an integration of body and mind. By producing a meditative state or heightened awareness of living in the present moment, massage can provide emotional and spiritual balance, bringing with it true relaxation and peace.

 

The Physical Benefits of Massage

~~Increases circulation, allowing the body to pump more oxygen and nutrients into tissues and vital organs.~~Stimulates the flow of lymph, the body’s natural defense system, against toxic invaders. For example, in breast cancer patients, massage has been shown to increase the cells that fight cancer.

~~Increased circulation of blood and lymph systems improves the condition of the body’s largest organ – the skin.

~~Relaxes and softens injured and overused muscles

~~Reduces spasms and cramping

~~Increases joint flexibility

~~Reduces recovery time, helps prepare for strenuous workouts and eliminates subsequent pains of the athlete at any level.

~~Releases endorphins — the body’s natural painkiller — and is being used in chronic illness, injury and recovery from surgery to control and relieve pain

~~Reduces post-surgery adhesions and edema and can be used to reduce and realign scar tissue after healing has occurred.

~~Improves range-of-motion and decreases discomfort for patients with low back pain.

~~Relieves pain for migraine sufferers and decreases the need for medication

~~Assists with shorter labor for expectant mothers, as well as less need for medication, less depression and anxiety, and shorter hospital stays.

Source: http://www.massagetherapy.com/articles/index.php?article_id=468

 

Massage helps with these conditions: 

~~Headaches/ Migraines

~~Back Pain

~~Neck & shoulder issues

~~Carpal Tunnel issues

~~Edema- fluid retention and swelling

~~Fibromyalgia and Chronic Fatigue Syndrome

~~Sciatica

~~Plantar fasciitis

~~Scoliosis

~~Arthritis

~~Premenstrual Syndrome

~~Asthma

~~Insomnia, Anxiety, and Depression

~~High Blood Pressure

~~Pregnancy Discomforts and Recovery

~~Athletic Event Warm Up, Cool Down and Recovery

~~Muscle Injury Rehabilitation

~~Scarring

~~Detoxification…

~~And there are many more reasons to get a massage!

 

Call and schedule a massage today and see how good you can feel!

 

 

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“ You can run like a racecar… “

… But you have to come in for pit stops.” 

I have said this so many times in massage or energywork sessions that I wish I had a dollar for every time I have said it!

What I am referring to is that balance is usually thought of as a Zen concept; where you go into a blissed out state, and live there (in a yoga posture) no matter what traumatic events may happen.  Now I have no problem with yoga, if that is your thing, but we all have our “thing”.  I like and use yoga.

But balance may be more of a concept where balance is the righting effect of going 100% and then screeching to a stop to catch your breath, like a racecar coming in to get the fuel and tires to continue on at a crazy pace.

I usually see people when their world has come crashing down around their heads, and they are in pain, hyper-tense, not breathing, and needing some relief.  Getting people and their bodies and their energy to a calm, relaxed state, and in less pain is the righting effect.  Scheduling down time before getting wound back into that knot is also has a righting effect, knowing that there will be a “port in the storm”.

We all have stressful times, and times when we can’t stop yet, but there needs to be an end strategy in place.  Taking time out for massage can be one strategy.  What are the positive ways you deal with stress?

Karate?  Walking?  Listening or playing music?  Involvement in community theatre?  Writing?  Getting more sleep?  Lunch with “the girls/guys”?  Veg’ing in front of the T.V./Computer/Game Console?  Reading a good book? Decorating/painting your house?  Art?  Cleaning?  Long, hot bath with candles?  Playing with your kids or pets? Working in a garden?  Volunteering?  The list goes on and is individual for each of us, at any given time.

Given the intensity and length of stressful situations, we may all reach for unhealthy choices, or close off from overwhelm.  I believe this is where addictions some in, sort of like a baby’s pacifier.  Depending on the situation, these can take us over.  Working back out of crisis situations can be a long or short journey but one that can be shaped by adapting with new habits and letting go of and replacing less beneficial habits.  A mental re-framing and re-claiming of one’s life and relation to it, is the road back.  Getting back your life, you come back up to speed with the rest of life around you.  Now you are back to flirting with the whole racecar mentality.  But now you have choices on how to spend your energy.  …Take time for that “pit stop”.

Mandy  : – )