Top 10 Benefits of Massage

With gentle music and pleasant aromas, relaxation is often the main goal for our massage clients. While this is an excellent way to escape the stresses of life, massage can also be so much more. Here are a list of my top 10 benefits (in no particular order) that massage can provide:

1. Boost Your Immune System. Better flow around your lymphatic system allows white blood cells to pick up bacteria and viruses before they make you sick.
2. Reduce Pain. From headaches to delayed onset muscle soreness after a workout, even to fibromyalgia, massage has been proven to help you feel better.
3. Improve Your Sleep. More important than most North Americans give it credit, those who receive regular massage on average, sleep longer and deeper than those who do not. Getting enough sleep helps improve memory, immune function, recovery time and overall health in general.
4. Improve Joint Health and Mobility. Joint mobilizations similar to but gentler than those performed by chiropractors, can help get nutritious synovial fluid moving and loosen up stiff joint capsules. Great for osteoarthritis, frozen shoulder, or post-immobilization (casting).
5. Decrease Swelling. Specific gentle techniques around an area of swelling allow your body to pick up the extra fluid and get it back into your blood where it belongs.
6. Improve Your Posture. Desk work can be a huge factor in promoting poor posture, but knowing which muscles to stretch, and which to strengthen can be a significant help.
7. Improve Your Body Awareness. Physical touch helps bring awareness to parts of our bodies we may not have realized existed. This can help reduce the chance of injury as we become more mindful of our bodies.
8. Boost Your Metabolism. By increasing circulation and freeing metabolic waste from tissues, your body can work more efficiently at a cellular level.
9. Reduce Constipation. Getting things moving again can help reduce bloating, headaches, insomnia and other possible issues from toxicity, not to mention allows for better nutrient uptake.
10. and of course, Reduce Stress. Taking the time to focus on yourself is very important. Massage helps lower blood pressure and improve mood regulating neurotransmitters in your brain.

Over the next few weeks, I’ll write more about each of these benefits, but feel free to talk to any of Sugar Moon’s RMTs if you have any questions. Relaxation tends to be a main focus here, but keep us in mind the next time you get a headache or feel an unusual pain in your body. We can help you out!

Best of Health,

Cheryl Knopp, RMT