Sure, a massage sounds nice. You'll get one....maybe...someday. But perhaps it seems a little self indulgent, or it's just not the first thing on your to-do list. And so you put it off. I've done the same thing, honestly. There's so much going on in life! Who's got time to lie on a table for an hour?
And then I remind myself that a good massage is a lot more than relaxing. A massage benefits your overall health in sometimes surprising ways.
It's pretty obvious that a massage can reduce tension in stiff, sore muscles. A sedentary lifestyle or too much time hunched over a computer, for example, can elevate your shoulders and pull your head forward, leading to neck and back pain. Sound familiar? A massage can help alleviate that.
But that's not all.
Massage has also been proven to lower blood pressure and reduce heart rate. And massage can lower the levels of stress hormones in your body. These stress hormones are actually very useful things – if you're trying to run away from a saber-toothed tiger. When these hormones are always present (no matter whether there's a tiger around or not), then our stress is chronic. And that's a lot less helpful. Massage can help ease chronic stress, gently urging the body out of fight-or-flight mode.
Massage also allows your body to enter something called the parasympathetic state. (More on that in a future blog post, so stay tuned.) In this state, your body can rest, relax, digest, and heal, which means that massage can improve the functioning of your immune system and help your body get the nutrition and rest that it needs.
So a massage is more than an indulgence; it’s more than something that might be nice someday. It's a way to bring your body into its healthiest state.
Who says that massage can do all these things? If you're the type of person who likes to check the footnotes, you can explore these sources: