Information On Advanced Massage Techniques

By Imelda Reid

Every individual who gets kneaded normally does it for dissimilar personal motives. There are individuals who do it to get relaxed but some do it because health requires them to. The reason why an individual gets these services does not really count, what counts is that the person massaging them identifies with all advanced massage techniques they are supposed to so as to achieve the goals of their client. Here are examples of the common methods of massaging that they ought to know.

The Swedish reflexology is an example of the most popular tactics in this skill. It is method that nearly all masseuses employ. In this approach, the masseuse uses some long sliding strokes as well as some small friction signals. The kneading is typically done to affect the intersections so as to decrease muscle exhaustion and later induce relaxation.

Deep connective tissue also known as DCT is a more advance technique of massaging compared to Swedish massage. This technique aims to influence all the layers of fascia that usually support and separate all muscle tissues. It uses very long and deep strokes that work by fully extending and relaxing the muscles. This allows the body to return to its natural alignment helping the person to feel relaxed.

Another approach frequently used in reflexology is the neuromuscular treatment and its main aim is to lessen pain. The therapy uses lots of pressure that is used on the nerves to intersect the pain indicators before they get to the spinal cord area. This aids to ease the pain on the customer. The force also removes any poisonous irritants that may have collected in the receptors.

Myofascial relief is another method of massaging that is utilized when working with soft tissue related problems. In this method, the masseuse puts on mild patterns of strain which help to give back the body its regular functioning. The mild pressure is usually applied in a certain direction to the instant that the objectives are reached.

Sports kneading is technique used on athletic members. It is usually essential for them to go through this treatment to make their bodies ready for the forthcoming games to prevent injuries. There is before games massage and after games massage to ensure the bodies retain their optimum state. With this treatment, their bodies are also able to recuperate faster from the intense exercise.

There is a different soft tissue method that is mostly used to heal muscle related ailments. This technique is referred to as the active release method. It is usually used to treat ailments also connected to the fascia, ligaments, nerves and also tendons. Most of these ailments are cause by excess use of the muscles hence this technique is efficient in this treatment. Apart from the above ailments, people with recurring headaches, joint ailments and also frequent back pains can utilize this method of massage.

It is not every masseuse that has complete information about this activity. The customer must therefore make certain they hire a qualified masseuse who has done that course in their studies and is also approved to practice. Whether reflexology is done for fitness purpose or for relaxation, the wrong masseuse may cause many problems for the client.

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Cleansing Techniques And Therapies Of Advanced Skin Care

By Ryan Robinson

Generally, people ought to know that proper coat treatment goes beyond just cleaning it. However, there are numerous procedures undertaken in advanced skin care for your pelt to appear without any blemish. Some of these techniques have to be applied together for better results. Hence, it is necessary to look for a qualified aesthetician. It is because some situations call for a professional who is well knowledgeable of the procedure.

Many fail to differentiate between an esthetician and a dermatologist. The latter is a physician who studies the dermal membranes and disorders related to it whereas the former, offers complimentary services to what the dermatologist does. S/he has adequate training to enable them spot signs of disorders before hand and tap the situation before it reaches a point of gravity.

It is critical to do a thorough search of a qualified coat care provider. You should not compromise on integrity. Hygienically speaking, the premises should be well sanitized and clean as per the bars set by the Board of Certified Dermatologists. Moreover, they should be knowledgeable in medical science as at timers they will have to combine the two practices for the best membrane treatment.

Chemically peeling the skin is one process used in advanced pelt care. It is a remedy effective in reversing the effects caused by aging, harmful ultra-violet rays, scarring, dull complexion and uneven tone. Coat flakes may be light, fair or profound. Depending on the nature of the peels, different down time is required for each with the deep peels requiring as long as a week to heal properly.

Exfoliation is one curing technique used in professional therapy. The skin can sometimes have dead cells. This method is used in such a case. Care givers may choose to remove the dead cells through scrubbing, brushing or microdermabrasion using a peeling chemical product. The product may also have digestive enzymes that engulf the dead cells in more advanced stages of this disorder.

Aside from the discussed methods, extraction is another remedy. This procedure is done in a bid to unblock the pores. The extent of the clogging determines what removal mechanism to be adopted. An aesthetician, depending on their evaluation, may decide to use their protected hands or employ the use of equipment; a razor-sharp blade specially meant to uplift clogging element from pores.

A medical procedure used by advanced estheticians is microdermabrasion. This technique is meant to lift the epidermal layer with the use of tools that polish the outer layer. Here, a crystal spurt is used. The spray is to permit the dead coat and sanded surface out of the layer. Microdermabrasion maintains a good hide texture, gives it a fine line pattern and allows the quick penetration of cosmetics.

The removal of unwanted hair is a commonly used skin therapy. It is a process known as waxing. It can be soft or hard. Supple waxing requires you to apply wax in your coat in tandem with the direction of your hair growth. Then a cloth slip is rubbed on top of the wax and the peeled off towards the reverse direction. Hard waxing involves the same steps. The only difference is that a cloth is not used.

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Techniques for Strength Building with Yoga

by Nina

Bob Kubik, Age 79

As you might have been able to tell, Baxter and I have been delving into the topic of strength building lately (see Strength Building: How Long to Hold Poses and Static versus Dynamic Poses). And now I’m excited to announce that after a couple of weeks of research, discussion, and debate, we’ve finally come up with a basic set of guidelines for how you can use your yoga practice for strength building! So I thought I’d share them today. 

All poses, except restorative poses, are weight bearing (even if you’re bearing weight on some body part besides your feet), and all active poses require muscle contraction in some form, so any active yoga pose will strengthen both your bones and muscles. A well-rounded active yoga practice that includes a good mix of standing poses, backbends, twists, and forward bends will provide all-around muscle and bone strength building. But if you’d like to focus on strengthening a particular area, for example, if you have knee arthritis and want to work on leg strength, you can choose the corresponding categories to emphasize in your practice. 

Poses for Leg and Hip Strength. Any poses where you stand on one or both legs, especially with one or both knees bent, are strengthening for legs and hips. Also strengthening for hips and legs are poses where you lift your leg or legs away from the ground, for example, in Locust pose (Salabasana) or Boat pose (Navasana).

Poses for Arm and Shoulder Strength. Any pose where you bear weight on hands or forearms will strengthen your arms and shoulders. (To strengthen your wrists, you need to bear weigh on your hands.) Also strengthening for arms and shoulders are any poses where you lift your arms away from the floor, either out to the sides (Warrior 2), overhead (Warrior 1), forward or behind your back (Locust pose).

Poses for Core Strength. Any poses where you lift your leg or legs away from the floor, such as Hunting Dog pose, Locust pose, and Boat pose. Any poses where you tip your torso to the front, side, or back, such as Triangle pose, Half Standing Forward Bend, or Standing Backbend. And any pose where you lift your hips away from the floor, such as Plank pose, Side Plank pose, and Upward Plank pose. 

Poses for Back and Spinal Strength. Both standing and seated twists help strengthen spinal bones and the muscles of your back that support your spine. Standing, prone, and reclined backbends will strengthen overall back muscles.

How Long to Hold the Poses

For muscle strength in static poses, you can either work on muscle strength or endurance. To work on muscle strength alone, hold the pose at least 8 to 10 seconds and consider repeating the pose several times. To work on endurance, hold the pose as long as you safely can, gradually working up to longer and longer holds. For bone strength in static poses, we recommend holding the pose for 30 seconds or more. 

If you’re too weak or fatigued to stay in a pose for the recommended timings, hold the pose for as long as you safely can and then come out. Gradually over the next several weeks work your way up to longer and longer holds. 

For muscle strength in dynamic poses, you can either move in and out of the pose with your breath or hold the full pose within the vinyasa for at least 8 to 10 seconds to enhance strength building. For bone strength in dynamic poses, based on what we know about weight-bearing movement, such as walking and running, we recommend practicing poses dynamically for bone strength in sets of six repetitions.

How Often to Do the Poses

Muscles need a day of rest between exercise sessions when you are working on strength building. So generally you shouldn’t exercise the same muscle group on consecutive days. However, you can do muscle strength-building yoga poses every day if you focus on different areas of your body on each day, for example, alternating between upper body, lower body and core strength. Or, you can alternate strength building practice days with gentle stretching restorative yoga, or sessions of breath work and/or meditation. If you are practicing for bone strength, follow the same recommendations.

Other Tips

Balancing Your Practice. To balance your strength building, make sure your practice includes poses of all the basic types: standing poses, backbends, forward bends, and twists, as long as they are safe for you. Of course you don’t need to do all these basic types within a single practice; just try to get to them sometime each week. Also, try to include poses where you bear weight on your hands as well as sitting bones, shins, and so on, such as Downward-Facing Dog pose, Side Plank pose, Hunting Dog pose, and Boat pose.

Stretching. Because your body’s response to stretching and strengthening is similar in promoting muscle growth, poses that you might think of as “just stretching” actually also enhance strength (see Just Stretching is Not Just Stretching). So when practicing for flexibility you’ll be increasing strength. You can enhance your strength building in a stretch (and improve the stretch) by adding in muscle activation for stretching as described in Why and How to Activate Your Muscles in Yoga Poses.

Muscle Activation for Strengthening. Although a weight-bearing pose on its own will strengthen bones that are actually bearing your weight, if you consciously contract the muscles holding you up by firming them toward the bones, you will enhance the bone strengthening effects of the pose. For example, if you’re standing in Tree pose (Vrksasana), firming your leg muscles will enhance bone building in the standing leg. 

For strengthening muscles, you can strengthen more than just the obviously active muscles by consciously contracting other muscles as you work in the pose. For example, in Downward-Facing Dog pose (Adho Mukha Svanasana), firm all your arm muscles and shoulder muscles toward the bone. When you want to strengthen your hip area, in a standing pose, for example, you can slowly engage the muscles all around your hip joints, while ensuring that this action does not pull you out of good alignment. 

To achieve these benefits, contract your muscles gently rather than strongly. Strongly contracting a muscle noticeably shortens the muscle, which seems to prevent you from moving as freely in the pose. On the other hand, gently firming a muscle toward the bone provides muscular support without interfering as much with movement. If you’re not used to working this way, it may take some practice. Take it in two steps: 

1. Consciously relax the muscle, allowing it to lengthen. 
2. Gently firm the muscle toward the bone. 

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Techniques for Managing Pain with Yoga

by Baxter and Nina

Beams of Light by Melina Meza

This post recommends techniques for helping you manage acute and/or chronic pain. Although the causes of acute and chronic pain differ, depending on your condition on a given day, you can use similar techniques to reduce your pain.

Start by considering your pain levels both today and, if you are suffering from chronic pain, over time. By reviewing your pain levels through the course of a day, week, or month, you will begin to see patterns. To do this, you might find it useful to assign a rating to your pain and keep a journal of pain levels that you can periodically review. To get a better picture of how pain is affecting your entire being, you could also note your stress levels and your predominate mood. You can then use all this information to guide you to practice differently on different days. 

For chronic pain, on high pain days, start or stay with gentle poses, relaxing breath practices, and meditation. If your pain is very severe, focus on relaxation and breath practices, and maybe imagine the poses. And on low pain days, try carefully increasing the intensity of your practice.

For acute pain, if your pain is tolerable, this is a good time to practice asanas, which will increase oxygen flow to brain and muscle tissues, and release held tension from the muscles. But if your pain is severe, you should focus solely on relaxation and breath practices. 

For everyone, practicing stress management on a regular basis is very beneficial, as reducing stress levels can lower pain levels. We will compare and contrast some of the techniques below. 

How Often to Practice. For chronic pain, it is important to have rest days, where you are practice only restorative or extremely gentle poses, or skip the asana portion of your practice entirely. So we recommend that you practice more actively 3 to 4 times a week, and at least do breath practices and meditation on your resting days, if possible. 

For acute pain, follow a similar schedule. Because acute pain will ideally resolve more quickly, as your pain subsides and your functioning returns to normal, you can gradually increase your practice days to 5-6 days a week. 

Balanced Practice. We recommend that your active practice be a well-rounded one, including yoga poses from all the basic groups (as long as they are appropriate for you unique pain situation), in both dynamic and static variations. In addition to your poses, try to include breath work, resting poses, and mediation. Because down-regulating your sympathetic nervous system is so beneficial for pain management, we recommend that at least 25 percent of your practice be devoted to breath work, restorative poses and/or meditation.

For both types of pain, always begin your asana practice with gentle poses. Start with simple movements that improve breathing, such as Cat-Cow pose, seated or standing side-bends, and arm range-of-motion actions. Then, if you are feeling up to it, add in more active asana, dynamic or static, such as Arms Overhead pose, Warrior 1 and 2 poses, Downward-Facing Dog pose, and Locust pose, and any other basic poses that work well for your particular condition. Finish up with one or more relaxing restorative poses, such as Easy Inverted pose, Legs Up the Wall pose, Supported Child’s pose, or Supported Relaxation pose. 

Dynamic Poses. Use dynamic poses either to create a balanced practice or to address a particular area where you have pain. When you first try a dynamic pose that may stimulate the area of your pain, move slowly and mindfully in and out of the pose. If this movement stimulates pain, modify it so you come up to the edge of pain without fully triggering your pain response. When you find a way to practice that feels safe, you can move at a pace that feels good to you, be it slower or slightly faster.

Static Poses. Use static poses to stretch areas that are stiff and tight, and, if you have chronic pain, that may have developed limited mobility as a result of pain. Focus on the particular flexibility poses that will gently stretch your tight areas. For example, if you have low back pain and are tight in the backs of your legs, Reclined Leg Stretch could be a good choice. 

Also use static poses to strengthen muscles that have been become weak due to lack of use. For example, chronic low back pain often results in weakness for the lower back muscles. Focus on strength building poses that will gradually build strength in your weak areas, For example, for weak lower back muscles, choose poses that builds back strength, such as Locust pose, to regain lost strength.

As you work with both flexibility and strength building, practice mindfully and note if these poses also begin to reduce pain levels. If they do reduce pain levels, continue practicing the poses and gradually add in other similar poses. However, if they don’t reduce your pain levels, try reducing the time in each pose or consult with an experienced teacher to help you re-organize your practice choices.

For acute pain with no history of chronic pain, practicing strengthening poses is less important, because it takes time for weakness to develop. However, if the acute pain becomes chronic, we recommend adding strengthening poses to your practice to help prevent weakness from developing.

Breath Practices. You can use any breath practice you find helpful. Generally, we recommend starting with calming breath practices, such as:

• gently lengthening both inhalation and exhalation
• 1:2 ratio breathing
• alternate nostril breath

When you reach a point where you are working on stress hardiness or active strength building practices, you could try adding in a few more stimulating practices, such as 2:1 ratio breathing or Kapala Bhati, as these practices can help energize your body and mind, contributing to your strength and endurance. 

Restorative Poses & Focused Relaxation. All forms of focused relaxation are helpful for reducing stress. However, if you are in acute or severe pain, you may find recorded guided versions are easier to focus on, as your mind will be more attentive to the recording than your own attempts at moving your focus away from pain. 

In general, start with a comfortable relaxation pose, from simple Savasana (Relaxation pose) to any form of supported Savasana, or any symmetrical restorative pose. Then practice any conscious relaxation technique that works for you, such as simple breath awareness, a body scan or guided imagery, or the rotation of consciousness portion of yoga nidra. 

Meditation. For both acute and chronic pain, you can practice any form of meditation, from simple breath awareness to more formal practices that cultivate feeling of kindness towards your self. We especially recommend meditating on an image in your mind that is calming and joyful or a color that is peaceful and pleasant, or using the formal Vipassana Metta meditation (Loving Kindness Meditation). To get a handle on how much of your mental energy is going to thinking about your pain versus other topics, you can try simply observing your thoughts. Experiment with these various different techniques to see what works best for you (see Yoga Meditation Techniques).

Imagining Asana. For those with chronic pain, on days when you don’t feel up to moving, imagining you are doing an asana actually prepares your body to move with greater ease and comfort when you are ready to move again. To prepare yourself to do this, you may want to rehearse this technique on a low pain day while you are actively practicing. For example, as you using whatever method you normally use to practice, whether using a sequence from a book, a video, or an audio recording, or creating your own sequence, after each pose, stop, close your eyes, and do the pose or mentally, as a way of memorizing it. Then, the next day, try out a short practice mentally. As you improve at this technique, you will be able to easily access the mental practice on the days you don’t feel up to moving.

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