Relaxation massage at medium and deep pressure can beat up my hands. That’s why I use a massage pressing tool.
Dude, that’s called acupressure.
True, if I only pressed, but I glide, too.
A pressing massage tool (pictured below) not only can be used to do static or reciprocating pressure when gliding with body parts (hands, knuckles, fists, forearms), it can also be used as the primary gliding vehicle, too.
Using a Massage Pressing Tool for Static Pressure During a Glide Stroke
Using a massage pressing tool for static pressure during a glide stroke is fairly straight forward.
You glide with your favorite body parts (hands, fists, knuckles, forearms) and when you find a tight spot you pause, pick up the massage pressing tool, press, put the massage tool back down, then continue on with your glide.
More about how to do that here:
Gliding with a Massage Pressing Tool
Gliding with a pressing tool requires a little more practice. But it’s worth it.
Why?
Because when you can glide with a pressing tool you can:
- Maintain consistent flow.
- Save your thumbs and hands.
- Seamlessly do static or reciprocating pressure at anytime during the glide stroke.
Gliding with a pressing tool can be a little awkward at first, but I have 2 tricks to make it easy.
First, do an exploratory stroke WITHOUT a massage pressing tool.
Trick #1: Exploratory Strokes
For an exploratory stroke glide with your favorite body parts (hands, fists, knuckles, forearms).
As you glide note the tight and tender areas along the way. Now you have a basic mental map of the areas you may want to focus on.
With that map in mind pick up a massage pressing tool and start to glide, which brings us to trick #2.
Trick #2: Don’t keep the same pressure through the entirety of the initial pressing tool stroke.
So, say you’re gliding with deep pressure in the lamina groove with a T-bar.
If you initially do the whole stroke with deep pressure, you’re going to hit some tight spots on the map, and it’s NOT going to feel so relaxing to the client when you slam into them with that deep pressure.
So, instead of slamming into tight spots as you glide, back of the pressure as you approach them.
How will you know where they are?
Use your map.
So, this means that you’ll go over the first tight spot with the lighter pressure, then you’ll stop, back up a little and do your magic (possibly deeper static pressure) to provide pain relief to that area.
The whole stroke looks like this: Starting stroke with a deep pressure glide using a T-bar…tight spot coming up…lighten up a little…over it…stop…back up…on it…find the pain relief pressure for that spot…make the client sigh…done…glide on with deep pressure…next tight spot coming up…lighten up just before you make contact…over it…stop…back up…on it…pain relief provided…move on and repeat this same process until the end of the stoke.
By the way, my relaxation glide stroke is pretty damn slow. So, it’s not like I’m jamming on the brakes when I stop and pause on a tight/tender spot.
Personally, I think that stopping and addressing tight/tender areas when doing a relaxation massage (in a relaxing way) is what separates an average relaxation massage from a good relaxation massage.
Okay, sounding pretty good so far?
Well, here’s the bad news. When you actually glide with a massage pressing tool for the first time this is what’s going to happen: The massage tool is going to fall out of your hands OR you’re going to squeeze so hard your hand will hurt.
Here’s how you fix that: Use two hands.
In this video I demonstrate how to hold a TheraPress with two hands while gliding.
Okay, got it, Mark, two hands…glide but not too much pressure at first…slow the stroke down…then come back to the tight spot on Thursday, but not Friday…
Yeah, let’s simplify things for gliding with a massage pressing tool.
- Do an exploratory stroke WITHOUT the massage tool.
- Use two hands to brace the tool.
- Lighten up on the pressure when you first come up to tight spots.
Boom!
If you’re getting serious about using massage tools to save your hands, check out How to Hold a Massage Tool.
Massage Tools Online Class
And if you want to get really serious about saving your hands and using a massage tool to deliver focused pressure, I have an online, home-study class for you: How to Use Massage Tools (Fearlessly and Effectively).
