Natural Medicine Healthy Living

A Brief History

Massage therapy was first referenced by the early Egyptians but it was the Chinese who were first to really recognize the healing value associated with massage therapy around the year 3000 BC.  It was prescribed for restoration to those coming from battle and was adopted as a daily ritual for relaxation.  Throughout history herbalists have used this technique to heal the body of common complaints and ailments and essential oils or base oils were regularly used to anoint the body after bathing.

Massage therapy became popular in Europe in the 18th and 19th century thanks to a man from Sweden named Per Henrik Ling who learned the technique while traveling in China.  He developed his own techniques and this knowledge soon spread worldwide with many medical professionals adopting the practice.  Today the practice is very much based on the traditional Swedish massage.

The Effects of Massage

Massage is well known to help the body relax, boosting circulation by stimulating the blood and lymphatic systems and has many uses the most common being to ease tense muscles or stiff joints bringing an overall feeling of relaxation to the patient.

It is also known to help aid the digestive process reducing common stomach complaints and is commonly used nowadays on babies who suffer with wind and gripe.  

The practice of massage therapy is also popular with athletes, helping to restore mobility after strenuous exercise or competition.  It can also help to improve muscle tone and the practice is becoming increasingly popular as an aid to training athletes.  Sports injury massage has been shown to greatly ease strains and sprains and speed up healing time after injury.  It is often used both before exercise as a warm up technique and after to aid sore muscles and cramps.

The Nervous System

Through massage the nervous system is stimulated and  can be effectively used to both soothe and invigorate the patient.  The human body has millions of nerve endings that send messages from our body to our brain, massage works on these nerve endings to help the body relax and feel soothed as well as to energize.  There are many thousand nerve endings in the feet alone, making reflexology a popular choice for many people.

Massage gives an added benefit to the skin through exfoliation of the dead skin cells and also by helping to tone the skin making face massage popular for the reduction of wrinkles.

The Basic Techniques of Massage

Some of the common techniques used in traditional massage are Effleurage, Petrissage, Connective Tissue massage and Percussion.

Effleurage is mostly used at the beginning of a massage and is often used for initially applying the base essential oil to the body.

Petrissage is the method of kneading and rolling a group of muscles or a single muscle one at a time.

Connective Tissue Massage is a circular movement using deep pressure to an area of tension on the body and is used to ease muscle tightness and muscle cramping.

Percussion movements are the fast stimulating movements that many people picture when imagining massage, these include the pummeling and hacking movements most commonly seen.  However it may look, these techniques should not cause pain and are used to stimulate blood circulation.

Practicing these techniques at home can be a great way to help relax after a long day at work or looking after the children and is also a way of connecting with a partner however for specific health problems you should visit a trained massage professional.

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Worldwide clinical heat disease studies

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This compound showed that it worked in a couple of ways against heart disease by:

Preventing the cardiac muscle from enlarging.

Repairing the damage to the already affected cells and preventing tissue scarring.

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Karen A Graham has 1 articles online

Karen is an holistic therapist, health and nutrition researcher. Visit her site to find out what ingredients work best to battle the causes of aging and promote optimal health, one is curcumin and discover her recommendations to her clients.