Massage therapy is one of those treatments that has been around for thousands of years. It has benefits for our physical, mental and emotional health. If you think of massage, you may see it as a luxury treatment, something to do once a year when you spoil yourself for a spa getaway. In reality, you will only get the lasting benefits of a massage if you go for one regularly.
But how often should you get a massage, and will it be worth your time and money to get one more frequently? The easy answer is yes. You absolutely should treat yourself to a massage more often, if your budget allows you to. In today’s modern society, most people have high-stress jobs where they take stressful commutes to work only to spend eight hours of their day in front of a computer screen, encouraging bad posture. Overtime, stress and bad posture can result in chronic issues like back and neck pain, poor sleep and low mood. These are all things a frequent massage can improve.
Let’s look at some of the benefits of going for a frequent massage:
- Massage can help to reduce stress and the effects of stress on your body
- Massage can relieve chronic pain
- Massage relaxes tight and sore muscles
- Massage can increase athletic performance
- Massage can help speed up recovery from injury
- Massage helps you to relax
- Massage increases circulation
- Massage promotes the removal of toxins from the body
- Massage can boost your mood
- Massage can boost your immunity
- Massage can increase your range of motion
The more you go for a massage, the more these benefits will start to accumulate, resulting in a better feeling body and a happier you.
How often you should go for a massage depends on your goals, physical and emotional needs
Take a deep breath and think of what is most important to you. Are you looking to improve your athletic performance or nurse an injury? Or would you like to reduce your stress and loosen those tight desk-sitting muscles? Once you know what you would like the end goal of your massage to be, you can start looking at how frequent you should get one.
For pain relief consider going for a massage weekly for a few weeks. You can then reduce the frequency to biweekly or once a month.
For athletic performance you can consider going for a massage biweekly, but if you are a serious athlete and need to prep for endurance, you can go once or even twice a week.
Use the knowledge of your massage therapist. Your massage therapist is the best person to recommend how often you should go for a massage as they are working with your body and muscles. If they know what your end goals are, they can make a good recommendation for you.
In periods of high stress where you start to feel overwhelmed, you should go for a massage more often.
The rule of thumb to remember is this: if you have a good therapist that gives a good massage, once monthly should be enough to keep you feeling good and reaping the benefits of your massage.
