New Year's Resolutions: Computers, Fitness and Massage
Posted by Jennifer Shaw on Tue, Jan 26, 2010 @ 10:00 AM
By Marc Frazier, LMT and Owner of South Congress Athletic Club and Jennifer Shaw, LMT and Marketing Director
With the New Year's Resolutioners hitting the gyms and running trails and seeking out personal trainers, massage therapists are likely to see a lot of pain management business coming their way in the early months of 2010.
Massage therapists should especially keep an eye on clients with fitness resolutions who usually spend their days working computer-centric jobs. These clients are often less fit and more de-conditioned because of inactivity than ever, and they can really benefit from massage therapy in the New Year.
Why "Computer People" Need Massage
First, the instantaneous nature of modern-day technology sets the expectation that the human body can also achieve things instantly and with ease - with the click of a mouse, as a matter of fact. Often times, computer people will push their bodies to do more work faster than they can physically handle. This behavior results in, at best, extreme muscle soreness and, at worse, serious injury.
But more importantly, clients with computer jobs will be affected most because they spent so much of 2009 sitting at computers that the receptors in their muscles and their connective tissues - essentially their entire nervous systems - have physically been altered.
At the beginning of 2010, the computer folken are left out of touch with both reality and their bodies via their jobs.
How Massage Can Help The "Computer Folken"
Massage can help with both causes of physical pain - the unrealistic expectations and the physical affects of sitting - in these newly-motivated, computer-centric people.
By helping these clients literally slow down and experience the real world of their bodies in time through a massage session, massage therapists can renew a client's awareness of his or her body - allowing them to feel the shortness of the hamstrings or the tightness in the pectorals - and bring the focus back from the computer screen to the reality of the body.
Physically, massage therapists can affect these clients by actually changing their neural input. By lengthening the muscles and connective tissues, the massage therapist can help the client's nervous system reset, lessening the likelihood of injury during these intense, often short-lived, months at the gym.
Marc Frazier, LMT has been a personal trainer for thirty years and a massage therapist for half that time. He primarily focuses on chronic injuries and injury prevention. He has worked extensively with collegiate, professional, and Olympic athletes - especially pitchers and swimmers. Additionally, he has been a teacher/workshop presenter at Lautersten-Conway Massage School since 1996. His teaching is oriented from an anatomical perspective in clinical and sports massage settings.
He currently co-owns South Congress Athletic Club with his wife, Tracy.
View a video demo of Marc Frazier's new massage continuing education workshop Advanced Massage Techniques for the Knee on our massage YouTube channel, TLCschoolTube.