Getting The Most Out of Myofascial Release
Self massage has so many wonderful benefits ranging from enhancing body awareness and calming down the nervous system to improving mobility, the health of the soft tissues and even improving athletic performance. While the practice doesn’t have to be fancy or complicated there are some actions you can take to get the most out of your self massage session.
Manage the Intensity & Work with the Nervous System
There’s a common tendency in myofascial release to chase after sensation. This often comes from wanting to make sure you’re getting the most out of your time and the effects of rolling, but this is where that old “less is more” wisdom really shines. Remember that healing happens in the parasympathetic (aka the rest and digest) state of the nervous system.
The parasympathetic nervous system controls the ability to rest, recover, digest/assimilate nutrients, and repair tissues. Slow, steady breathing helps the body to drop into this state. Applying too much pressure or staying on areas that feel intense beyond the ability to relax can actually tip you into a sympathetic nervous system state (fight or flight) leading to more holding and tension. An easy way to check in on this is to ask yourself the question, “Can I breathe easily and smoothly here?”. If you find yourself bracing, taking shallow breaths or clenching the jaw, hands or brow, the intensity is too much.
There are a few ways to manage the intensity of pressure or stimulation while performing self massage.
Add cushion or padding over the prop to make a softer surface or use a softer tool
Place a second ball next to the first to spread out the pressure over a greater surface
Adjust the amount of your body weight landing over the tool, that might mean shifting your position slightly or moving from the floor to a chair or the wall
Try moving just slightly off the spot, often a half centimeter in any direction can scale down the intensity
Know Your Why
There are many reasons you might be performing self massage and your why influences your how. Here are some general guidelines on how to approach your rolling session for common goals. With all of these, remember to stay present and mindful throughout the process to have a meaningful experience and gain insight as to what’s most useful for you.
Recovery & Relaxation - light pressure, slower movement, focus on a slow and steady breath
Compression, Rolling and Contract & Relax are nice techniques
Warm Up for Athletic Performance - broad & light touch, focus on hydration and stimulation not addressing adhesions or staying too long on any one point
Rolling and Shearing are good techniques, I generally like a foam roller for the broad surface
Working Through Adhesions (perhaps from injury, surgery or in high friction zones) - focus more on releasing trigger points and restoring range of motion
Compression, Cross Fiber, Pin & Stretch, Contract & Relax are good techniques for this
General Tissue Health - follow the advice of point 1 above, (manage the intensity and work with the nervous system), use your intuition to feel what is most helpful to you day by day
All techniques are great for general health of the tissues, different parts of your body may call out for different approaches. I like to focus most on hydration for general tissue health!
Work Above and Below
This advice is particularly useful if you’re using self myofascial release to work through an area of pain or discomfort. The idea is that sometimes it’s best not to poke the bear, so they say! Rather than hyper focusing on the area in pain, it can be helpful to look at the joints above and below.
For example, if you’re experiencing knee pain you can certainly roll around the knee joint, but dysfunction in one area can often be traced back to dysfunction in a neighboring joint that’s causing issues up or down the line. So, it would behoove you to also try rolling around the hip and ankle. You might find some interesting areas of hidden tension that release the original pain point. If you’re in the mood to do some extra research on the topic, Tom Myer’s Anatomy Trains system is a helpful resource to start to understand how different parts of the body connect, relate and influence each other.
Pause to Notice
The moments of pause between sides or right after rolling are my favorite times in the whole process of SMFR. It offers a chance of presence and curiosity and helps to integrate the experience on multiple levels. After you roll a spot or finish one side, take just a few seconds laying on the back or belly to notice the effects. That might be a change in temperature, sensation, circulation or how one side of the body feels on the floor versus the other. Take in how the areas above and below the spot you just rolled feel. It’s not so much about what you find, but taking that moment to notice the effects. This also helps to clarify what’s most useful to your individual body so you can continue to make the practice as effective as possible.
Follow with Movement
Following your self massage practice with movement is a wonderful way to make the effects of self massage more sustainable. Because fascia is so intertwined with other bodily systems, namely the nervous and muscular systems, we get a unique opportunity after rolling to encourage a longer lasting change in the tissues. This is an example of neuroplasticity or the ability to change neural pathways through growth and reorganization. Movement after SMFR allows the brain and body to move through the newly acquired ranges to help create new pathways of greater mobility, blood flow and coordination in areas that were once inhibited or “offline” in the brain-body map.
These movements don’t have to be anything specific. Move the area of the body you rolled with intention and curiosity through a simple flow or a gentle stretch. As an example, if you rolled the rotator cuff, some simple arm circles taking the shoulder through it’s comfortable range of motion would be a great compliment to re-educate your mind and body about the changes you’re trying to encourage. A gentle static stretch could be used to encourage more length in the chronically short tissues or a mild engagement can be used to tone tissues that are locked long or have a hard time turning on.
Consistency
Fascial remodeling takes time. It’s a much slower process to change the structure of your fascia than to change your muscle tissue. Muscle tissue typically remodels in 6-8 weeks whereas fascial remodeling can take anywhere from 6-24 months! If you’re committed to making long lasting changes then it takes time, consistency and patience. Rolling can be a great way to manage pain or discomfort in the tissues, but I recommend using it more as a preventative tool or for maintenance rather than to spot treat symptoms as they arrive. With that in mind it can be helpful to roll different areas of the body and apply different techniques day to day and avoid overdoing one spot. Self massage doesn’t have to take a lot of time either, a few minutes a day is enough to encourage new body awareness, hydrate the tissues and be a practice of simple self care.