Neck pain is a common problem with almost all of us. We know you are looking for practical ways to massage your neck to get rid of the cruel pain or stiffness. This neck pain can be a big problem as it can slow down your productivity level, make you grumpy and you can end up irritating others around you.
We care for you and want you to get rid of your troublesome neck pain, so here we are giving you some ways to massage your neck yourself or give a good neck massage to others.
Self-Massage: Killing Neck Pain and Stiffness
Having a stiff neck, don’t worry. This technique will help you in killing the neck pain that has been troubling you for some time.
- To start, hold your head with your left hand and stretch it towards the left shoulder. Make sure that you do not overextend it that it causes you extreme pain.
- Now do the same procedure with your right hand. You can do this twice or thrice as it stretches the muscles and relaxes your head.
- After this, hold the back side of your neck with the palms of your hands and give it a couple of compressions, do the same with the muscles below the neck, this will relax your neck muscles.
- Now slide your fingers gently upwards, dig the fingers inwards and then mildly pull the muscles from the spine outwards. Repeat the entire process for a few times, and this will relax your muscles and rid you of the pain.
- With the tips of your fingers, rub your neck muscles in circular motion, this will also help in reducing the stiffness.
- After this, make sure that you make a lifting-squeeze motion with your hands, starting from the bottom of your necks and going upwards. Now press your fingers in the back of your head and lean backward, this will help you get rid of tense muscles, headache and especially neck pain.
The above steps are necessary to relax your muscles, now comes the most critical part. Find the area that is hurting you specifically, pin down on it and stretch your neck away from it. This might cause some pain, but it is not equal to the elongated period of depression that you have to face due to stiffness in your neck. Carry on with this process for a few times; finish the entire process by doing some neck circles.
Check out this short video to know more self massage techniques for neck:
Ice massage – use an ice pack to massage your neck, this will help in relaxing the tense and overworked muscles that are causing pain. Make sure that you do the ice massage in short intervals.
Hot Stone Massage – on the contrary to ice massage, you can also use a warm damp towel or a heating pad to ease of the pain in your neck. Apply this technique with short intervals as well.
Balm Massage – massage the back of your neck with a pain relief balm, balms can be helpful as they have no side effects.
Massage with oils – use massage oil on your neck, they will help in relaxing the stiff muscles.
Giving a Good Neck Massage to Others
If you want to give someone a good massage, then we have got you covered. Follow the following steps to provide an excellent and ever remembering massage to your partner or any other loved one and relax them.
- Trim your nails correctly, so that you don’t scratch the other person and adjust the height of the massage table and ask the other person to lie face down on the massage table so that you can access the back of the neck. Makes sure that you sit on the head of the table so that your forearms are resting on either side of the massage table.
- Apply a small amount of oil to your hands to reduce friction, cup the base of the other person’s skull in your left side and run your right hand’s palm from top to bottom of other person’s neck till the neck meets the shoulders. Carry on this process for a few times.
- Make loose fists, and place each fist on either side of the other person’s neck near the base of the skull, make sure that you rotate the wrists forward while going down the neck and do the opposite while going up the neck. This process must be repeated for a minimum of 5-6 times.
- With your fingers, make circular motions, starting from the bottom of the neck and going towards the skull, repeat this process for at least ten minutes.
- Press the heels of both hands into the area where the neck meets the shoulders, gently massaging it with your hands. Keep your hands on the shoulders of other person’s shoulder and gently push them, release and the push again. Don’t forget to do this process for a minimum of 5 minutes.
We are sure that this massage will kill all the pain in the neck of the person who has received this massage. Make sure that this process is only carried out on the back side of the neck, as on the front side, it can cause some choking.
We care for you, and that is why after telling you the best massage techniques, we feel that it is our responsibility to bring into your notice that by sleeping the right way, having an ergonomically correct workstation and proper exercising can avoid neck pain at the first place.