Are You Too Aggressive With Your Tissue?
When you use tools like foam rollers, sports balls, wooden massage rollers or our personal favorite, Yoga TuneUp Balls™ do your muscles brace? That’s your body’s way of telling you “Yo, too much.”
Muscle bracing can happen for multiple reasons: your tool is too hard, you’re moving too fast, or you have too much global tension. This is the opposite effect we are trying to create when we are using tools to massage ourselves. Remember your fascia is a sensorial tissue. Too much too fast can do more damage to your tissues than help.
Foam rollers can be very dense and do not provide enough precision to navigate around your bony prominences. Sport balls like tennis, lacrosse, or golf balls are meant for sports, not your body. They can be way too dense which doesn’t allow your body to relax enough to absorb the pressure.
Now this doesn’t mean don’t use what works for you. But have you tried a Yoga TuneUp™ ball? It can be a game-changing in your rollout game. They are grippy and come in different sizes to approach the specific needs for specific parts.
To know if your tool isn’t working for you, here are some great tips:
Do you hurt both during and after rolling? If so, this is a sign to stop.
Is your whole body tense? Are your eyes bugged out or your hands stiff while you roll? These are sympathetic responses that are telling you you are either in the wrong place, need to roll against the wall vs the floor, or need a different tool. Learning to relax is part of the practice.
Can you breathe? If you’re holding your breath that’s a great indicator that your body no longer feels safe and its too much.
Just like any other practice or training that we partake in, there is such a thing as ‘too much’. If your intention is to assist in your recovery process, take a step back, breathe, relax, move slowly. Rolling out should feel good and bring you back into the parasympathetic.
Watch this short video and learn more about the different sizes and shapes of the Yoga TuneUp™ collection.
For a more in-depth way to recover from burnout and perform at your best, join our yearly course The Magic of Mistakes: Your Performance Lab or join us for daily practices in the Waffle Membership.
