How to Give A Foot Massage – 6 Easy Steps to Pamper Your Feet
Our lives are stressful. The day starts early and disappears into the office, family and the countless chores in both places. In the end, all that we are left with is a drained mind and an aching body.
Sleep helps us relax and de-stress, but is not as useful in cases of sustained stress over a long period. You wake up each day, feeling as tired as you were the night before. For this reason, everyone, and not just the pros, should learn how to give a foot massage.
How to Give Your Foot A Good Massage
Unbeknownst to us all, our feet take an immense amount of pressure all day. We are always either walking, running or sitting still or cross-legged on hard chairs, wearing stiff, professional shoes. We may be standing for long hours on crowded trains and may even have out toes trodden.
By the time we are back, the muscles in our legs and feet have already suffered a lot of strain. This is why we simply love to kick off our shoes and flop down at the end of the day. The feet, after all, take the weight of the entire upper part of the torso.
If you know how to give a foot massage, it is an excellent way for the whole body to unwind after a hard day’s work. But not everyone knows how to and hence the continued sore feet. Let us take a look at some secret tips to giving a great foot rub.
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Steps for A Relaxing Foot Massage
You must be prepared to devote adequate time to get a good foot massage. That and a few extra ingredients that you never thought could come in handy. When you are learning how to do it yourself, you may make some errors, but with time and practice, you will get better.
1. Create An Ambiance
Key to every kind of massage and spa session is a soothing atmosphere. Dimmed lights and a quiet surrounding are ideal. Preferably there should not be people talking loudly or a TV running. Some respond well to a soft, calming background music, usually of the instrumental nature.
2. Soak the Feet
Every foot massage starts with a nice, warm bucket of water that you can soak your feet in. You can add a few drops of a moisturizing body wash to the water, although a more helpful ingredient would be some kind of aromatic oil.
Scented essential oils – jasmine, chamomile or geranium – help unwind the muscles and create a peaceful distraction from the humdrum of the rest of the day. The warm water softens the dry skin on feet and boosts circulation. You can scrub at the feet using slices of citrus fruits; this loosens the dirt, opens pores and releases the toxins from the feet.
3. Warm-up The Feet
It is now time to get some relaxing movements into the feet. After taking the feet out of the water and dabbing at them with a towel, keep the feet horizontally on your lap.
Cradling the heel in one hand, use the other to gently swivel the foot in a clockwise direction five times, followed by a counter-clockwise direction five times. Now do the same to each of the toes.
Repeat the whole process another time. This movement gets the blood flowing and lends flexibility to a pair of stiff feet.
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4. Stress-Busting
Once the feet have been rejuvenated, put a few drops of a lotion, or cream or oil on your thumbs and start massaging the center of the sole of the feet in a circular motion. Use both the thumbs – one moving clockwise and the other moving counter-clockwise.
You can keep at this for about a minute, after which you can load the thumbs with another dabbing of lotions and gently move the thumbs along the length of the feet, one foot at a time. One thumb can start at the ankle, and the other can start at the toes.
While moving along the length, you can use the other fingers to press lightly the top of the feet. This repeated massaging helps unwind the muscles and the soft connective tissues and increases the blood circulation. You can also slide the fingers – each bearing a drop of lotion – through the gaps between the toes for added effect.
5. Toe-Care
Once the soles and the top of the feet are taken care of, you can take care of the toes, by gently tugging at them and pressing them between the forefinger and the thumb. One way of avoiding stress on the feet is to keep wiggling the toes at intervals during the day. Since most of us never end up doing that, this kind of toe-care keeps them relaxed.
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6. Cool off Your Toe
Now that the major nerve endings of the feet have been attended to, you can finish off the foot massage by gently pressing at the ankles and the heels – in the region of the Achilles tendons – and progressing upwards towards the calves. Mild stretching exercises go a long way toward relaxing the bruised muscles.
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If you know how to give a foot massage, half your problems in the day are solved. But admittedly, it is better served by a masseuse – even an amateur one – than having to do that yourself.
Of course, you cannot always hire someone to give you a good foot massage, and your partner may be as tired as you to humor you. In such a scenario, if you know the process, you will be greatly benefitted.
