Running Your Own Business? A Little Known Secret To Increasing Productivity

Massage

Did you realize that there’s a connection between massages and success? Yes, the many benefits of a massage may be just what you need to create a highly successful home-based business.

If you no longer work for anyone but run your own business from home, you may still get stressed out. In fact, you may have even more stress than when you worked for someone. If things go wrong and you earn less than you need to cover your monthly expenses, you alone are responsible. The solution? More work-life balance.

An Unusual Suggestion

Imagine, then, what it would be like to be able to get a quick massage at home on a regular basis. You’d be surprised at how inexpensive massage chairs can be, and you can hire someone to come in a few times a week for 30-minute massages.

A chair might be better than a table because you may get a little too relaxed with a full-body massage to do any work at all for the rest of the day! With a chair, a massage therapist can work on tense shoulders and back muscles, helping you relax without getting too drowsy to get back to work.

Rethinking Productivity

An unusual idea, certainly.

After all, most ideas on improving productivity are about how to get more organized, motivated, and highly active.

But think about it for a minute:
• When do you make the worst business decisions?
• When are you most likely to procrastinate on an important project?
• When are you least likely to go the extra mile to generate more business leads?

The answer, of course, is when you’re stressed-out, overwhelmed, confused, and fatigued.

Don’t you think a massage — rather than an exhaustive run in the park, drinking too much coffee, or taking an ibuprofen — might be the perfect solution?

7 Ways A Massage Can Help You Get Your Pep Back

Here are 7 reasons why this unusual approach to high performance might be exactly what you need to create a successful home based business.

1. Physical relaxation. Worrying about things when running a business increases stress and tension. You’re afraid that if you don’t pay attention, things will get out of control. When your nervous system is on alert for long periods, you build up cortisol, the stress hormone. A massage not only lowers your level of cortisol but it also increases your level of endorphins.

2. Pain relief. You experience pain in your neck, shoulders, and lower back because of tight muscles. Massage provides relief because it relaxes muscle tissue and releases nerve compression. Besides helping ease aching muscles, it also helps with carpal tunnel and sciatica.

3. Flexibility. The longer you sit at your desk, the lower your range of muscular flexibility. Over time, chronic tightness in tendons, ligaments, and muscles will reduce your range of motion. Muscles need to be moved, compressed, and stretched and joint space increased to ensure great flexibility and a full range of motion. Improving flexibility will reduce pain and inflammation.

4. Energy and vitality. Although you may be sedentary most of the day, it doesn’t mean that you’re not using up a large amount of energy. Your brain consumes about 20% of your body’s oxygen supply. Through the restorative effects of applied pressure, you can enhance energy and vitality.

5. Circulation. A massage improves circulation, nourishing your cells and improving their ability to eliminate waste. As circulation improves, it reduces inflammatory conditions like arthritis. Another issue that often affects people with sedentary occupations is edema. This is a condition where there’s an excess accumulation of fluid in tissues, and this interferes with proper lymph drainage.

6. The relaxation response. There is a high correlation between creative thinking and relaxation. If you work at home as a knowledge worker, you understand how valuable it is to be creative. However, when your left brain is busy communicating, analyzing, and calculating, your right brain is passive. Since insights spring from the left brain, you won’t see things in a holistic way. The right brain is excellent at detecting patterns that your left brain completely misses. When your thoughts are detail-oriented, you tend to lose the big picture perspective. While in-depth thinking is a left brain function, big picture thinking is a right brain function.

7. Relationships. Ultimately, all businesses, even an Internet-based business depend on your ability to get along with others. If you tend to get irritated with people, lose your temper, or get into arguments, people are not going to want to do business with you or buy your products. However, it’s difficult to try and be nice when you’re wracked with emotional anguish or physical pain. Massage calms you down, mitigates pain and makes you feel much more agreeable, patient, and tolerant.

The Pursuit of Excellence

Whether you like it or not, you are not just a brilliant mind supported by a body. You are a mind-body complex. By taking care of your physical health and well-being through massage, you will also increase your mental acuity and social skills.

Although it may seem like a stretch to think about massage as a way to become highly productive in your business, when you think about the wide spectrum of benefits a massage provides, it actually makes perfect sense.