Rolling on the Shiatsubag provides a dynamic massage or you may be motionless and enjoy static acupressure on any part of your body.  You can place it on any supporting surface including the floor, sofa, bed, and chairs.  It is a great comfort for people suffering from Fibromyalgia Syndrome.

1. The Erectors  

We all tend to have pretty bad posture when we are sitting, and we can develop tight erectors (these are the long muscles that extend from your lower back right up to your neck on either side of the spine). You probably won’t find many trigger points in this area but, the thoracic and cervical (upper) erectors are where you want mobility and are often very tight increasing stress and tension on other surrounding muscles.

How To:  Place the ShiatsuBag on the ground behind you. Lay down slowly and extend over the ShiatsuBag. Once you have extended over an area, roll forward and back moving your body over Shiatsuball to the next vertebrae. Do this right up your back. This movement massages and stretches the erector muscles and helps remedy bad posture.

2. The Trapezius

Most people have tight traps. These are the bulges of muscle on either side of your neck. People tend to get tight traps from sitting with a bad posture, stress, lifting and simply everyday life. Your traps run right down to you middle back, but it’s the top area that you will find are generally tighter.

How to:  There are two ways you can approach this. Firstly, place on the ground or a sofa where your feet are in contact with something to push on, fold the ShiatsuBag onto itself creating a clump of Shiatsuballs. Lay back and find the spots on your traps that are the tightest. Move your body around by pushing from your legs. Try to relax your neck and head.  You have lots of trigger points in this area, however you might find that the overall muscle is simply too tight and you need to loosen it first before you can get specific trigger points.

3. The Pecs

Sitting at your desk and using your computer leaves you with tight pecs. Your shoulders are often in a rounded position and your pec major and pec minor want to stay in that shortened position. Let’s not even touch on the fact that most people are bench press dominant when they go to the gym. Point is, these get tight, and need to be released for optimal shoulder health.

How to: You will find the best response comes from the upper pecs, where the muscle starts to get smaller and go into your shoulder. It’s a big muscle, so play around. Lay on the ground, a table, or a countertop with the ShiatsuBag underneath you. Roll around a little until you find tight and tender spots, then hold. This is a pretty painful one, but very necessary in almost everyone.

4. The Rotator Cuff

The rotator cuff consists of four muscles. The infraspinatus, teres minor, subscapularis and supraspinatus. The only two you can really access are the infraspinatus and the teres minor, they sit on the back of your scapula and can be palpated through the skin. These are both external rotators. The other two are very deep but the pressure created by the Shiatsuballs is effectively massaging the deeper tissues. Rotator cuff tightness and trigger points are a very common cause of shoulder pain. Bad sitting posture, keeping your arms overhead a lot, using the mouse with one hand and typing with no elbow rest can cause these can become very tight.

How To:  First you need to locate the infraspinatus and teres minor. These sit smack bang on the meat of your shoulder blade. Place the ShiatsuBag on the floor , sofa, or bed.  You then lay on the ShiatsuBag on your side. You will find that your shoulder blade moves round to be underneath you and will be able to sit nicely on top of the ShiatsuBag. Move around slightly to see where you are tighter. The infraspinatus is quite long, so try and work the whole length of the muscle. Once you have found a spot, lay there and don’t move. These muscles are very tight and will respond.

For some extra work, move your arm and internally and externally rotate your shoulder. Do this about 10 times. You should feel the pain slowly getting more bearable. You may isolate the painful spots on a single ball and remain stationary for 10-30 seconds staying on the trigger point or sore point.  This does wonders for loosening up your rotator cuff and keeping your shoulders healthy. 

*The ShiatsuBag was originally conceived after extensive open rotator cuff surgery in 2006, and provided pain relief and was extremely beneficial in a complete rehabilitation resulting in flexibility and strengh far exceeding the Orthopedic surgeons expectations.

5. The Neck

The neck seems to be the most stressful muscle group in the body. It is constantly working and can bring the greatest level of relaxtion and stress release when massaged.

How To: Pile the ShiatsuBag on the ground, on a bed, on a cushion, or against a wall or other barrier. Place your feet against and object that you can push against. You may roll your feet back over your headbut be careful not to put too much force on your neck vertebra. You can try laying on your side and on your chest providing some of the most complete deep tissue work. While this can be extremely relaxing, Don't fall asleep while laying face down on the ShiatsuBag as you could cut off blood circulation and air supply.

What Your Should Know

As you become familiar with the ShiatsuBag's functionality, understand that the Shiatsuballs can be used together in a flat configuration, or you can pile and clump then simply by folding the bag onto itself or holding it in the air with one hand and tying off a portion of the bag, restricting the balls to a smaller space.  Also, balls can be added or removed from the bag creating a varying degrees of pressure at each point of contact.  You may also isolate trigger points on single balls which will provide the greatest level of control to individual points of contact.

When the ShiatsuBag is utilized with all of the balls included it provides relaxing and comfortable massage and acupressure treatment.  However when it is used for trigger point therapy and more pressure is concentrated on fewer balls, it can be be uncomfortable at first and even painful… but, it shouldn’t kill you. If it doesn’t feel like a good pain, STOP! You may have an injury!  Some injuries simply require rest and isolation. Consult with a physican or physical therapist.

Go slowly. Work up and down the muscle at a slow pace, and stop on any tender points. These may be trigger points. Work up and down through each muscle about 5 times or hold and move around on an area for 30 seconds at a time.

Do each muscle a couple of times, it’s not important how much you do it, you will know what you need once you start. When you reach a trigger point it will be a pretty deep pain you feel. This is OK, grit your teeth and stay on it.

If it is a trigger point, as you hold the ball on the spot you will feel the initial shock of pain diminish.

You may also feel referral pain in a different location. Don’t stress, this is normal and means you have hit a spot.

When you are on an area, work around, test it out. Trigger points are usually in certain areas, but don’t be afraid to move around on the ball and find where yours are.

Remember, even if you don’t find any trigger points or specifically release them, you will find that a deep tissue massage does wonders for how your muscles and fascia feel. Recovery is important, and this is one of the steps to feeling top notch. If you don’t actually find trigger points, you will see that these areas are very tight in most people and simply need loosening anyway.

The ShiatsuBag is shown being used on the a carpeted floor, but it is also effective while lying on a bed, sofa, or seated in a chair.  The ShiatsuBag will conform to any type of supporting surface and to any part of your body, providing a different level of penetration based on the surface that is selected. 

*Adapted from laurensfitness.com