Office work might not be the most physically-taxing, but that doesn’t mean it can’t take a toll on your body.
Working at a desk and sitting down for hours and hours can cause a lot of unexpected aches and pains.
And while some of us just suck it up and quietly deal with it, a massage gun can be a real asset in preserving your greatest asset: your body.
As someone who sits down for hours glued to the computer all day, here’s what I learned on how to maximise my massage gun as a desk worker.
Let’s get started.
Key Takeaways
- Plan ahead to integrate your body’s self-care into your daily schedule
- Pick the right massage gun with high battery life and portability for maximum convenience
- Maintain professionalism by confining massage time to your breaks
1. Plan Ahead
If you want to use your massage gun at work, plan ahead because your employer isn’t exactly paying you to massage yourself while you’re on the clock.
Schedule your massage gun time during breaks or periods of downtime, when there isn’t much going on. Look into using a spare room if you don’t have a cubicle with ample privacy at work. Just try not to appear like you’re hiding something and it will likely be fine.
Remember: relax.
You’re doing this for your health, after all, after experiencing the effects of sitting at your desk for long periods of time as a result of all your hard work.
We don’t want your aches and pains to get worse.
Because a friend of mine used to complain a lot about back pain.
She used to be just fine, and then I presume all the aches and pains just built up in her body as she worked over the years.
She used to go for 1-2 hour massages a few times per week because the pain was that much.
Eventually, it seemed that she was working to be able to afford massages so she could work even more!
It just goes to show how we must take care of our bodies, because neglect can wear us down bit by bit.
Therefore, plan ahead to include (massage gun) self-care in your routine. Or your body might regret it.
2. Know which muscles you want to target
You might want to take note of which parts of your body hurt when you’re planning to introduce a massage gun to your office relaxation regimen.
Especially if you have limited time in the work day, you won’t be able to go over every body part at your leisure.
But a lot of office workers complain of the same aches and pains time and time again.
Here are the top 5 physical complaints of office workers that I’ve noticed over the years:
- Neck pain
- Shoulder pain
- Back pain
- Wrist pain
- Repetitive Strain Injury or RSI
I’ve had pretty much all of these pains at some point, and I know a few people who have had to get wrist surgery because of being glued to their laptops for hours at work for years.
Take care of your bodies, people.
My spa-going friend knew exactly which parts of her back she wanted to target since she’d been directing masseuses exactly where to pummel her body for years.
Likewise, my complaints aren’t exactly the same as yours.
You might get tight hips and thighs from sitting down a lot, whereas I notice my wrists tend to hurt if I’ve been on a keyboard the whole day.
Plan your attack and think of exactly what muscles to target, to maximise your massage gun time during your breaks.
3. Maintain professionalism
Not all company cultures are very open and permissive.
It depends on where you work.
But it will most likely look strange if you go about your work day, interacting with your co-workers face-to-face with a massage gun in hand, humming along as you push its vibrating head onto one of your body parts.
Some people just aren’t ready for such a deep working relationship.
On a more serious note, to put it clearly, you don’t want to be in any sort of percussive massage during meetings (unless it’s a corporate spa trip or something.)
Not many people have discovered the benefits of using massage guns yet, so you still might get a few odd looks in the event you use one in public.
4. Lessen “mental friction” with using your massager gun
One concept that influences any good habit that anyone wants to form is the idea of mental friction.
A good massage gun allows you to lessen the friction with taking care of your body: because you won’t have to always worry about a short battery life or where your accessories and attachments are, among other issues.
Mental friction is any obstacle between you and your intended behaviour, both physical and not.
For example, if you want to practise more electric guitar, having the instrument out on display makes it easy to grab it and get to practising, versus having to take it out of a zipped case that’s stuffed behind a dresser, and then having to put on its strap and cable: tonnes of friction.
Removing friction is important because we more or less have decreasing willpower (a concept that has been called “ego depletion,”) as we do things throughout the day. (Source)
That’s why even though we know that something is good for us, when it’s later in the day, we’d rather do something mentally easier: like scrolling social media or binge-watching a series.
Remember my friend we talked about earlier? After she got her massage gun, her time spent inside spas (in addition to the hundreds of dollars she was giving them per month) dropped considerably.
She lessened the friction with taking care of her body when she suddenly had access to an on-demand way to massage herself easily every day after work.
She still goes to spas once or twice a month. Old habits die hard, I suppose.
Of course, making muscle self-care as frictionless as possible brings us to:
5. Pick the right massage gun
With years of experience being into personal wellness and health (many of those while working at a desk job,) I can attest that the best massage gun for office workers has these characteristics:
- Very quiet so it won’t disturb your co-workers or boss.
- Has a long battery life so you won’t worry if you’ve charged it or not.
- Is convenient to use; comes with a carrying case to hold everything you need.
- Has a streamlined design and is not too bulky to bring outside the home.
Of course, you’ll find that our Musclegun fits the bill quite well. (Find out more here.)
While the Musclegun isn’t the most compact percussion massager in the market, it has a great price-to-performance ratio, high maximum speed, quiet 30-50 dB operation, and 4–8-hour battery life.
In my experience, smaller massage guns aren’t all that powerful—they tend to lose battery life a lot quicker, too, so they’re not that convenient for the busy desk worker.
Picking the perfect percussive massage gun for the office means that it should pretty much be grab and go: you shouldn’t have to think much about it.
All you’ll be reaching for is that instant relief only a muscle massage gun can provide, at any time most convenient for you.
Try out our Musclegun here, delivered overnight, straight to your door NZ wide.
Summary
To conclude, maximising your massage gun as an office worker is simple, given you plan ahead, keep things professional, and make it easy for yourself to give your sore back, neck, and wrist the care they need after long hours at work–with the right massage gun for the job, of course. View our guide on how to take care of your massage gun.
Make it easy to relax after—or even at—work: Our Musclegun easily provides a convenient massage experience, with its Samsung 3400maH battery for up to 8 hours of massaging use. Delivered straight from Christchurch with no long overseas shipping times.