The Way of Yin

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Benefits of Breast Massage

Art by @sashapodgurska

Why should you massage your breasts?

Your breasts require connection. Being extensions of your heart space, they are represented by the fire element. Fire; passion helps us to express joy. When we experience joy, we are able to give and receive love. ⠀

Our breasts require touch and palpation. They need lots of circulation due to their tissues. Lymph needs our participation in order to move. Fat likes to store and hold. And our mammary glands are there to fill up with abundance to nourish babies. ⠀

3 benefits to Breast Massage

  1. Circulation: By massaging we are pumping our lymphatic heart, moving old stagnant fluid and allowing new blood to flush the area.

  2. Hormonal Health: The same hormones that influence your menstrual cycle also influence your breasts. With regular breast massage, you’ll introduce much needed flow that is required for balanced hormones. Your breasts are like sponges and tend to store toxins within the fatty tissues. One hormone that can easily become imbalanced is estrogen. When in excess (estrogen dominance), our breast tissues can feel too full, swollen, store, tender and fibrocystic. Hormones are just messengers. And, the message of estrogen is to build and build. While we have times of the month where building is very much needed. We also need just as much time to pause on building and encourage more movement, warmth and cleansing.

  3. Toning the Vagus Nerve: Engaging with your breasts tones your wandering nerve. Your Vagus nerve helps to regulate your nervous system. Stimulating your nipples and breast tissues releases oxytocin, often coined the “cuddle” or “love hormone”. It helps you to feel relaxed and open.

Complementary Therapies

Other than breast massage, there are other ways that we can take care of our breasts holistically.

  • Castor Oil Packs: We often associate castor oils packs to liver cleansing and also to soften any hardened areas of the body like scar tissue. Another way that we can utilize this powerful medicine is to do a castor oil pack on our breasts to help move and draw out toxins. This is not recommended for pregnancy or while nursing.

  • Bentonite Clay Masks: Most of us treat ourselves to the occasional clay mask. Why not invite the mask to travel a bit further down to your breast space? The pulsating feeling that we feel when the clay dries helps to draw out and move stagnancy. As with face masks, avoid the clay drying completely. You don’t want to dry out your delicate skin. I often add some charcoal in my masks to further help pull out toxins.

  • Hydrotherapy: Hot and Cold water therapy is old medicine. The push and pull and the opening and closing of pores creates a dynamic movement and encourages circulation. I often to breast massages while in the shower. To add in more circulation, I’ll let warmer water shower my breasts and then turn the water cold for a few seconds. It takes a little getting used to but it’s really refreshing.

  • Rebounding: Trampoline anyone? Your lymph system doesn’t have a pump of it’s own so you need to help it along. One really fun way is with a trampoline. If you don’t have a trampoline, simple qigong exercises like shaking and bouncing are highly encouraged!

My colleague, Michelle and I teach the inner alchemy practice of breast massage in our self study E-Course: The Ultimate Guide to Breast Rejuvenation. Following your pace, we walk you through how to assess all of the things that negatively and positively influence breast health.

Here’s your invitation into some radical self-care. We’ll touch and engage with our breasts as I demonstrate a sequence that you can perform on yourself when you’re ready. We’ll also be making some breast oil blends, masks and castor oil packs. We also have a robust resource list of our favorite green products including breast oils. Hope to see you there.

~Kris & Michelle

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