Nowadays, foam rollers are everywhere –your gym, your physical therapist’s office, your living room, and even in your travel bag. After all, foam rolling has emerged as the darling of the fitness world and the purported cure-all for many different aches and pains.

Essentially, foam rolling is a form of self-myofascial release, or self-massage, that can get rid of adhesions in your muscles and connective tissue. These adhesions can create points of weakness or susceptibility in the tissue. Foam rolling can indeed offer tremendous potential to relieve pain and help you move better — if used the right way. If not, you risk irritating, and possibly injuring, your body further.

Here are five common mistakes people often make when using foam rollers and why you should consider ditching it and trying percussive massage.

Mistakes #1 You’re rolling directly where you feel the pain. When we feel pain, our first inclination is to massage the spot directly, however, this might be a big mistake. Research has shown that If you iron out areas of inflammation, you can increase inflammation. And if you are in pain, your body will be too stressed to repair itself.

Mistake #2: You roll too fast. While it might feel great and be tempting to roll back and forth on a foam roller quickly, you’re not actually eliminating any adhesions that way. You need to give your brain enough time to tell your muscles to relax.

Mistake #3: You spend too much time on those knots. We’re often told that if you feel a knot, spend time working that spot with the foam roller. However, some people will spend five to 10 minutes or more on the same area and attempt to place their entire body weight onto the foam roller. If you place sustained pressure on one part of your body, you might actually hit a nerve or damage the tissue, which can cause bruising.

Mistake #4: You have bad posture. You have to hold your body in certain positions over the roller and if you don’t pay attention to your form or posture, you may exacerbate pre-existing postural deviations and cause more harm than good.

Mistake #5: You use the foam roller on your lower back. You should never use a foam roller on your lower back. Your spine will freak out and all the spinal muscles will contract and protect the spine.

For everyday active people and athletes alike, self-massage can indeed help relieve muscle tension, promote better sleep, reduce risk of injury, and increase flexibility and range of motion, however, it may be time to ditch your foam roller and try percussive massage!

Recent studies have shown that percussive massage can cause muscle tissue to contract more than 30 times more powerfully than normal voluntary contractions. Interestingly, like yoga and exercise, this action results in muscular and fascial lengthening and strengthening, leading to improved muscle strength and enhanced muscle recovery. This magical combination results in relieving muscular tightness and reducing the physical stress placed on bones and joints.

Percussive Massage for Pain Relief
One of the most innovative massage tools on the market, percussion massage devices deliver vibrations deep into the muscles, stimulating blood and lymph circulation, bringing more oxygen and nutrients into the muscle and fascial tissues. This leads to reduced muscle fatigue and soreness, breaks up muscle spasms and alleviates muscle pain. Providing a deep therapeutic effect used by therapy technicians, fascial release clinicians and athletic trainers alike, percussive massage delivers a powerful healing impact and effectively alleviates shoulder, neck, and lower back and back pain as well as discomfort in many other areas.

Percussive Massage Enhances Rehabilitation
Used for rehabilitation, percussive massage expedites healing and recovery of non-use atrophic muscles that have been injured due to trauma, surgery or disease, making it the perfect tool for people with paralysis.

Percussive Massage for Stress Relief
For many, stress is a part of life. However, too much stress can negatively impact on our health. Percussive massage promotes deeper breathing, relaxation, and reduces overall stress and anxiety. And it feels good!

A powerful way to massage sore muscles at home, at the gym, at the office, or just about anywhere, percussive massagers, also known as electric massagers, make it easy and affordable to incorporate the therapeutic benefits of massage into your daily routine, without all the hassles of foam rollers!