Stop for a second and notice your hands. If you are like most people, they have been busy since the moment you woke up, tapping at a keyboard, scrolling a phone, gripping a steering wheel, holding a mug. Our hands do an enormous amount of fine, repetitive work now, far more than they were ever really designed for, and they rarely get a moment of genuine rest. It is no wonder so many of us end the day with an ache in the wrist or a stiffness in the fingers we cannot quite shake.
The modern hand lives a strange life. For most of human history, hands did varied, whole-arm work, lifting and carrying and making. Today much of that has narrowed down to tiny, precise, endlessly repeated motions in a very small range. That repetition is what leads to the tight forearms, the sore thumb from a day of texting, and the general tension that builds up quietly in the wrists and hands over weeks and months.
Caring for them does not require anything special, only a little attention. Through the day, pause now and then to open your hands wide, spreading the fingers as far as they will go, then releasing. Roll your wrists slowly in both directions. Gently shake your hands out as though flicking off water. Press your palms together and lower them to stretch the wrists and forearms. And take real micro-breaks, setting the phone down and letting your hands simply rest, which they almost never get to do.
A little self-massage goes a long way here. Use one thumb to work slowly into the palm of the other hand, and pay special attention to the fleshy web between the thumb and first finger, a spot that holds a surprising amount of tension. Warming your hands first, by rubbing them together or wrapping them around something warm, makes the whole thing more soothing and effective.
There is something quietly fitting about giving your hands this kind of care. They are how we do so much of our reaching and holding and working in the world, and they carry the strain of it without complaint. Slowing down long enough to tend to them is a small way of thanking the part of you that is almost always in motion.
Hands hold a special place in reiki as well, since they are the practitioner’s main instrument, the gentle point of contact through which a session unfolds. If your own hands have been carrying more than their share of the day’s tension, a calm and restful session can help the whole body, hands included, finally let go. Jose offers reiki sessions at Transcendence Healing in Vancouver, and you can book a time online whenever you need it.
