Let’s Talk Posture
In today’s world with having to work on computers, drive cars, and look at cell phones, posture is something that has become harder to maintain. Posture is important long term as you will eventually begin to feel the effects of it “slowly sink in”. With sustained bad posture, you will begin to feel pain in the neck, upper to mid back, and lower back. You might even notice your head going more forward, a hump in the upper back, inability to stand straight, and a hard time walking.
Before anything else, it is best to know what postures you are holding and why. Understanding your patterns of holding can help you to then find out what activities cause it and make the changes necessary to help you improve. Posture is affected by EVERYTHING we do! So not just work, but also our hobbies, our lounge time, sleep positions, etc. Hence why it is important to first know what your tendencies are so that you can make changes.
Making an appointment with your chiropractor can help you find what positions you are holding and what you can do about it. Chiropractors specialize in alignment! We evaluate how you sit and stand and can help you to understand where your body likes to hold tension. Going over history also helps us to connect the dots of how your posture is affected by your activities. Treatment will also help reduce the tension and help you feel better and more motivated.
In the meantime, here are two basics that can help anyone improve their posture:
FREQUENT MOVEMENT! This is probably the most important and most beneficial advice I can give. Our posture affects us long term because our muscles “remember” the poor posture and then develop a tendency to stay there. Think of a rubber band- if you tension it consistently on the same side and hold it there for a long period of time, it eventually won't go back to that perfect circle. Our ligaments and muscles are the same way! When we hold that tension, our body tightens to “fit” that posture. This effect takes as little as 30 minutes to an hour to start “setting in”. It is recommended that you take a break every hour (minimum) to help your body “recenter”. This doesn’t mean you have to take a “full break”- just do a quick shuffle in your seat, a quick stretch with rolling the shoulders/neck and you are good!
This is especially important with sedentary jobs such as desk jobs. If you are stuck in a chair all day, you need to take breaks. Even if you were to stretch every night and do a workout, you are still going to be fighting 8+ hours of sit time for what.. 2-3 hours of movement max?! Also, going from one extreme (sitting) to the next (lots of movement) can be hard on the body. Breaking up the time with setting an alarm or having scheduled breaks is going to help you in the long run.
CENTER YOURSELF. Try to be central with whatever you do. Such as with computer work, keep your monitor in front of you. When you get into the car, do a little shuffle to center your hips. If you have a tendency to cross legs, cross the other over. If you sleep on your right side, switch to the left, if you always stand with weight on one leg, switch to the other leg. This is easier said than done as most things are, but this is helpful to prevent one side from being more tense and less flexible.
