The biggest influence you have on your body’s posture is habit. Unfortunately, it’s not easiest thing for you to change, and has to be taught. Sometimes the solution is to be reminded to stand tall, relax one of your shoulders, place more weight on one of your legs and straighten your feet. Another effective ways to improve your posture is to combine remedial massage, stretching and body weight training. This combination allows you to gradually strengthen your body while gaining an appreciation for how the body is designed to work.
Occupational habits are one of the biggest culprits of bad posture: you might raise your shoulder to hold your phone to your ear while you type, slouch in your desk chair, or round your upper back from using your computer all day. If you do these things every day, your body becomes used to holding itself incorrectly and those bad habits start to feel normal.
The way you walk is another example. If you look at the soles of your shoes, you can easily see the postural patterns you’ve fallen into. Be critical of wear not only around the soles but also in the shock absorbing area. Looking at your shoes can tell you a lot about the wear and tear you’re putting on your body – it is an important sign of your body’s overall balance and posture.
Your body always works as a whole. If your lower back hurts there’s a good chance there’s compensation happening in your neck and legs. Every action has a reaction when relating to the complete postural pattern and your reaction can be in the form of compensation. You compensate for your imbalances by making minute postural adjustments daily.
If you look at this in a technical aspect, the fundamental factor for your correct upright posture is the body’s balance against the force of gravity, and every subtle shift in your posture causes a whole body compensatory pattern.
Events like an injury that causes you to be in a changed postural pattern for a prolonged period, like having to use crutches, or even a chronic overuse of particular muscles may make it hard to return easily to your normal dynamic balance. This is where combining massage and rehabilitative exercises can speed up your return to balance.
Your body and brain are smart. They work together allowing you to do the things you want to do. Unfortunately humans are almost too smart when it comes to posture and body movement. We get lazy and shortcut out movements to make things easier, but often those shortcuts aren’t designed for a balanced pattern of movement and create torque where it’s not supposed to be. Injury is often the result.
Having worked with many different people as a massage therapist and personal trainer, I’ve seen that utilising the body as a whole, concentrating on posture and symmetrical left and right balance has made a positive difference to all of them, regardless of size, fitness or injury levels.
Pain or discomfort is related to the compensation you’ve demanded, but your body isn’t really strong enough or designed to perform in that way. How fantastic would it be if there was some kind of reset which could return your body to a normal dynamic balance efficiently?
A custom designed rehabilitative training program is a great place to start. It begins with massage, which helps to relax overworked and strained muscles. Depending on your particular needs, you’ll be taken through a program of corrective exercise, concentrating on technique, balance, functional movement and stretching. The ultimate outcome is to teach you how to fix and rebalance yourself.
Most people don’t expect to be given homework after a massage, but if you find the discipline and time to do it, you’ll notice an immediate improvement in your balance, posture and strength.