Improve Your Posture and Decrease Pain

Starting to work on your posture improves not only back and neck pain but also increases your overall heath. You don’t have to be somebody who is hunched over, has chronic pain, and walks slowly. We are not born with bad posture, sitting for long periods, slouching in couches and inactivity are among the parts of our lifestyle which affect our posture.

Bad posture is easily noticed, your head may be pulled forward, your torso may have rolled forward and your chest caved in. This will in turn reduce your ability to take deep breaths, reducing the amount of oxygen getting around your body. This leads to all manner of health problems longer term.

How To Improve Your Posture

As mentioned above, we are not born with bad posture, we train ourselves to have it through our lifestyles. On the other side, we can train ourselves to reverse bad posture over time. You make small changes to your posture in as little as a couple of weeks. Once you have trained yourself to have better posture, practicing a few new exercises regularly will help to maintain it.

Before you begin:

Have somebody take a picture from the front, back and side of your body so you can see the improvements over time.

Balance

Stand in a door way with good posture, head over your spine, shoulder back and down. Then lift one leg off the ground to balance on one leg. Keep standing tall in good posture, if you feel you are having to move out of good posture to keep balance then just put your hand out to steady yourself against the doorway. Your balance will improve and you will need to touch the doorway less and less. Repeat on the other side.

This will help to train your muscles to have better balance which is vital for good posture.

Alignment

Stand with your heels against the wall, then step out one foots distance away from the wall. Now lean back until your buttocks are against the wall, your back should be against the wall also. Now try to bring your head back to touch the wall. Most people will not be able to do this without lifting their chin up in the air. This is because of bad posture and if this is the case, keep your chin tucked in and move your head back as far as you are able. Over time you will be able to bring it back to the wall. Hold your head here for 20 seconds and repeat 5 times.

This posture, head over your spine, is controlled by muscles in your core. These exercises help to strengthen and engage these muscles. By holding you are training your muscles to remember this position.

Alignment in Movement

Using an anti-bust gym ball, sit on it with your knees flexed to 90 degrees.  

Sitting in good posture, keeping your knees, torso and head still, use your pelvis to move the ball in circles. Three times to the left and then three to the right. Keep the movement slow and controlled, the temptation is to go fast as this is easier, control is key.

There may be a difference between going in a circle to the left as to going right, by doing it on both sides over time you are taking out the imbalances. 

Talk to your chiropractor to see how these tips and others could help you to improve your posture and reduce back pain.