According to a 2019 national survey, 47 percent of people in the USA say they are concerned about their posture and its impact on their health. Even though slumping over in a desk chair and walking around with rounded shoulders may feel more comfortable, and easier, than learning the best way to correct your posture, it's not doing your health any favours. Slouching can make you feel fatigued when you're simply sitting, lead to headaches and pain, or cause numbness and tingling in the legs and arms. When you're sitting for longer periods of time, you also start leaning forward and compressing the diaphragm. You then won't be getting proper air and oxygen, which is part of the reason why we feel fatigued. But it can also lead to more serious health implications — slumping over can wear away at the spine, making it more prone to injury, cause back, neck, and shoulder pain, decrease flexibility and misalign the entire musculoskeletal system, according to the U.S. National Library of Medicine (NLM). Why? Think of your head like a 5 kilogram bowling ball — when you lean forward, the gravitational pull on the head increases, which can cause the weight of the head to put up to 5 times that amount of pressure on your neck and shoulders. Even a slight misalignment can place unnecessary strain on your body. 7 points to consider when standing upright:
Step 1: Start standing with feet shoulder width apart. Distribute weight equally on the balls of both feet. Step 2: Gently pull your lower abdominal muscles up and in, as if moving the belly button toward the backbone, to achieve a neutral spine. (Another way to picture this is to imagine slightly tucking the stomach in.) Step 3: Gently lower shoulder blades back and down as if tucking them into your pants pockets. Step 4: Adjust your body so knees are pointed forward and relaxed or slightly bent. Align your knees over feet, hips over knees, and shoulders over hips. Step 5: Let arms hang naturally at your sides. Step 6: Look straight forward and keep your head level so that earlobes are above shoulders. Avoid pushing your head forward, backward, or to the side. Step 7: Scratch the crown of the head to bring awareness there. Picture an arrow shooting straight upwards from that point on the head. This visualization will help in lifting the chin so that it is parallel to the floor and in ensuriing that your body is standing tall.
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