For Many of us, 80% of the Waking Day is Spent Sitting. Less Optimal Sitting Habits Will…
Accelerate wear & tear on degenerative disorders of the spine such as Disc Problems, Arthritis, Sciatica & Spinal Stenosis.
Increase compressive forces on the spine. Studies show over half of people over 50 y/o will experience an osteoporotic fracture contributed by poor sitting habits.
How do you really know when you’re in good healthy sitting posture ?
Consider the height of the chair you normally sit in. Why does this matter ?
When you sit “upright”, is it difficult to maintain ?
How do you
normally sit ?
What kind of furniture
do you sit on ?
We’ve been taught to sit up straight. How do we do that?
When we ‘try’, unnecessary effort we impose just increases wear and tear further.
Office chairs that fix us in apparent “good posture” put us in fixed positions which is also not healthy.
Good sitting posture is dynamic, and uses gentle interconnected movements. Healthy sitting trains our muscles and spine to support our body weight more easily.
The body’s natural bio-mechanical design is smart:
Our pelvis, known as ‘the power center’ drives healthy dynamic sitting posture.
Using the sitting bones of the pelvis as a reference point, the spine will automatically be in proper alignment.
When the spine is aligned, the neck turns easier and arm can reach with less wear and tear on
those joints.
Experience benefits of healthy dynamic sitting posture!
- Sit upright on top of your sitting bones, supported w/ a pillow or unsupported using your posture muscles. This allows the spine vertebrae to support your body weight, which eliminates stress on the disc with no compressive force on the bones.
- Learning to reduce unnecessary muscle work of your posture muscles in sitting comes from learning how to allow your pelvis to move your spine easily. This starts w/ a simple movement lesson.
- When you reduce effort & tightness in your upper torso and shoulders, it allows the back to relax when upright, and breathing to move from your belly; ie. diaphragm.
- Sitting unsupported dynamically when you move your whole spine more easily creates body intelligence that reduces or eliminates aches and stiffness.
- When you develop the ability to sit in healthy unsupported posture without the back of the chair, it automatically improves your core strength.
Supporting Sources
Orlando, F.L., Lin Fang, Parthasarathy Sriranjani, Susan J. Taylor, Deborah Pucci, Ronald W. Hendrix, Mohsen Makhsous.
“Effect of Different Sitting Postures on Lung Capacity, Expiratory Flow, and Lumbar Lordosis.” Presented in part to the Rehabilitation Engineering and Assistive Technology Society of North America. (June 19–22, 2004)
Kebaetse, Maikutlo, Philip McClure, Neal A. Pratt. “Thoracic Position Effect on Shoulder Range of Motion, Strength, and Three-dimensional Scapular Kinematics.
BREATHING
ARM USE
SITTING
STANDING
