POSTURE

Gravity pulls on us throughout our entire life and unless you are an astronaut we cannot escape its constant influence. Whatever we do it continuously affects us. Our frame (the skeleton and muscles) gives us a structure and a means to resist it….but it gets tired.

It has been scientifically observed that tight muscles and postures adopted in childhood do not go away when we get older and in fact develop over time. Through our personal history, upbringing, culture, repeated activities, injuries, illness, etc., we each adopt patterns of posture, physical behavior and movements.

So what do we do? Where do we start? We need to be aware of how we carry ourselves and move. This is the foundation from everything we do is based. The problem is we are so used to the way we hold ourselves we consider that as ‘normal’ and cannot see the subtle changes that have happened over time that may in fact predispose us to injury.

A trained professional such as a physical or occupational therapist will be able to identify these postures and know what to do to correct them. However there are a few things you can do to help yourself.