The painful truth about ‘good’ posture
🙋 Raise your hand if you've ever been told to "sit up straight!" or "pull your shoulders back!" to improve your posture and project confidence.
If you answered "yes," you're not alone. Many people (especially those with back or shoulder pain) have tried to sit or stand up straight because they were taught it's "good posture." But despite our best intentions, one of two things usually happens:
We eventually slump again. The moment you stop thinking about your posture, you start to slouch. Holding a rigid, military-straight pose takes constant mental effort. As soon as you relax your vigilance—whoop—back into the slouch you go. Keeping your back ramrod-stiff and your shoulders pinned back all day is exhausting, so you might save that effort for special occasions (usually when other people are watching 😉).
We hold ourselves upright by force (and pay for it). Alternatively, you might succeed in muscling yourself into an upright position all the time. You force your back and neck muscles to work overtime to keep your chest high and shoulders back. This often backfires – those muscles become fatigued and painful from being constantly tense.
Neither of these approaches is an efficient (or enjoyable) long-term strategy for improving posture. One doesn’t quite yield the intended result; the other is too much strain leading to tightness and pain. In fact, research shows that rigidly trying to hold a “perfect” posture can make you stiff, tired, and uncomfortable. It’s like trying to hold your breath – you can only force it for so long.
So, what’s a better way? 🤔 If said ‘good’ posture is so good, why is it so darn hard to keep it up?
Good posture shouldn’t feel like a chore or a source of pain. It can be easier and more natural. I’m going to break it down into four lessons that will help you improve your posture with less effort and more ease. Think of it as learning to work with your body, not against it. These lessons are practical and even fun (I’ll be throwing in some metaphors and tips along the way to keep things interesting).
In 4 Lessons in Posture, you will:
Get to know your Pelvis as the ‘unsung hero’ and learn to lead from it. With common “shoulders back” strategies, the pelvis often ends up being dragged along rather than leading the movement. You’ll discover what it means to let your pelvis be the leader of your alignment. By giving the pelvis its legitimate place as the captain of the posture ship, everything above it (spine, shoulders, head) can stack more naturally. (Hint: It’s hard to stand tall on a tilted foundation!)
Improve the communication between chest and pelvis. Ever feel like your upper body and lower body are speaking different languages? When your chest (ribcage) and pelvis aren’t in sync, your posture suffers. We’ll explore how to “stack” your ribcage over your hips so that your spine can support you in a comfortable, upright position.
Cultivate a dynamic posture - Posture isn’t a pose you hold, it’s a way of life! Our spine was created to allow us to experience and adapt to the whole kaleidoscope of life experiences. So we could:
fold into ourselves if we were experiencing grief/sadness or to ‘judo roll’ ourselves out of the way of a high speeding vehicle approaching us
extend when we want to portray a particular gesture on stage or jump with joy or show our strength in the face of physical or emotional threat.
bend sideways to reach for that chocolate on the top shelf, move through a tight space or adapt to undulating surfaces.
Our life and our spine allows us that richness! So the idea of fixating ourselves to one way of being, amounts to rigidity instead of resilience. You will learn to shape your spine and posture to what specific activities that we all do in our day to day life. In the process, you’ll retrace some of that patterning that is unique to you and how to not be too stuck in that patterning.