correcting posture


 

The TL;DR is that you need to find a set of exercises that works for you to ultimately make your resting posture straight - shoulders back and down, spine aligned and stacked, hips level and loose.  You will have a hard time with that if you sit all day, so change your position as often as you can from a sitting position.

 

This is what works for me - when I stick to it like Seinfeld

 

Specific exercises are below - useful links to check out.  Each exercise takes a couple minutes. 

 

There are several exercises below that I have found to help.  I made them into a routine for a while, and I still do them from time to time, and I have learned from them. 

 

However, I have evolved my strategy and I am now trying free bodyweight routines from Cori Lefkowith more often than once a week, and I suspect that they are having a bigger impact than doing all the exercises below.  This is an example of one of Coris stretching routines that I find helpful.

 

Below, each video link goes directly to the point at which the exercise is explained.

 

A lot of these types of exercises/stretches can be made more effective by adding SMR: warmup/foam-roll/stretch/exercise.  

 

0) Wall and band stretches from Trevor Bachmeyer

 

1) Anterior Pelvic Tilt Stretch/exercise ( Modified lunge with dumbells )

 

2) Forward Head Posture and Upper Cross Syndrome Stretch/exercise ( Specific wall lean )

 

3) Inward Shoulder Rotation Stretch ( Chest stretches or corner stretches ) - this as well

 

4) Overall Postural Alignment Stretch ( Basically a dual external rotation ala rotator cuff exercises using a theraband wrapped across the body) 

 

5) Correcting Weak Hips ( smr and hip exercises - other good advice - don't sit all day!)

 

Experiments:

 

I'm also trying the Upright Go to see if it helps.  The manual has some good body calibration stuff in it similar to  what Kelley Starret recommend in his awesome book Deskbound.