2 Easy ways to counteract your sitting day
Compared to our ancestors, we have become very intelligent but very sedentary. As humans we were designed to be upright and active but today’s world forces us to be on call 24/7, to answer emails on the go and follow friends on social media. We drive to work, sit 8 hours a day and then drive home, only to sit in front of the telly or our tablets and relax.
All of these activities encourage us to sit, slouch and look down. In simple terms, it makes the tissues down the front of our bodies short and the tissues down the back of us long (and usually weak).
This line down the back of our bodies is called the superficial back line and goes from the tissues in soles of your feet, up the back of your calf and thighs to your buttocks, before it carries on up your back, neck, over your head and ends above your eyes.
While it is important to strengthen your upper back and glutes for example, it is also hugely beneficial to strengthen the whole back line as one. It is after all how we move as humans! We would encourage you to counteract the flexed posture we hold for most of the day with some extension exercises. These are 2 great places to start:
Bridge pose
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Use your glute max and hamstrings to lift your pelvis
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Extend the spine using the muscles in your back
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Draw your shoulders backwards with the muscles in the back of the shoulder
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Draw your shoulder blades together
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Use your triceps to straighten the arms
Cobra pose
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Use your triceps to pull your hands back towards your feet
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Pull the chest forward by engaging the lats and muscles of your upper back
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Draw your shoulder blades together
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Use your low back muscles to lift you into extension
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Engage the glutes
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Point the toes to help engage the hamstrings
Tip: By activating the muscles in your back line, you are also stretching the short muscles in the front of your body. (Front of shoulders, chest, abdominals, hip flexors and quads).
Be gentle with yourself, go slowly and build yourself up gradually.