Does Your Posture Need Improvement?

Why is good posture important? In order to answer that, we have to ask another question: What is proprioception? Other than a very large word you can use to impress your friends at a dinner party, proprioception is the body’s sense of spatial awareness. It’s the reason you can close your eyes and touch your nose. You know that your elbow is bent or straight, even in the dark.

You have proprioceptors (the sensors in your body that sense its position) in all the joints in your body, with especially high concentrations in your spine. When the spine is healthy and the muscles are working efficiently, the little receptors send quality information to the brain and keep you upright and balanced.

When we get stuck in chronic bad postures (on our cell phones, behind the wheel in our commutes, slouched into a couch in a Netflix marathon, etc) the proprioceptors get switched off and no longer send the appropriate information to the brain. Muscles don’t work to hold you in better posture because they don’t know you’re in a bad posture! The muscles get weaker and the cycle starts to spiral. Bad posture leads to bad self awareness, which leads to bad posture!

Unfortunately, cell phones, laptops, Netflix, and commuting are an inevitable part of modern life. Fortunately, there is an easy solution. When we move our joints and work our muscles, we stimulate the receptors in the joints that can give our brains the feedback they need to keep us in line.

There are three absolutely incredible ways to give your body the right stimulation to improve its feedback systems and keep you upright. The first way is exercise. You have the highest concentration of proprioceptors along your spine so working the muscles along your back can have a huge impact on your posture. Not only in keeping the muscles strong enough to keep you upright, but to wake up your nervous system to know that you’re in the right place.

Second, stretching muscles to improve their flexibility is key. Remember if you’re really strong but the muscles are so tight that they’re compressing joints, you’re still not getting quality feedback from those proprioceptors! Flexibility and strength are two sides of the same coin when it comes to overall health.

Last but certainly not least, there is ELDOA. Another vocabulary word (acronym). Think of ELDOA as a direct stimulation of the joints themselves! Remember when I said that the highest concentration of all those proprioceptors was on the spine? Well there is an ELDOA posture to stimulate each and every joint along the spine. That means that we can improve the body’s self awareness in a very powerful way in only a few minutes.

Fortunately, in Seal Beach there is the largest concentration of ELDOA certified, highly educated trainers in the country. I’ve spent my career in helping people come to new realizations about their bodies and capabilities. I’m a trainer, but I see myself as an educator, helping people feel healthy and happy in their bodies. So if you are struggling with your posture, come see me at Beach Fitness and allow me and our team to help you!

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