Health + Wellness: Improve your posture

Several years ago, I was reading an interview with actress Helen Mirren. The author of the article asked her about her fitness routine and how she stays so fit. Her answer was, “Mostly, I just tried to stand up straight.” Sounds so simple, but let’s take a look.

Gravity is always trying to pull us down. With our head weighing 10 pounds, gravity will strain your neck if you do not slightly tuck your chin in and have your ear over your shoulder. This goes for looking at the computer, phone or TV. Your eyes should be level with the device. Think of a string on the crown of your head pulling you straight up.

It is very important when sitting and standing to squeeze your shoulder blades together. Some people sit with their upper back and shoulders hunched forward, allowing gravity to pull them down and causing the spine to be out of alignment, while muscles between their shoulder blades become weak.

To remedy this, shrug your shoulders up to your ears and then circle them back and down, thinking of sliding the tips of your shoulder blades down into your back pockets. If you can do this throughout the day, it will become easier as your posture muscles strengthen. To assist this muscle activation, when shopping or at a counter, lightly push down with your hands on the shopping cart or counter and remember to think tall and straight.

While you are doing that, do not let your ribs pop up and out. Try to use your abdominal muscles to keep your ribs tucked down and attached to your core. To activate these transverse abdominal muscles, lie down flat on a bed, take a deep breath and push your tummy out as you exhale, blowing air out. Then, squeeze your belly button down into your spine, as you would if you were putting on tight jeans. As you practice this abdominal contraction, those core muscles will strengthen, and it will become easier to hold your belly button to your spine while still breathing.

While you are lying flat imagining you are putting on your tight jeans, go ahead and practice some glute strengthening. It’s simple enough: Just squeeze/contract your buttocks muscles. Once you can easily activate those muscles lying down, progress to sitting and standing muscle activation. I like to do a few glute sets in the car while sitting at a stoplight. This will help you with sitting and standing from your chair and walking. Once that seems easy to activate, try thinking about squeezing your glutes while walking. On the weight-bearing leg, concentrate on activating that buttock while increasing step length with a good heel strike.

If that is not enough to think about already, I would like your toes and kneecaps to face forward when walking, not turned out or in too much. If you can make gradual improvements in this alignment, the affected muscles will strengthen and stretch out appropriately. When standing, try not to let your knees hyperextend backwards. They should be in alignment with your hips and ankles.

My friends always say, “Better sit up straight, here comes Paula.” As you can read here, it is not so easy to stand up straight, but remember, I will be watching.

Paula Givens has been interested in health and fitness since she was a teenager. She graduated from physical therapy school at Mizzou in 1980, and throughout the decades, she has worked as a physical therapist specializing in arthritis, orthopedics, neurology, pediatrics, pool therapy, rehab and Pilates.