It’s About Your Posture
In childhood, while many of us listened to our mothers repeat the well-worn phrase, “stand up straight,” few of us were ever interested enough to ask why good posture was so important. Now as adults, we can better appreciate that poor posture produces pain, poor health, and a body language that reveals a timidity or lack of self-confidence.
In simple terms, posture is how the body stands up. How straight and how tall you stand is determined by the balance, strength and flexibility of your muscles. Sometimes we think of muscles only as a source of strength. Muscles not only provide the strength we need to lift objects, walk, run or move from one place to the other; they also provide enough strength to support the size and weight of the body. Since the majority of the weight of the body relies on the legs for its support, it is important to pay attention to the muscles located above the hips to ensure that they stay properly developed.
The weight of the body is the sum of its parts. On average, our head accounts for approximately 10 pounds of our bodies total weight. Each one of our arms can be credited with about 5% of the body’s total weight and each leg is approximately 10 % of the body weight. The rest of the weight is assigned to the torso. This means that 80% of the total body weight is focused above the line of the legs, and how well you develop this portion is the key to your posture.
Activities that are one-sided or create any type of impact to the body, especially during the phases of growth and development can cause imbalances or changes to the posture. A bat hitting a ball may not look like much, but to a developing body it can result in a variety of physical issues with scoliosis being the most common. Any type of repetitive movement to one side of the body creates an imbalance in the development of the muscles leaving one side of the body over-developed and the other side under-developed. Developed muscles are heavier than under-developed ones, which causes an imbalance in the posture creating a shift in the spine.
The increasing need for functional exercise programs have been part of our physical culture since Hippocrates. As we become more and more competitive in sports, we increase the amount of impact and stress we place on the structures of the body. Posture specific programs, such as Pilates are needed not only to counter the structural stress that our hectic lives are placing on our bodies, but also to help neutralize the affects. By paying more attention to your posture, not only will your body feel better, but it will look better. How you look in your body and how you feel in your body can only be as good as the structure you provide for it.
