Who knew that a little slouching could do so much damage? Here’s how to fix your bad posture habits—and get healthier in the process.
Straighten UP!
- Sure, bad posture can make your neck creak and your shoulders ache, but recent research shows that your slouch might be making you a grouch. Heads-up!
- Here are some weird ways posture can affect you—and how you can get out of the slump.
# 1 – Deepens Depression
In a recent study from San Francisco State University, students were told to either walk down a hall in a slouched position or to skip. The slouchers reported increased feelings of depression and lower energy than skippers.
Even our language reflects this connection between proper posture and emotional affect—someone weak is called spineless, and someone proud has backbone!
The fix: Imagine there’s a headlight right in the middle of your chest at the sternum (breastbone).
- Sitting or standing, your headlight should always shine forward.
- Now, keeping your head centered over your shoulders, extend your head toward the ceiling without lifting your chin.
# 2 – Causes Career Problems
- Slouching doesn’t just hurt your attitude—it can affect how people see you.
- You don’t want to walk into somebody’s office slouching and bent over, because people really do perceive you as not as vital.
- To improve posture long term, you need to strengthen muscles mid-back.
The fix: To avoid being a slouch on the job, do this exercise at your desk:
- Lift the bottom of your ribcage an inch or two off your hipbone, pulling your shoulder blades back and down.
- To make sure you maintain the position, pin a ribbon to top and to bottom of your shirt and keep it taunt for 10 minutes at a time.
# 3 – Backs you UP!
- When you sit in a crunched position, your viscera (intestines) are folded up, too.”
- That can slow everything down.
The fix: Yoga and Pilates are great exercises to strengthen your core and help get things moving,
- One pose that can rev up a sluggish gut is the Cobra:
- Lie on your belly while resting your head on your lower arms.
- Raise your forehead and look upwards, letting your weight rest on your chest.
- Letting your head fall back a little, move your belly further off the mat as if someone is pulling your arms.
# 4 – Increase the Risk of Disease and Death
- A recent Australian study found that after the age of 25, every single hour of television—i.e., slouching on the couch—reduced the viewer’s life expectancy by 21.8 minutes.
- Plus, when English researchers cross-referenced sitting time with health outcomes in a different study, they found that those people who sat the most more than doubled their risk of developing diabetes and had a 147 % increase in their risk for cardiovascular disease, even if they exercised.
The fix: Don’t let the box beat you. Try the TV Stand:
- Stand up from chair without using arms and sit down in a smooth and controlled motion.
- Just doing this simple move can keep your lower body muscles very strong.
# 5 – Makes You Look Heavier
- Does this chair make me look fat?
- Well, yes! We’ve become a nation of professional sitters.
- When you are slouched over, your internal organs have nowhere to go but down and out—you immediately look fatter.
The fix: The solution for this one is simple.
- Get up and move!
- When we stand as opposed to sitting, we burn 20% more calories and strengthen our muscles, boost metabolism and increase bone density.
# 6 – Cuts Off Your Circulation
Our bodies are machines that move fluid and gases back and forth. Prolonged sitting, especially with your legs crossed, can cut off the flow, increase pressure and even cause spider veins.
The fix: To get blood flowing to your lower body, stand up and find your best posture, then lift one leg up so your thigh is horizontal to ground.
- Keep your standing leg locked (not hyperextended) and hold for five strong breaths, pushing your breathing down to your diaphragm. Repeat on the opposite side.
# 7 – Stresses You Out!
- A recent study from Harvard showed that when people who adopted powerful postures (open shoulders and straight spines) had a 20% increase in testosterone levels and a 25% decrease in cortisol levels—but people who slouched had a 10% decrease in testosterone and a 15% increase in cortisol.
- That translates into low self-confidence and high stress.
- And sitting slouched over can compound the problem.
- Shallow chest breathing strains the lungs, which must move faster to ensure adequate oxygen flow, and taxes the heart, which is forced to speed up to provide enough blood for oxygen transport.
- The result is a vicious cycle, where stress prompts shallow breathing, which in turn creates more stress.
The fix: Take everyday cues—a ringing phone, a stoplight—as reminders to take relaxed abdominal breaths to combat stress.
- Here’s how to make sure you’re breathing deeply:
- Rest your hand below your belly button; you should feel your belly expand as you inhale.
- Invite the air all the way down to the deepest portion of the lungs, where oxygen exchange is most efficient.
- As you exhale, you should feel your belly contract again and stress leaves your body.
The good news: Weak posture can be strengthened. Improving posture and health involves more than just telling someone to stand straight and keep their shoulders back. Improving posture means strengthening the body’s balance and movement.