I’ve always marveled
at those people who sit or stand up straight. Slouching in my desk during
school and tertiary studies, and later on in the working world has always been
a bad habit of mine. Sitting for long periods is definitely something I don’t
relish and I tend to shift around in whatever chair I’m sitting in.
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It is worse
when sitting on the ground; I can only seem to maintain a fixed sitting position
for less than a minute before I’m moving around again. This was always a
problem for me during school assemblies and gatherings where we – the pupils –
would sit cross-legged on the floor of the school hall listening to the weekly
sports reports and other announcements. I could never understand how some
people could just sit in the same cross-legged position for an hour without
moving an inch.
Later, during
my tertiary studies, we would sit in plastic chairs attached to a long desk
that would fold in and out on a reinforced hinge. Apart from trying stay awake
during class – which was always a problem – I would shift around uncomfortably
after about five minutes while trying to absorb the class’ subject matter.
This probably
led me to one of my favorite pastimes; lying on the floor. Yes – be it watching
TV, reading, talking to family, I’m always more at ease lying down on the floor
than sitting.
Luckily the
work place allows more freedom and I get up regularly to walk around or even
work at my desk whilst standing/squatting. My boss would understand a bit about
posture though; he has practiced yoga for the past two decades and he always
maintains an impressive sitting position.
Over the
years, posture has been something I’ve grown to work on as well observing the
people with seemingly good posture. I’ve noticed that ladies definitely have
better posture than men, generally speaking. One time during a long Saturday
ride, one of my fellow cyclists commented that I had great posture on the bike;
this surprised me a little as I didn’t really think that I did.
Over the last
few years, I’ve come to be aware of my posture and constantly looking at ways
to comfortably maintain an upright sitting position. Slowly but surely, it has
become almost awkward to sit with a bad posture, so I must be doing something
right.
Studying massage recently
has made me even more “posture aware” and, in fact, is one of the main pointers
that we were tested on during our practical examination. As asinine as it may
sound, it is certainly easy to injure yourself whilst performing massage
treatments.
I’ve always
been a big fan of flexibility and strengthening exercises, particularly for
sports people. Lately, I’ve become more interested in exercises specifically designed
to improve one’s posture and balance, and came across this great website:
More
specifically, I was intrigued by the following blog article;
a short and sweet piece on how to improve posture through a set of simple yoga
poses. Sure enough, that short article has motivated me to practice the
sequences outlined by “Sage Rountree” a few times per week.
I must admit
that the “Bow Pose” is quite
challenging; I tried for the first time in front of two colleagues and could
barely reach my feet to “strike the pose.” Maybe I should just ask my boss for
some advice.
