In our last article we discussed the physical and mental challenges associated with prolonged sitting, as well as the need to build postural awareness. Now we will take a look at how you can develop increased body awareness and retrain yourself to build healthy seated posture.
While many people imagine that it is exhausting holding good posture all day, the opposite is true. If you build up a good, natural posture through awareness — you actually feel a lot less tired at the end of the day. You might also find your outlook on life becomes more positive.
Let’s get started.
1. Get to know your sit bones. Sit comfortably on your chair and have your feet hip distance apart, with your feet flat on the floor. Check that your hips are just above your knees. You may need to raise or lower your chair to achieve this.
This sitting position allows you to take some weight through your legs and into the floor, which takes pressure off your lower back.
Now, bring your awareness to the part of your body that is in contact with the chair seat. Can you feel your sit bones?
To deepen your awareness, you can use your hands to feel them. Place a hand under each buttock and locate the region where the buttock and back of the thigh meet. Press in with your fingers until you feel a bony prominence on each side — these are your sit bones.
To sit tall these bones should bear most of your weight when you are seated. Can you feel each sit bone equally, or can you feel one side slightly more than the other?
And what is now happening with your feet, are they still making firm contact with the floor? Make small adjustments to the amount of weight through each foot, to adjust the weight you take through your sit bones. Experiment with the amount of pressure through each foot to adjust one side, and then the other. Are you sitting more evenly and solidly on your chair? Take a couple of breaths — slowly and deeply — to integrate this new awareness.
2. Become aware of your natural spinal curves.3. Take your awareness from your toes to your crown. Gently draw your pelvic floor muscles in and up as you activate your abdominal muscles. Ensure that you can still breathe deeply.
Gently, and without force, engage the muscles between your shoulder blades— to gently pull the shoulders back and help open the chest.
Check that this muscle activation feels natural and relaxed, and not forced or military style.
Tuck the chin very slightly just so that you can feel a lengthening through the back of the neck. Soften your face and relax your jaw.
Keeping this position, and with both feet gently, but firmly pushing into the floor, take your awareness to the very top of your head. Imagine lengthening through your entire spine. The heart is over the hips. The head is over the heart.
Inhale and feel your whole body expand. Exhale, and allow any residual tension to leave the body along with the breath — but keep your new shape. How do you feel?
Take a moment to integrate this new awareness, and practice regularly to make this your new habit.
Movement and posture are habitual, and your body will initially ask you to return it to a more familiar position. Each time you remind yourself to sit tall is a positive- you have created new body awareness and are building new muscle memory. Practice will turn to habit, and habit turns into comfortable and correct posture.
If you would like further guidance, the Salute the Desk app contains a sit tall workshop as well as mindful stretching routines, all of which can be performed at your desk.
