Why do you care so much about posture?
Well….
Why don’t you care so much about posture?
🤷
When I was able to hobble myself to the library everyday in 2014 and 2015 I read a ton of books. So many of those books talked about posture but in different ways. I was more concerned about rehabilitation but what I needed to understand was what I was rehabilitating my body back to.
I had spent time rehabbing my body in the past but all those exercises did little for me other than pass the time. Eventually I would stop doing the exercises and go back to my every day life. Overtime my pain would subside and I would eventually step back onto the court. I knew that I was different but I didn’t know how.
I woke up with less energy. I would be stiff and feel less mobile. I could still play the game I loved but my body wouldn’t make the plays I was accustomed to.
What I didn’t realize at the time was that I was aging.
I would run into people from my childhood and I would always hear the same thing.
“Joe you look different than you used to.”
I had no clue what that meant.
Whenever I looked in the mirror I saw me, I always saw me but what I didn’t recognize was that my posture was changing.
Excruciating pain was the final step for me before I entered the world of studying health.
I decided that I wouldn’t be bias towards one train of thought. I couldn’t become attached to one persons theory. I had to read many authors to understand which one would benefit my own personal pain. What I discovered is that all the theory was the same but the way it was applied was different.
A lot of therapeutic approaches would always focus the exercises on the issue or where the pain presents itself. I would try the exercises but nothing would change. My body never changed.
Finally I stumbled over some books on pilates.
Those books talked about posture first. Building your body back to posture. Rebalancing your muscles so that you have ideal posture. Stretching and lengthening your muscles to maintain posture.
Do you see what I see?
Pilates equals posture.
I finally looked in the mirror objectively and not subjectively.
This is something hard for people to do but it’s the best way to understand your body alignment.
My posture was way off.
Now I could understand what the people from my past meant.
I wasn’t the same.
Now I had a goal.
Ideal Posture first then workout.
The exercises I practiced daily were specific to my own posture deviation not what others believed would help, or pre programmed classes or weight lifting exercises.
The goal was to lengthen my shortened muscles first so that I could strengthen the lengthened ones afterwards. Once I hit that goal then I would begin doing the repetitions to maintain my form. Form first, progressive loading of weights second.
Day by Day my body began to feel better. My stiffness turned to fluidity. I became more motivated to fix those past injuries and realign my joints. This wasn’t work, this was my new lifestyle.
Finally I was able to get back onto the court and play beach volleyball.
Playing sports with my daughter, going for bike rides together, rollerblading, climbing trees.
This was all a dream when I laid on the floor with my ribs popped out and I couldn’t breath.
Life felt very uncertain and I felt helpless.
Not because I didn’t think there was a way but so many things I already tried never worked.
I found a way and that was because I had a direction, an overall goal.
I am happy it happened because it forced me to go the library, study and learn to find that goal.
These days when I see people from my twenties and thirties they say you look so different. You’re lean, you look tall, you look young.
This time I understand what they are saying.
You have good posture.