Stand Up Straight, Look a Stone Lighter… Yes Really!

We often don’t give our posture enough credit when it comes to how it can affect our appearance. But it’s true! Stand with a slouch and you could potentially be making yourself look a lot bigger than you are.

In fact, take the simple step to stand up straight and you can immediately look 1 stone lighter!

But this is not all your posture can do…

Aside from helping you to look better, good posture can help to relieve your body of tension and make it easier for you to lose weight!

How good is your posture?

Many of us slouch without even realising it and this is partially due to the lifestyles we lead such as sitting at a desk and craning our necks forward all day.

For this reason, it is worth evaluating how bad your posture is. Try doing the following self check:

1. Taking off your shoes, put your back to a flat wall and press your heels and bum against it.
2. Next slide one of your hands between the wall and your lower back.

Now, this space should only be about the width of your hand. If it is any bigger then you may be suffering from an overcurvature in your lower spine where your head is pulled forward and your shoulders look rounded.

Other signs of poor posture include: arched lower back, excessive anterior pelvic tilt (protruding bum) or excessive posterior pelvic tilt (protruding stomach /pelvis)

How to improve your posture

If you’re suffering from poor posture, then there are a number of tricks you can try to help straighten your back and ultimately help you to lose weight.

But first things first, here are some poor posture triggers:

How can I prevent poor posture?

Okay, you’re now aware of poor posture triggers, but how can you prevent them? By doing the following steps:

1. Take a break – taking a 30 second break a few times a day can help to remove tension and prevent poor posture. Simply stand up straight, bring your head and arms back at the same time, then work the muscles in your back by stretching them.
2. Learn to breathe properly – try to breathe through your belly instead of your chest. This will help to relax everything, including your lower back, neck and shoulders.
3. Exercise– there are specific exercises you can do every day (corrective stretching) which can help to improve your posture, but these will depend on your problem.For instance if you have got a forward head and rounded shoulders, then you will need to do back extensions and reverse flies to stretch your chest and remove tension from your upper back muscles. Whereas if you’ve got a pelvic tilt then you’ll have to focus on your abdominals.No matter your posture type, we recommend speaking to your doctor firstwho can examine your posture and suggest appropriate exercises for your back.

As you can see, you don’t have to let your posture define you. Nor do you have to let add unnecessary pounds to your appearance. Simply aim to improve your posture, stand up straight and breathe properly and you can begin benefiting from a slimmer reflection.

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