Although I have made past videos that work on this ‘how to fix bad posture’ and “how to fix hunched posture” issue, I understand that many of you just won’t be consistent when presented with a ton of different posture exercises. I get it, corrective exercises for posture are not “fun” for most people. So, in this video I thought I’d create a routine that shows you how to potentially achieve a proper posture with the least amount of effort. So, when it comes to how to fix your posture, there are just 3 moves.
It’s important that we first understand the reasoning behind posture exercises. As a result of sitting hunched over, your mid-back has lost some of its ability to extend upright and leads you to a kyphosis and a hunchback posture. As a result, certain mid-back muscles (e.g. lower traps), get weakened and their activation actually become inhibited. What’s the solution? Well, first we’re going to work on mobilizing our mid-back. Then, after we mobilize the thoracic spine we’ll work on a lower traps exercise to work on activating and strengthening them.
First, when it comes to how to fix bad posture, we’re going to work on some thoracic mobilization. To set up, lay on your back with your knees bent and place the foam roller around the level of your shoulder blades. Then, place your hands behind your head to support your neck. From here, contract your abs and then leading with your head, slowly arch your upper back over the foam roller. Return back to the starting position and then repeat that for a few more reps. Make sure that as you do so, you aren’t letting your ribs flare up and lower back arch. After you do a few more reps in that position, continue moving the foam roller further down each segment of your back and repeat until you reach the end of your mid-back region. Next, we want to use an exercise that’ll help our body engrain that mindful awareness of how to actually extend at the mid-back. To do so, we’ll use thoracic cat cows.
Next, once we’ve successfully mobilized our mid-back with the previous 2 exercises for posture, we’re now going to temporarily be in a much better position to be able to activate and strengthen our lower traps for long term results. We’ll use something called the modified prone cobra. Practice this daily, and once you’re able to activate your lower traps quite well here without compensating with your upper traps, we want to then swap your lower traps exercise for more difficult progressions.
But the main goal of this is to gradually move through these each of these exercises over time as you “master” each progression. So, if you want proper posture, take your time and don’t rush through these.
To summarize the daily routine, here’s the action plan:
Spend 10 minutes to cycle through each move in order:
Move 1: Thoracic Extension (~ 1 minute)
Move 2: Thoracic Cat Cows (10 reps)
Move 3: Lower Traps Exercise (10 reps with 5-10 second holds at top position)
Level 1 = Modified Prone Cobra
Level 2 = Behind Head Raise
Level 3 = W Raise
Level 4 = Y Raise
*Perform this routine 1-3x/day to break up long periods of sitting/standing.
Overtime, by consistently devoting at least just 5-10 minutes a day to work through this ‘how to fix your posture’ routine, you should notice a significant improvement in your ability to activate your lower traps and other important mid-back muscles that have been weakened. This will then enable you to actually use these muscles more not only when you stand and sit throughout the day, but also in the gym with movements like the pull-up, lat pulldown, and rows that normally should be strengthening these muscles. And as a result of this, you’ll be able to see long lasting visual improvements in your hunched over posture which can in turn creates a lot more relief upstream in your upper traps, neck, shoulders, and potentially even downstream in your lower back and other areas.
And for a step-by-step program that shows you exactly how to properly train these often overlooked muscles, and combines it with a weekly weights routine so that you can build lean muscle while improving your posture and various imbalances in the process, then simply take the analysis quiz to discover which science-based program would be best for you and where your body is currently at below:
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LINK TO FOAM ROLLER:
amzn.to/3iFv05l
Filmed by: Bruno Martin Del Campo
MUSIC:
Music by Ryan Little - Body Language - thmatc.co/?l=A37F6F3E
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