Why does strong posture benefit us as an anti-aging tool?
Several studies have led to new reasons for concern about improper posture impacting our health and prematurely affects aging. In “The Rancho Bernardo Study”, about Forward Head Posture and Mortality, it sited women with a jutting forward head posture had nearly half again the risk of dying prematurely. The summary of another study indicated older people with weak posture had a 1.44x greater mortality rate!
Weak posture can also cause muscle fatigue. When muscles have to overwork just to hold up your head and body, this leaves you tired and without enough energy for other things. Muscle aches frequently mean the muscles are overworked. Chronic tension can actually cause physical changes in the muscles, ligaments, joints and bones. Chronic neck and back pain from years of weak posture will result in the body literally changing. Joints can become stiff from mechanical stresses and mis alignment. How do we prevent this? We must practice strong posture exercises to strengthen the muscles and align the body.
Since our bodies were designed to move to keep healthy, we must do everything to keep moving! Posture plays a significant role because it tells us how the bone, ligaments, muscles and joints are functioning. Posture also affects our breathing, and breathing affects our posture. Posture is also how we balance our bodies. Balance allows us to move in harmony and safely. To do posture exercises will strengthen our bones, ligaments, muscles, joints and keep us breathing better and moving longer. The stronger our bodies are, we will age naturally and keep our independence and not slow down to the point of losing freedom.
As we practice strong posture, we are strengthening the strongest muscles and building patterns of normal muscle movements. With stronger muscles and core strength, a person’s balance will be so much better, that if they would trip, they would have more efficient muscles to react and catch themselves and possibly avoid a fall. With stronger posture, the bones are stronger, so if the fall did occur, the bones would be more resilient.
Over time, there is the likelihood for body posture to weaken the body. The more injuries lead to compensations in movement patterns, which weakens the posture and entire body system. Posture exercises strengthens the entire body, improves ones quality of life, and the ability to recover should accidents occur.
Lois Mueller Burgener, RDH, MFT
