Other than just getting you from point A to point B, walking is a great way to get exercise, relax your mind, and restore alternating rhythm in your body.
But how do you know you are walking well? And what can you do to get all these benefits mentioned above?
In this series of posts, I will go through five simple steps on how you can be a better walker, and by doing so restore freedom and flow in your body with every step.
Before we get into what you can do to walk better, let’s consider why you would even want to pay attention to how you walk.
Asymmetries Become Magnified
Walking is a symmetrical activity, but the body that does the walking is inherently asymmetrical.
We are asymmetrical in our internal anatomy but also in how we use our bodies. For example, we may always use the same hand to reach for something, always kick with the same leg, always read from left to right.
When we do a symmetrical activity like walking with an asymmetrical body, any asymmetries become magnified.
Inevitably, one leg will be more flexible or stronger, one arm will swing further or stay closer to your body (and yes your arms are involved in walking), and your brain will perceive the right and left sides of your world differently.
Soon we are no longer walking efficiently, no longer pumping air in and out evenly, and we start to create harmful torque on joints and tissues.
So what can you do to walk better?
Free Your Arms
You can start with liberating your arms!
Arms are very important for walking. They provide a counter force and counter balance to the legs, and more importantly your shoulder blade on your ribcage provides a compressive downward force on the opposite leg as the arm swings back, providing your brain with an increased sense and awareness of the ground beneath you.
This tells your brain that you are safe and your whole body can relax into the flow of walking.
One simple thing you can do to walk better is to let your arms just do their thing. Of course you have to carry things sometimes, but try to walk a little bit each day without carrying anything.
Let your arms swing naturally.
That means no dog leashes, no groceries, etc. If you walk to work or school, consider wearing a well fitting backpack instead of a shoulder bag.
ummm, can we see a little arm swing please?
Make sure your hands are open (not clenched or in a fist). Don’t force your arms to swing, just let them move naturally with the rotation of your trunk.
What’s this about trunk rotation? Your trunk (i.e. ribcage) and pelvis rotate in opposite directions as we walk. While walking, the arms literally just hang off our torso. The arm swing is actually just a pendular motion of relaxed arms as the trunk rotates side to side.
So it’s not helpful to “make” your arms swing. Let them do what they do naturally, but make sure your trunk/torso is moving well.
I mean, that’s a little excessive, but you get the idea.
This takes us to our next tip for walking better…
Twist your torso!
Stay tuned for how appropriate torso movement improves your walking.
Make sure you subscribe to the blog to get the next post with the second tip on walking better as soon as it is published 🙂
We’ve all been told to “Sit up straight.” But what does that really even mean, anyway? This advice can be confusing, and even problematic.
The postural restoration institute (PRI) is about so much more than posture, but they have taught me a lot about how to position yourself in your daily life so that you can breathe better and reduce unnecessary tension and patterning in your body.
The Problem:
A common problem that I see when people follow the recommendation to “sit up straight” is over arching your back. Of course, it is not good to slump (picture 1). There are so many reasons why slumping like this is terrible for you, I’m sure you’ve heard them all (and can see how it just looks awful!) so I’m not going to get into that here.
But! it’s just as bad to over arch your back (picture 2).
This is because when you over arch your back, your abdominal muscles cannot help stabilize you and they become weak. Conversely, your back muscles become tight, short, and also weak, with extra compression in your lower back spine.Â
You are forced to hold yourself up with your hip flexors, which also become short and weak!
Not to mention, you can’t breathe well sitting in an over arched position.
In the PRI world, we understand that abdominals are breathing muscles first, and in the over-arched position, your back muscles take over and abs can’t do their job.
Most of your lungs, and best area for passing oxygen from your lungs to your body, is in the ​lower back lungs. ​When you sit overly arched, this area becomes compressed and you can’t breathe well.
Fix It!
The best way to sit is to not arch or slump, but rather to keep your ribcage neatly stacked over your pelvis (picture 3).
This allows for the abdominal and back muscles to work together in a balanced way, and for the natural curves of the spine to exist. It also promotes normal breathing.
How To Do It:
Sit with knees at hip height or slightly higher. Roll your pelvis slightly under (as if you were trying to bring your belt loop closer to your belly button). Feel your sit bones in the chair (the bony points at the base of your pelvis). Exhale through your mouth and allow your lower front ribs to move down. Place a pillow behind you for additional support, putting the pillow all the way down to support your whole back (picture 4).
Ahhhh, that’s better! Your spine can decompress, your back muscles can relax, and you can breathe.
Need more help? Here’s a video guiding you on how to fix your sitting posture!
With the exponential growth of yoga in the last few years, class sizes are getting bigger, and the content more imaginative. It is wonderful that more people are exposed to yoga. As a physical therapist, what concerns me is the lack of emphasis on internal stabilization. This stability comes from deep muscle activation, in sanskrit called bandha, which translates to “Lock.”
In our fast-paced lifestyle, we are often tempted to put ourselves in a position of compromise to “just get things done.” We skip the part where we find our sense of center, and we forget to return to it repeatedly. This is what the practice of bandha teaches us. Developing the bandhas takes effort to build strength, vigilance to maintain, and patience to master. However, once the bandhas are in place, all the other aspects of yoga practice become more accessible, fluid, and enjoyable.
Bandhas stabilize the body during dynamic movement. Some yoga postures can even be damaging if done repeatedly without this awareness. Sure, a teacher might now and then mention a bandha, or advise students to “engage the pelvic floor.” . The problem is that many people have never been taught how to access the bandhas in the first place.
Yoga and the bandhas can apply to every day life.
What are bandhas, and how do we access them?
In yoga there are essentially three bandhas in the body. The
main two we will discuss today are “mula bandha” and “uddhiyana bandha,” which
represent the pelvic floor muscles and the transversus abdominus muscle, respectively.
These are the deep stabilizers of the trunk and pelvis. The third bandha is
“jhalandara bandha,” which involves the core muscles of the neck and head known
as the deep neck flexors (longus colli and longus capitus muscles).
Mula Bandha (Pelvic Lock)
Let’s start with mula bandha, the root lock, or the pelvic floor. In physical therapy practice we often teach patients to engage their pelvic floor if they have hip, back, and leg pain. I even now teach pelvic floor exercises to help patients who have neck pain, because the pelvic floor is the “foundation of the house.” If the head and neck are the roof of the house, you can imagine how a poor foundation would result in an unstable roof.
In my experience working with patients, these muscles are inherently difficult to engage for several reasons. The first is that they are “postural muscles.” Unlike big mover muscles, like the thigh muscles that bend the knee, the postural muscles are under subconscious control. This makes it difficult to fire them at will, and they are harder to feel. The thing that makes pelvic floor muscles really hard to access is the fact that we can’t see them, and many people have never even heard of them.
How to access Mula bandha
As mentioned
above the pelvic floor is hard to access, but visualization can be helpful.
Sit on a firm chair with knees and hips at 90 degrees and feet flat on the floor.
Sitting up straight, hinge forward and back from the pelvis until to feel ventered on your sit bones (the boney protrusions at the base of the pelvis).
From here, draw the sit bones closer together, without tightening your gluteal muscles.
Keep this as you visualize the sit bones pressing down into the chair, as the space between them moves up (this is the doming up/activation of the pelvic floor muscles that make mula banda).
If you can achieve this lifting sensation, you can try maintaining that while visualizing your coccyx (the tailbone) and the pubic symphysis (the very front of your pelvis) also moving towards each other.
These four points (the sits bones, coccyx, and pubic symphysis) all are moving towards a central point.
Even if you feel nothing initially, with continued visualization you will begin to feel something. It is a process.
Uddhiyana Bandha (Navel Lock)
Also known as “flying up” bandha, this is the place between your navel and your pubic bone that wraps around your waist. It creates lightness and lift, and stabilizes the trunk and pelvis during movement and during static standing and sitting. A long, flat sheath of muscle, this bandha is made up primarily by the transversus abdominus and the internal oblique muscles.
The transversus abdominus muscles that make up uddhiyana bhanda.
How to access Uddhiyana Bandha
One accessible way to feel uddhiyana bandha is by activating the leg muscles strongly.
Stand with your feet hip width apart, feet parallel.
Draw up through the inner arches of the feet, while rooting the base of the big toe, base of the pinky toe, and straight down through the heel. You may feel something light up in your core with just this! If not, no worries, keep going.
Imagine you are drawing all the musculature of your legs up towards your pelvis.
Maintain that as you tighten the front and back of the thighs simultaneously.
At this point you should feel the area below your navel turning on. That is uddhiyana bandha.
Now see if you can relax your legs somewhat while keeping the activation in your abdomen.
Jalandhara bandha (Throat Lock)
While the full expression of Jalandhara Bandha is more
applicable during breathwork, a sense of this lock can help with asana practice
as well.
Due to our lifestyle that now frequently involves sitting,
the head tends to come forward with the chin protruding. Then, when it comes
time to practice yoga on the mat, we carry this poor posture with us.
Jalandhara bhanda can mitigate this effect by teaching us to draw the head back over our spine. In the full expression of the bhanda, the chin is nestled in the nook of the breast bone between the collar bones, called the sternal notch. This can be a good release of the fascia along the back of the neck, but is impractical for asana practice and may cause strain for some individuals.
A lighter version of Jalandhara bhanda can help us find a neutral and stable position of the head and neck by recruiting the muscles that make the “core of the throat.” These deep muscles return the head to a neutral position.
How to access Jalandhara bandha (throat lock)
Sit in a firm chair, feeling your sit bones.
Exhale completely through your mouth as you let your neck and shoulders relax and your front lower ribs move down and in (for more info about the importance of the ribs here, see my other post “the posture myth”)
Now, draw your head straight back so that it sits atop the rest of your spine.
Maintain a relaxed posture of your neck and shoulders as you draw slightly nod your head down as if you are holding a small orange between your chin and the space between your collarbones.
Imagine the base of your skull floating up as your chin drops slightly, lengthening the back of your neck.
Check to see that your shoulders are still relaxed. If not, take another exhale and let them drop.
Stay here a few breaths, inhaling to lengthen through the back of the neck, exhaling to settle the shoulders and the front lower ribs.
Yoga and Injury
As a physical therapist, the most common yoga injuries I see are in people who are naturally flexible (usually young to middle-aged women, which happens to be the largest demographic of yoga practitioners). These individuals can put themselves in many challenging postures but lack the deep stabilization of the bandhas. I also see stronger men and women who are able to muscle through arm balances but end up with neck and shoulder pain because really it is the deep connections of the bandhas that create a sense of levity in arm balances, not the arms. Practicing poses with correct activation of the deep stabilizing muscles may mean that you have to approach the pose in a new way, and you may not be able to make the pose look as good initially. This is where the yoga really happens- when we shift our focus from what the pose looks like to what it feels like, when we move from place of integrity and patience.
It can take time to develop a keen awareness of the bandhas and to incorporate them into practice. However, by learning to engage the bandhas, yoga injuries can be prevented and healed by practicing with increased awareness, intention, and patience.
From the outside we look symmetrical. Left to right, it seems that if you drew a line down our center we would get two equal parts. Most anatomical drawings present the human body in this way.
When we dig a little deeper, it turns out that right to left we are quite different, and these differences can have a profound effect on our physical functioning.
Often I have patients ask questions like, “why is it that only my right knee hurts with running?”
Good question! Some may say that this is due to handedness, with most of us being right handed. But have we ever stopped to ask why it is that most of us end up being naturally right handed? I don’t intend to get into a debate about handedness, but it certainly hints that there is something else at play, some asymmetry inherently present in all of us. These asymmetries are normal and natural. However, these asymmetries can become problematic when they become unbalanced.
This can occur due to external or internal circumstances. For example, your life requires that you do repetitive tasks to one side only, like reaching for the phone on the right, or getting in and out of the driver’s side of your car. It may also be something intrinsic to you, such as an injury. If you had an injury to your left leg, you felt more stable on your right leg as you were healing. That is helpful while you heal, but that patterning of preferring the right leg to stand on can remain long after the tissues have healed.
The Postural Restoration Institute has a deep understanding of these asymmetries and how they affect us. This institute is unique in that it addresses these complexities of being a human when creating a treatment plan, which I have not seen in literally any other course or training for physical therapists, even when I was in my doctorate program this was glossed over at best.
Let’s Talk Asymmetries.
The primary source of these asymmetries is the center of our body, the trunk. It is the generator of motion in our limbs and it is our center of stability. At the center of our trunk (the “core of the core,” if you will) lies the diaphragm, which is dramatically impacted by the asymmetries of our organ and lung placement.
The diaphragm on the right tends to be more domed due to:
lower attachments of the diaphragm onto the right side of the spine compared to the left.
The central tendon (which makes the dome of the diaphragm) is thicker and stronger on the right than the left.
The right diaphragm has the support of the liver underneath.
The presence of three lung lobes on the right and only two on the left to make space for the heart.
Radiograph showing the right diaphragm (left side of picture) being higher than the left. This is normal human patterning.
All these things cause the right rib cage to be in an “exhale” position with the ribs dropping down and into the body, and the ribs on the left to be in an “inhale,” an elevated and expanded position. Think of the left lung as a big balloon pushing on the smaller balloon on the right. This causes an orientation of our ribcage to the left. The attachments of the diaphragm on the spine cause the spine to turn right.
The Postural Restoration Institute has recognized this natural asymmetry and incorporates this anatomical variance into their training of physical therapists and therefore the treatment of our patients. When I first heard that everyone is biased one way, it was news to me. When I was in my doctoral physical therapy program, we learned all the asymmetries of the vital organs, however the influence of this asymmetry was not applied to physical function. Furthermore, the asymmetrical structure and pull of the diaphragm was hardly mentioned, if at all. I find this surprising now as the diaphragm is a muscle that we use all day, every day, and it has profound impacts on how we move and interact with our world.
So what’s the big deal about the diaphragm?
The diaphragm is huge! It attaches to our lower back spine and interfaces with our abdominals, low back muscles, and hip flexors. After I took my first postural restoration course, I was pleasantly surprised at the emphasis on diaphragmatic function and it’s role as a driver of human movement. I was also surprised at how “belly breathing,” which I taught and practiced myself, was actually detrimental to harnessing the power of the diaphragm. The inherent asymmetries within our diaphragm drive the initiation of human movement, specifically walking. Essentially, the stability of the right diaphragm supports right stance phase of gait (standing on your right leg and left leg swinging).
The problem occurs when we go to stand on our left leg, but we are still in right stance with our supporting muscles. The left diaphragm is not able to support our body in this position, and our right leg does not adequately recruit muscles to swing the right leg. This occurs not just in walking but also during day to day tasks. This can create all kinds of issues, knee pain on one side being just one of them. Fortunately, this asymmetry can be addressed with specific exercise that is asymmetrical, and therefore corrective. These exercises incorporate the breath to achieve diaphragm function.
Once again, I want to reiterate that this asymmetry is not a bad thing inherently. It is in fact a wonderful thing as it initiates the walking cycle and allows us to begin rotating through our trunk and pelvis. Asymmetry becomes a problem when we get stuck on one side, and are not able to get over to the other side. Relearning how to transition from right to left, and then back from left to right, is how we get balanced again.
Are you transitioning well from right to left stance?
You may have difficulty transitioning from side to side if you:
Tend to always have tightness in one hip more than the other
Always cross one leg over the other (usually the left one over the right)
One leg feels longer than the other
You notice different wear patterns on your shoes or bike saddle
Try this simple exercise to test your asymmetry:
Stand with toes pointed straight forward (feet not turned in or out). Keep this foot alignment as you transition to standing on one leg. You can touch a counter in front for support. Now, turn your pelvis so that the zipper of your pants comes over your right big toe. Try the same thing standing on the left leg, toes pointed forward, knee slightly bent. This time, try to turn the zipper over your left big toe. Notice if you can do this on one side, but not the other.
If you find one side to be challenging, but not the other, that indicates you may have trouble shifting to one side. Because of our natural human pattern, it is usually harder to do this standing on the left leg. That doesn’t mean you can’t stand on that leg at all, but it means that when you are standing you aren’t using the correct chains of muscles, which results in pain and dysfunction. To address this issue, come see me or a PRI trained therapist near you to get properly screened and the tools to find better ease and balance in your body.
Most of us remember being told to “sit up straight!” or “shoulders back, chin up!” as a child or maybe more so as a teen. While this advice was given with the best intentions, it may not have been that helpful. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not advocating the slumped computer posture with shoulders rounded and head poking forward.
Example of poor posture.
This is certainly not a biomechanically sound posture and can lead to all sorts of dysfunction and pain. In an effort to avoid this unsightly slump, we may find ourselves in a position I call “reverse slumping.” This is the tendency to pull the front lower ribs up and push the chest forward. While this may look more upright, it is an overcorrection, and can be more problematic than helpful.
The Problem
So what’s wrong with a lifted chest and elevated front lower ribs? The problems that arise are largely due to how we breathe, and the important relationship between the ribcage and the pelvis. The Postural Restoration Institute has defined the relationship between the breath and function. Below is my meager take on their extensive understanding of the topic. For more information check out https://www.posturalrestoration.com/.
1. Poor oxygenation. If our front lower ribs are “flared” up and out, the mid-upper back is essentially closed off and becomes flat. This causes many problems, one of which is poor oxygenation. The human body is designed to breathe into the back mid and lower ribs, not just the front. These back middle and lower regions of the lungs have the largest area of lung tissue, and the highest blood flow to lung tissue ratio. This means that this area is very important for getting oxygen from your lungs to the rest of your body. When this is closed off (by pushing front ribs up) we are forced to breathe shallowly into our front upper chest, which may recruit neck muscles to help inhale and result in increased neck tension (among other issues). Further, it is harder to get air out because the chest is in a hyper-inflated state. This means less new, oxygen-full air in. Theoretically, if you improve the expansion of your mid back, you will use oxygen more efficiently and fatigue less quickly with sport and daily living.
2. Altered neck and shoulder mechanics. The spine is not meant to be straight, rather it has natural curves that allow a springy quality for shock absorption. When the front ribs are pushed up, the upper back spine becomes flat. This destabilizes the shoulders, as the shoulderblades are designed to function on an egg-shaped surface, not a flat one. As a result, the muscles that manage the shoulderblade cannot function optimally, thereby changing the mechanics of the shoulder in an adverse way. Many of the muscles that attach to the shoulderblades also attach to the neck spine and can create increased tension in the neck area if they are not functioning well.
The muscles that attach to your shoulderblades, back, and neck can become strained and painful with poor posture.
A flat upper back also burdens the point where the upper back spine meets the neck spine. The neck spine is naturally curved and is designed to follow the curve of the upper back. However, if the upper back is now flat, the spring-like shock absorbing factor is lost. Furthermore, the juncture from upper back spine to neck spine becomes vulnerable due to a sharp corner instead of a nice smooth curve between the vertebrae. This can create pain and sensations of tension in this area.
3. Increased stress levels. When we are stressed, that really means our body is entering a “fight or flight” state, which means that there is some imminent threat, and we need to either fight or get away. Blood is shunted away from the core and immune function and digestion are halted as the body prepares to fight or flee. This threat could be anything from being chased by a mountain lion to a steady drip of small daily stressors, like traffic, aches and pains, worrying about money, etc. Our body simply does not distinguish what the cause of the stress is, the same pathways and neurotransmitters are stimulated in the case of a lion attack or spilled coffee. The “fight or flight state” has its purpose, however it is not healthy to remain in this state for prolonged periods of time.
The part of our nervous system that promotes our “rest and digest” state is governed by the vagus nerve which passes from the brain to the abdomen through the ribcage. This state allows the body to be calm and relaxed, allowing for sleep, healing, and digestion. When we are in this state, our breathing is full and deep, with the diaphragm moving through its full range of motion.(1) This is the state that we should be in most of the time.
So what does this have to do with posture? Well, if we push the front ribs up and close off the back of the ribcage, the sympathetic ganglia (the nerves that promote a “fight or flight” state and live along the upper back spine) become overly stimulated due to compression. Furthermore, with the front ribs elevated, the body is in a constant state of shallow inhales and exhales, which is correlated with higher stress levels and promotes release of stress hormones in the body.(2) What’s really amazing about our bodies is that this system works both ways. That is, just as the state of our nervous system causes our breathing patterns to change, we can similarly alter our nervous system by modifying the way we breathe.
4. Poor recruitment of deep abdominals, especially upon inhale. Even if you have six pack abs, that doesn’t necessarily mean you are using the abdominals in the way they are meant to be used. Deep to the well known “six pack” of the abdominals are deeper muscles that create a cylinder around the center of the body. These are breathing muscles. They attach to the lower rim of the ribcage and the upper rim of the pelvis. They create stability and order within the body as well as reduce pressure on the lower back spine and associated nerves. They allow us to be both stable and mobile when they function correctly.
When the front ribs are excessively elevated, the front of the pelvis is often tipped forward as a counterbalance. This places the deep abdominal muscles in the front of your body in a state of excessive length. Our muscles do not function very well (or hardly at all) from their most lengthened state. It’s like trying to pick up a heavy bag of groceries with your arm totally straight instead of slightly bent. It just doesn’t work as well.
A deep stabilizing muscle, called the transversus abdominus, helps us maintain neutral posture.
So then what is good posture?
Essentially, your rib cage should be egg shaped, and sit atop your level pelvis. The spine should be lengthened while maintaining its natural curves. In sitting, you can achieve this by:
Sit in a firm chair with your feet flat, knees and hips at 90 degrees.
Feel your sit bones (the boney protrusions at the base of your pelvis). You may need to lean forward and back a few times to find where you feel them most. When you are most aware of your sit bones pressing into the seat, this indicates that your pelvis is level. It may feel like your pelvis is slightly “rolled under.”
With a long, relaxed exhale breath through your mouth, allow your front lower ribs to drop down slightly. Pause a few seconds at the bottom of the exhale. There should be a sense of your front lower ribs coming down to the front top rim of your pelvis.
Maintain this position as you imagine your lower back ribs expanding with each inhale, and your lower front ribs moving down and back towards your spine with each exhale. Hint: pausing after your exhales for 3 seconds will make it easier to feel back ribs expanding.
Below is a video on finding a neutral sitting posture.
And there you are! If you are used to pushing your chest up, it probably feels like you are slouching when you come into a correct posture. To assure yourself that you are still sitting straight, you can use a mirror to see that you are indeed not slouching. If you can see yourself from the side in the mirror you may also notice that now you have a little more expansion in your lower back ribs. Good job!
References:
1. Russo MA, Santarelli DM, O’Rourke D. The physiological effects of slow breathing in the healthy human. Breathe (Sheff). 2017;13(4):298-309.
2. Hirotsu C, Tufik S, Andersen ML. Interactions between sleep, stress, and metabolism: From physiological to pathological conditions. Sleep Sci. 2015;8(3):143-52.
3. Tenney, R., KL Boyle, A DeBord. Influence of Hamstring and Abdominal Muscle Activation on a Positive Ober’s Test in People with Lumbopelvic Pain H. Posturalrestoration.com. Accessed January 26, 2019.
