If your body has good posture, the skeleton and muscles interact efficiently to provide a stable alignment of your body in a vertical plan while standing still and when moving.
Odds are however, that if you are reading this article either yourself or a friend is a sufferer of bad posture. It is an unfortunate fact of life that there are many issues that cause poor posture, and a sizable minority of people suffers from this condition.
This article will briefly outline some of the more frequent triggers of bad posture:
Tiredness
Even with the best of intentions, it is difficult to maintain correct posture when your body is fatigued. Maintaining a straight back is the key to good posture. Attempting to do this for a prolonged period of time without rest will eventually lead to your back muscles tiring, and result in slumping or slouching.
Weak Muscles
Whether through bad genes, a poor exercise regimen, or simply an injury, many of us have muscles in the back that are overly weak. This can cause our body to adjust the way it stands to try to provide relief to these muscles. While this can ‘protect’ an individual muscle, it does so at the expense of imposing unnatural stresses on the rest of our backs.
Foot Issues
If you do not stand with your feet in a posture friendly position, you will adversely impact your spine. Allowing your feet to follow their natural roll inwards will cause ripple effect up your legs to your spine, resulting in slouching. To avoid this always wear good shoes that provide ample support for your feet.
Nutrition
While rare in the Western world, malnutrition is a major problem in some countries that can cause serious issues with posture. A healthy body is essential to good posture, and children raised without adequate nutritious food are likely to have poorly developed muscles and bones – and hence suffer from poor posture.
Psychological Issues
If you are experiencing a lot of stress at home or in the workplace, this can manifest itself in bad posture. To lessen this make a conscious effort to avoid letting the stresses of everyday life impact the way you carry yourself.
Habit
This is probably the most nefarious cause of bad posture. Simple force of habit, combined with laziness, can have the healthiest of people walking with a slouch – this behaviour is the antithesis of what is needed for maintaining or correcting bad posture. Luckily, if habit is the sole cause, this can be addressed yourself by deliberately focusing on maintaining good posture.
As has been explained, there are many possible causes of bad posture. Thankfully, therapies such as the use of a posture corrective brace are available to help address poor posture symptoms and to provide lower back pain relief.