Sitting posture & tight hips.
Last week we started analysing why posture matters, how it affects your body and what you can do to stay on top of your ‘office niggles’. If you missed it, take a look here.
This week, we’ll review in more detail how your sitting posture may be contributing to your tight hips and back pain.
We generally assume that sitting relieves stress on our backs, but in reality, the load through the spine is roughly 40% higher when sitting compared to standing. This fact makes sitting correctly even more important to avoid lower back pain.
As we mentioned last week, controlling pelvic alignment is the key to a better posture and there are 2 common faults we notice in office workers:
- sitting with an excessive posterior tilt, when your hips roll under your trunk
- sitting with a side tilt, when you sit over your wallet or you regularly keep the same leg crossed
Both these positions will create excessive tension in some muscles, put unnecessary strain on your discs and the joints in your back leading to tight hips and back pain, as well as compromising your entire spine position: so you end up slouching your upper back, leaning over one shoulder and poking your head to far forward, creating even more issues up the line.
Learn to sit actively, so that your muscles are being used and focus on your breathing. Your belly and lower ribs should expand on inspiration, then relax on expiration. Focusing on your breathing will help keeping your core muscles engaged and leave your hip flexors in peace.
Try these simple stretches:
In need of some more help? Check out our new Mobility and Movement Series to break the stiffness and start moving better NOW.
