Do We Need Exercise To Improve Posture?
I believe the initial mistake made by those promoting exercise to improve posture was to confuse the outward sign of poise, that is the good posture of a poised individual, for the desirable goal. Changing the body to look right does not attain poise. Many of the systems designed to improve posture use a number of F.M. Alexander’s methods, often without recognition, but have not appreciated the basic principles. It is not possible to take individual precepts from a philosophy and make them work as part of another. These systems advocate exercise to achieve the desired results whilst ignoring the essential step of preventing use of the habits that caused the condition. The methods designed to correct posture are flawed and based on the following misconceptions:- 1. "We can control individual muscles." We do not have direct control over individual muscles, only the movement. When we choose to move, the movement is organised by subconscious centres of the brain that do not contain individual muscle actions. Try to contract the biceps muscle without thinking of moving your arm and you can begin to appreciate how it works. What we sense is a feeling associated with that movement and not the muscle. We cannot know if an action lengthens, shortens or even uses a muscle, only that we have performed a movement we associate with the feel of it. One exercise system to improve posture even goes to the extreme of instructing participants to engage the postural muscles in each exercise to twenty-five percent of its strength! This level of control is just not possible. Injury and poor habits may lead to a change in the pattern through repetition of a degraded movement. Following injury, the actions of the muscle to prevent movement of the damaged area or to compensate for temporary loss of mobility become habit. These compensatory measures become part of the permanent pattern and will feel normal. The subconscious and habitual nature of movement combined with a lack of attention to the activity means deviation from the natural pattern may go unnoticed. If we do not have an accurate account of how we execute a movement, we cannot be sure of correctly following the instructions of a coach. Many coaches will have observed this when a pupil’s actions bear no resemblance to their command. 2. "The problem is with the muscle." Posture is the manifestation of attitude. Exercise to improve posture designed to strengthen the perceived weak postural muscles do not get to the cause of the problem. If a muscle is weak, it is most likely through lack of use if not activated due to a faulty movement pattern. If you don’t use it, you lose it! A muscle can also appear weak if it is habitually held tight because further contraction is not possible. Our shape is a result of an intricate balancing act involving every muscle of the body. Weakness in one area usually indicates excessive tension in another. The task of trying to achieve balance by working on individual groups of muscle is not only time consuming but pointless. Changes in one part of the body achieved with an exercise to improve posture will bring about, often unexpected, results in another. Muscles perform their function as directed by the controlling mechanism. Postural exercises call into play the same mechanisms that created the poor condition in a more vigorous manner. The result is ‘stronger’ muscles at the mercy of the faulty controlling mechanisms. The careless driver now has a more powerful car. 3. "We know what good posture feels like." The knowledge of how to maintain good posture has never been at a conscious level. The absence of poor habits allows good posture in children without us having to ‘do it’. Once habits start to interfere with the process and posture deteriorates we cannot know what to do to get it back. It is foolish to believe we can improve on what should be a natural process by trying harder. In order to perform corrective exercises it is assumed an individual knows how to use the muscle in question with the appropriate amount of tension. If we had this ability we would never have developed poor posture initially. The underlying condition causing poor posture cannot be used to improve it. Poor posture is a symptom and should not be addressed by direct means. To know what good posture ‘feels’ like, we need to have it. 4. "To correct posture we need to try harder." In fact the opposite is true. The centres of the brain that mediate the postural reflexes are at a level below conscious awareness and are therefore beyond our direct control. Any attempt to correct posture by a conscious act will interfere with this process. The common response by those wishing to ‘correct’ their immediate posture is to stiffen up, shorten the back, hold the breath and adopt the military stance. Young children are often used as an example of good posture, yet they give no consideration to it. They allow it happen by not interfering with the process. To achieve ‘good posture’ we need to learn what not to do so as not to impede the righting reflexes. 5. "An exercise to improve posture will enhance performance." As described earlier in this section, good posture does appear to promote efficient movement, however we need to go deeper to understand why. This view puts the cart before the horse. It is the ability for efficient movement that promotes good posture. Good posture is an indication of poise consequently poor posture is a sign of lost poise. A poised athlete moves freely with minimal effort and is not pulled out of shape by excessive muscle tension. The athlete without poise uses inappropriate muscle action in all activities, including the exercises prescribed to correct posture. If an individual has poise, corrective exercises are unnecessary and could even lead to its loss. If an individual does not have poise, any exercise to improve posture is counterproductive serving only to complicate the problem. Postural exercises may show improvements to shape, but by whose yardstick and at what cost to poise? The shape is not important. A better shape and sense of feeling stronger is not necessarily a good result. In a poised individual the appropriate muscular activity to maintain balance is activated by postural reflexes. When the reflex excites the muscle we experience only the movement, not the effort. For example when the patella (knee) reflex is tested we have no sensation of applying effort to move the leg because we receive feedback of effort only if we have voluntarily activated the muscle. In standing we do not need to voluntarily control muscular activity directly and therefore should have little sensation of strength. If we ‘feel’ stronger we are probably overworking the muscle. Exercises for developing specific muscles do not promote the balance and integration required for poise. New habits are learnt by using muscle to perform moves that may not correspond to their natural function. The postural reflexes in conjunction with the learnt pattern co-ordinate muscle activity for balance without the need for extra effort. Exercises designed to aid athletes could therefore have the unexpected side effect of restricting movement. When we engage the habits developed through exercise to attain what we assume to be ‘correct’ position or movement, we interfere with preparatory actions for movement. I believe targeting muscles with a specific exercise to improve posture encourages inappropriate use for actions that they are not intended to perform, ultimately leading to loss of poise. The next chapter looks at the 'mechanics' involved in posture.
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