Deskbound

Deskbound: Standing Up To A Sitting World by Kelly Starrett <-- Book link


I recommend everyone who uses a desk, or sits down for extended periods of time, to read this. I've switched over entirely to a standing desk and made huge life changes after learning what extended sitting does to our bodies and health. A couple of freebies that I feel that should be shared:

  1. Invest in a standing desk, or sitting-standing desk, and a comfortable foot mat to go along with it. The full desks are pricey, but well worth the cost. I ended up getting a cheap IKEA one for about $250 but an electronic one can go for as much as $700. I noticed physical changes within a few days, less pain and my posture slowly becoming better over the course of weeks. There are also desk stands for laptops and books that go on your existing desk, but I found them to be too bulky and take up too much room. However, desk stands are a good alternative if ergonomic space isn't a big deal.
  2. The Bracing Sequence: The first exercise taught in the book and the most useful to begin with if you don't exercise or stretch: It will stretch the correct body parts, you can do it laying down or standing, and it is a good diagnosic tool to assess what parts are out of alignment in you.


The Bracing Sequence (taken from http://www.encasedinsteel.co.uk/2016/01/23/the-bracing-sequence/):

    • Step 1: Squeeze the glutes (If you find this hard, make your feet straight and about 6" apart and rotate your legs outward without actually rotating your feet out; you will feel your pelvis extend out and your lower back straighten.)
    • Step 2: Pull your ribcage down to your hips
    • Step 3: Get your belly tight (just pull your diaphragm towards your spine about 30% of the way)
    • Step 4: Set your head to neutral and screw your shoulders into a stable position (rotate your palms forward so your shoulders go back and do a horizontal chin tuck.

"In step one, we are squeezing the glutes together, which should drive the hips forward. A lot of people have overextension in the lower backs, and this step ensures that the hips are correctly placed underneath the ribs and helps to eliminate overextension.

Step two similarly combats overextension and ensures that the ribs correctly sit over the pelvis. The analogy that Dr. Starrett uses to describe this is to imagine that the ribs and the pelvis are both bowls filled with liquid. If they sit directly on top of each other, the liquid can’t escape. If you either overextend however or round into flexion, then the edges of the bowls no longer meet and water escapes. I normally explain this step by telling people to pull the bottom of the ribcage down to the top of the pelvis as if doing a miniature crunch.

Step three is to tighten the belly. Dr. Starrett describes this not as “sucking in or hollowing; it’s not even drawing in; it’s stiffening in place as you exhale.” As a coaching cue, I generally tell people to draw the belly button in towards the spine. This is not quite what is described in the original sequence, but I’ve found that if I tell people to stiffen the mid-section, they very often don’t know how to do this, but they always understand how to draw the belly button towards the spine. If steps one and two have been correctly executed first, this will also prevent the midsection from being sucked in too far. Steps one and two ensured the lower back was placed in the correct position, step three creates more intra-abdominal pressure, which will help to maintain the correct position of the back.

Step four is about finally ensuring that our head and arms are in the correct position. Ideally, the head should be directly centred over the spine and the shoulders should be down to the sides of the body, rather than rounded forward. “Note: you don’t need to squeeze your shoulder blades together; just feel the tips of your shoulder blades reaching towards your hips.” At this stage, I normally tell people to roll their shoulders back and down, which not only puts the shoulders in the correct position, but generally as people do this, they also put their head and thoracic spine into the correct position as well."


Posture Exercises

I followed the Athlean-X video above to fix a lot of my back issues (I looked like that guy in the before-picture). I found the first step and third steps were not helping too much, so I modified it with a foam roller and doing thoracic extensions over it with my arms held out straight in front of me and slightly crossed, which replaced the first step. The third step was a bit too rough with a weight on my head, so I replaced it with chin tucks on the floor and bringing my head up slightly to exercise the neck flexor muscles (third video). The combination of these started reversing twenty years of poor posture and pain almost immediately.

Note: If any of these videos are taken down and you want copies, please email me and I'll provide download links.