7 Exercises to Fix Your Bad Computer Posture

Hi, everyone!  This is Lara Hammock from the Marble Jar channel and in today’s video, I’m going to talk about bad computer posture and what to do about it!

So, what is bad computer posture?  Just take a minute to think about how your posture might be affected by our society's recent dependency on computers and smart phones. The most pronounced issue is that we are losing the curve in our necks. Necks are supposed to look like this with a healthy curve. You can see that having a curve in your neck nicely stacks your head on top of your shoulders. By looking at screens constantly, we are changing the curve in our neck to be more straight. Our ears no longer stack on top of our shoulders, because our head is jutting out in front of us.  Some call this forward head or forward carriage.  Here’s the problem with that — every time you move your head forward an inch, 10lb of extra weight are added to your neck. This creates all kinds of problems, including headaches, neck strain, TMJ, pinched nerves, and breathing issues.

The other big issue that comes from our heavy use of computers and smart phones is the tendency to roll our shoulders forward and slump.  There are significant heath issues with this as well, but just to state the obvious — it looks terrible!  It makes us look shorter, dumpier, and less confident. In fact, studies have shown that just changing your posture increases self-esteem, improves your mood, and reduces stress.  Plus, bad posture is habit forming so once it becomes the way you normally stand, it is harder and harder to actually force yourself to have good posture.  

For me, I only realized recently how far forward I'm carrying my head these days.  I think it is made worse by my posture when looking at my iPad.  And I'm utterly convinced that this is at least half the reason for my neck soreness, TMJ, and frequent headaches.  In addition, because I do roll my shoulders forward, I’m afraid that if I don’t change things now, I could end up eventually looking like this.  Since I'm already super short -- I can't afford to lose any height through bad posture!

First of all, let's establish what good posture is.  Stand with your back against a wall with your feet, butt, shoulders, and head touching.  That is correct posture.  Are your shoulders touching the wall or just your shoulder blades?  Roll your shoulders back until they touch the wall.  Ow, right?  The problem is -- the longer you have had bad posture, the more that your muscles have conformed and tightened around your bad habits.  I think the most important thing is to be constantly conscious of how you are holding yourself -- consciously try to pull your chin in and roll your shoulders back.  Including when you are sitting.  That's not very fun news, is it?  I'm starting to think that the only time you can really relax is when you are fully reclining -- otherwise, you should constantly be working to hold your body in place.  However, if you are like me, I've had bad habits for so long that my muscles are tight and its physically exhausting to maintain good posture for any length of time.  So, here are some exercises to do in order to 1) strengthen the right muscles and 2) stretch out the ones that are contributing to your bad posture.  Let's start with the neck.

3 Exercises to Regain Neck Curve

• Double Chin -- This exercise helps to build the muscles to hold your head in the right position.  You are going to put your finger on your chin and push it way back beyond good posture and hold it there (you can see why I call it the double chin) for 20-30 seconds.  
• Chin Lift - This both strengthens and stretches and is easy to perform in an office chair.  You just lift your chin up until your face is parallel with the ceiling and hold for 20 seconds.  I find this exercise absolutely excruciating after about 2 seconds -- which means I'm probably on the right path.  
• Neck Range of Motion - This also strengthens and stretches the neck muscles.  There are 6 ranges that you should try to loosen up.  First, head to neck, now face to ceiling, ear to left shoulder, ear to right shoulder, now turn to left shoulder, and turn to right shoulder.  Don't try to overextend, once you feel resistance, hold for 5-10 seconds in each position.

4 Exercises to help roll your shoulders back

Bad posture creates tight shoulder and pectoral muscles.  These muscles right here (whatever they are called) get particularly tight if you stand and sit with your shoulders rolled forward. It makes sense to stretch these muscles so that it is easier to roll your shoulders back AND strengthen the muscles in your shoulders that you need to keep them back there.

• Behind the Back V stretch - Grasp both hands behind your back and pull back and up.  Hold for 30 seconds.
• Doorway stretch - Here’s another good way to stretch those muscles using body weight force. Find a doorway that you can step through. Make your left arm into an L shape and lay it flat against the molding.  Step your left foot through the doorway and twist your body to the right until you get a good stretch.  Repeat on the other side.
• Wall Hands Up - This helps build the muscles needed to maintain good posture. Back up against a wall and put your hands in “hands up” position with your butt, shoulders, head, elbows and hands all touching the wall. Your upper arms should be parallel to the floor. Now squeeze your shoulder blades together and hold for 5-10 seconds.
• Arm Circles - this helps to build the muscles required to hold your shoulders in position.  For this, your hand positioning is important. Hold your hands with the fingers touching the palms and the thumbs out like you are hitchhiking. Now raise the arms out from your sides and point the thumbs forward, palms facing down.  Do small circles forward 50 times or until it burns. Now point the thumbs backward with palms facing up and do small circles backwards 50 times.

I am not an expert on any of this, but the information came from reputable sources.  If you are an expert, let me know if there are other things you would recommend!  My dad is a huge believer in Egoscue therapy, which uses posture and alignment exercises to solve chronic pain.  Egoscue has a more holistic body philosophy where posture and movement affect all parts of your body.  So, I'm also looking into that, but for now -- I'm trying to be very conscious of my posture, I'm changing some of my work configurations to accommodate better alignment, and I'm doing these exercises.  

Let me know what you think!  Comments are always appreciated and thanks for watching!