Knee Posture

When you think about it, we take our knees for granted, except when they are bothersome.  Just as good postural habits can help our spine and neck, good positioning of the knees may forestall problems in the knee joint.

How the knees are supposed to work
Moving 
Our knee is a simple hinge.  It can bend and straighten and brace.  There can be no sideways movement or twisting without issues arising.  We can strengthen bending and flexing and we can strengthen bracing. We can ensure joint health by doing stretches, in this one plane of movement.

We must guard against twisting the knee, especially while loaded up with body weight.  Think of those careful Tai Chi steps.  When we place our foot down angling the toe outwards, it allows us to easily step to the diagonal.  Similarly side stepping, when we place our foot toe-down first of all, we can load up with body weight without compromising the knee.

Sitting Knee Posture

Consider what it is like sitting at the desk, completely absorbed in work.  We already know how to keep our spine happy - stack sit, "behind" behind you. What about our feet and knees?  If your legs are tucked under the seat and your ankles are crossed, it would be bad news for the knees and the circulation of the legs altogether. It will also cause our spinal positioning to suffer.
Ideal seated-knee posture means both feet are on the floor and the knees are at 90 degrees

Standing Knee Posture 

Unlock your knees, simple.... 

Try this experiment. Stand up with your legs straight, now tighten the leg muscles so that your knees hyper extend, you can also call it locking the knees. They seem to poke out the back a little. This has effects upon the the posture - your spine will extend and your head comes forward.  Two things you don't want.  Certainly, it is easier to lock out the knees - you hang from your skeleton instead of relying on muscles.  This is only a short term advantage, though.  

Our head forward posture costs us a lot of energy and possibly neck and shoulder pain.  Maybe even a sway in our back starts to ache. So let's unlocked those knees stay a little more agile; allow for better circulation,and  make it easier to stand strong and straight. 

An idea from Japan to Manage stress Shinrin-Yoku Words of Wisdom - Wow

The physio from

Shinrin-Yoku, Japanese Forest Bathing.  It was an idea to help me manage my shoulder 

pain, when it was quite acute. The idea is that being in a forest, is like meditation. 

It quietens down the stress associated with pain.  Here are the basics. 

Forest bathing basics

• Find a suitable place that's easy and pleasant to walk on, has places to sit, and ideally with access to natural waterways and different aspects. It also helps if it's close to home.
• On arrival, notice the place you are in, notice your body, and tune in to your senses.
• Walk slowly with steady step-by-step pace, while silently noticing what is in motion in the forest. If you start to feel distracted or rushed, come to a complete halt.
• Make friends with the forest. Notice the trees, stones, plants and flowers. Listen to the forest. Let the natural world make an impression on your mind.
• Sit down. Find a comfortable place to sit, staying still for up to 20 minutes, cultivating awareness.
• Give back. Quietly acknowledge everything the forest gives you.

Source: The Nature and Forest Therapy Association

Don't you just love it?

Postural Habits all Click Together - Habit of the Week, HOW

As we start to implement our postural habits, we don't need to remember them all.  Our habits all work together, so if we remember one of them, we are easily able to practice many. Let me illustrate:-

While we are walking
For example, if our head is stacked above our body, it is easy to spread our chest triangle.  While we are there with our head in an easy neutral position it is easy to look into the longer distance for our safety sake.
With our chest triangle open and lifted, it is easy to swing our arms or roll our shoulders up and  back and down. Delicious!

While we are sitting

Why not stack sit, nice and tall, with our "behind" behind us.  This allows us to easily, place the head directly over the body.  A simple shoulder rolls puts our arms in the correct place.  

These are familiar habits. You know them as well as I do.  These habits make our movement and sitting more efficient i.e. less energy wasted. Beautiful posture helps reduce stress and aches and pains.  Our posture assists us in breathing better, and digestion.

Let's put our posture habits to good use. 

How Boring - Words of Wisdom - WOW

Are only boring people bored?  Is it a reflection of your character if you are bored? It is the way we cope with boredom that is the real question.

The Dopamine System.

There is a reward centre in our brains. It could be called, more correctly, the "desire centre". It is here that the chemical dopamine operates.   It could be regarded as the motivation system, without which, we wouldn't even be motivated enough to get a drink of water when we are thirsty. 

However, the corporate digital world exploited our reward/desire system to keep us clicking on the internet or Facebook, or playing on screen games searching for the reward.  Before we get all high and mighty about those young people, the digital gen y and their phone addiction - let's think about our own guilty pleasures, food, gambling, alcohol, the internet. 

Let 's also consider how TV uses the reward centre to promotes itself  "coming up next". We are given an exciting teaser and we are hooked. 
As with any reward - like any addiction or compulsion - as we become habituated, the level needs to be greater and greater, because our dopamine receptor "down regulates" that means we need more and more for the same reward.  They have also discovered that random rewards are more attractive than a reward every time. For example, if you were to glance down at your phone and see a text message every time, it would not be as thrilling as not knowing whether you have a message or not.

However, there is something exciting you can do. I should say "boring" you can do.  You can have one boring day per week.  The idea is have an entire day without your particular guilty pleasure.  This resets the dopamine levels.  So that boring hard work, can become more interesting. To illustrate this, imagine that a man were to be served gourmet meals every day,  if he were then to be offered a bowl of steamed rice,  it would not be attractive.  However, if the same man were starving, that bowl of steamed rice would be delicious.

We live in a high stimulus, short-attention-span environment. Maybe our circuits need a break.
Go bathe in the forest - Shinrin-Yoku. 

"shinrin-yoku" is Japanese forest bathing.  It is a thing. There is no water involved, though. "Japanese research has identified measurable health benefits from a stroll in the forest"  (ABC Life)  

I also recommend Cal Newport's two books "Deep Work" and "Digital Minimilism"

Here is a link to the dopamine story on Youtube:-

Dopamine Detox by "Better than Yesterday"

Breathing through your nose is a good trick - Smelling the roses

Patrick McKeown is the oxygen man:-  The Oxygen Advantage is his program
He has devoted his career towards educating us all about the benefits of nose breathing -compared to mouth breathing.

There are around 30 tasks that nose breathing performs. You would know a few already. Nose breathing:-

• slows down the breath
• Warms the air
• Sterilizes the outside air before it enters the lungs against virus and bugs
• Transports nitric oxide into the lungs thus the bloodstream.
• slower breath goes to the lower parts of the lung, towards the diaphragm.
• allows for optimal exchange of gases with the blood vessels of the lungs
• The tongue can stay on the roof of the mouth, the correct position
• Therefore better body posture
• better sports performance
• much more efficient and so better sports performance

Mouth breathing on the other hand:-

• Speeds up the breath. 
• dries out the airways
• mainly goes to the upper part of the chest
• faster breath impairs the exchange of the gases oxygen and carbon dioxide
• the tongue is positioned incorrectly and not at the roof of the mouth
• This means Head-Forward posture.. oh no. 

I was a mouth breather when I was younger.  I had allergic rhinitis for years.  This could account for my own head forward posture. 

Nose breathing has big implications for exercise.  For vigorous exercise, nose breathing is a little more difficult.  However, because exchange is gentler and slower in the lungs, it becomes more efficient, it should pay an efficiency dividend and be worth the effort. 
I've tried to stick with nose breathing on my morning walk. Truthfully, I don't know if it is the placebo effect, but it actually feels easier and I recovered better  

This idea turns everything on its head.  How often have we been told to just take a deep breath?  According to Patrick, no no no.

We should seek to take a slow long breath through our nose, of course. When we breath incorrectly, and we take a big breath we send air to the chest, the upper part,  and  because the air is travelling so fast and forcefully, it cannot be exchanged properly, you know, oxygen into the blood stream, carbon dioxide out. We can actually train our management of the carbon dioxide levels. That is exciting. 

As well, during the proverbial big gasp inwards, with an open mouth, the all important nitric oxide  enters neither the lungs nor the blood vessels. Nitric Oxide has the capacity to relax and soften the blood vessels, therefore lowers our stress levels. It is an anti inflammatory. We miss out on this with mouth breathing

Patrick McGeown says that we should experience a breath hunger. We are still safe, there is plenty of oxygen in the blood stream. There is a breath "pacemaker" in the brain, which is governed by carbon dioxide levels in the blood.  We can train ourselves to slow down our breath rate - which is not only more efficient, but is a way of reducing stress - modern life is equal to faster breath. 

Talk about smelling the roses. He claims that to smell that rose, if we try a much gentler breath - our experience of the scent would be better.

This week's habit is try to breathe through the nose, breathe more gently and slow down.  You might be surprised at the difference.  I was surprised.

Here is the link to the benefits of nose breathing 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oftuk0FrlCo


and 
Here is a link to Patrick's Ted talk:-

 Ted Talk Patrick McKeown