stress

Exercises to Help Improve Your Posture

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Virtually everything we do requires us to hunch forward – typing, cooking, driving, etc. When we slouch, our chest muscles shorten, our back muscles weaken, and our abdominal muscles grow slack. This muscle shortening is a cause of a wide range of uncomfortable symptoms. Fortunately, however, being mindful of our posture can prevent back pain, help us feel better, and even assist in projecting more confidence.

We hear a lot about “core” strength, but what exactly is the core? Put simply, it is the series of abdominal and lower back muscles that connect to your spine and pelvis. These muscles are involved in virtually every movement we perform, but like any other muscle group they can become unbalanced from lack of consistent use. Imbalances in strength and use can cause them to grow fatigued, get overstressed, and wither over time.

In order to improve posture, we must strengthen our core muscles through consistent, periodic training, without overdoing it. Finding routines which use resistant bands or dumbbells can be a great way to improve strength and flexibility but it’s important to realize the differences between resistance bands and dumbbells before incorporating them into your fitness routine.

Having the right routine to strengthen your core will assist in reversing the feeling of “tight” muscles, strengthen little-used muscles that have atrophied through lack of use, and keep consistently-used muscles from growing fatigued.

Try the following simple exercises on alternating days with one day off in-between. You may feel a bit sore on the first few days, but being consistent with this quick and easy routine will improve your posture and fortify your core and back muscles.

Core Exercises:

Lying Leg Raises

Lie down on your back with your legs straight. Put your hands by your sides or under your glutes with palms facing down (to support the lower back). Press your lower back to the floor as you lift your legs off the ground until they make a 90-degree angle from the floor. Slowly lower your legs back down towards the ground.

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Curl Up/Crunches

Lie down on your back with your knees bent and feet flat on the ground. Put your hands across your chest or pointing forward by your sides. Keep your lower back pressed to the floor, slowly roll your head, shoulders, and upper back off the ground. With control, slowly roll back down.

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Plank

Start with your elbows on the ground with palms facing down and fingers facing forward. Make sure that your shoulders are right above your elbows, and they are away from your ears (no shrugging). Your toes should be tucked under towards your shins. Keep your core tight and leg rigid. Try squeezing your thigh and glute muscles. Hold in this position for as long as you’re comfortable. You should not be feeling your lower back.

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Back-Focused Exercises:

Superman:

Lie down on your stomach with your arms out overhead and your legs straight behind you. Lift your arms and legs off the ground simultaneously as you contract your back and glute muscles. Keep the motion slow and controlled. Your neck, head, and spine should be aligned. Slowly lower your arms and legs back down on the ground.

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Shoulder Blade Pinch:

Stand or sit with your shoulders back, down, and relaxed. Squeeze your shoulder blades together as you open up your chest. Hold the pinch for 10 seconds.

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Cobra Back Extension:

Lie on your stomach with your hands by your shoulders. Straighten your arms as you contract your back muscles in a back bend. Hold this pose for a second before slowly lowering back down.

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Trainer’s Tips:

Pull ab muscles in and up toward your spine – try not to use your hips to move your lower core.
Use slow, controlled movements—don’t jerk your body through the movement.
Breathe evenly throughout the movement—don’t hold your breath.
Stop doing any activity that causes pain or makes pain worse!

 

 

Blog by Guest Author:  Sally Leung – a fitness coach, certified personal trainer, fitness instructor, and nutrition and wellness specialist who is committed to helping others live their healthiest lives. She is also the host of Get Fit, Get Strong on Rogers TV and the creator of her signature program – The Bikini Body Method. Sally believes in sustainable changes, and she is passionate about helping everyone discover how to permanently improve their lives. For workout ideas, fitness tips, and recipes, check out her website www.SallyLeungFitness.com and follow her on social media: www.Facebook.com/SallyLeungFitness and www.Instagram.com/SallyLeungFitness

I’m Single. Why Does Valentine’s Day Matter?

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Valentine's Day

It doesn’t matter if you are attached or single on Valentine’s Day! The message that should be portrayed goes much deeper than getting chocolates from a secret admirer.

Sadly, the confectionary and stationery companies have gotten ahold of this once-sacred holiday and turned it into another opportunity for consumption.

If you are able to look past spending money on teddy bears, chocolates, flowers and lace, you will begin to see that there is a beautiful side to the now-commercialized holiday.

The message that shines through from the deeper side of this holiday is the importance of taking a moment to appreciate love, the wonderful people in our lives and to take a minute to shower each other with gratitude.

In present day, that gratitude can equate to purchases, but at the roots of the holiday, the message is love and appreciation.

However, the most important aspect of the love and appreciation we share on this day can sometimes be forgotten.

Self Love!!

What are you doing today to celebrate your SELF?? Your incredible value, your consciousness, your health and your life? Often, it’s too easy to forget about our selves and care for everyone else, showering them with all of our love, kindness, support and help, and we forget to leave some for ourselves!!

It is very difficult to fill someone else’s cup if yours is empty.

This week, in honour of Saint Valentine, spend some time with yourself, working on your self care, and noticing how you feel.

Spend time doing things that you love to do, take a time out and close the door. Remember back to less stressful times, or maybe when you actually had TIME! and think of things you used to love to do. If you have a hobby that you haven’t picked up in awhile, return to it and experience the joy of doing things you want to do, rather than things you have to do!

Maybe your self care is making time to have a luxurious bath without your children banging the door down. Ask for support when you need it – and have someone help you out so that you can take a bit of time for yourself.

Or maybe you love yoga and rarely get the chance to go to a class. If you have responsibilities at home that make it difficult to go to a class, bring one to you!! There are many amazing yoga classes on YouTube that you can do right at home. Look for an online teacher that is at your speed and make time to enjoy this practice. Get lost in your breath and breathe joy and love back into your life.

Whatever you choose to do to create space for some self care, it’s also important to focus on self love. Develop a mantra that you can say to yourself every day that makes you feel important, appreciated, beautiful, loved, healthy and supported. It is so important to develop a deep love for yourself and treat yourself how you treat your best friend – with kind, supportive words and overflowing love and kindness.

Sitting Too Much is the New Smoking

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sitting

The amount of sitting that we do in a day has quickly become a concern for our health and longevity.  Studies reveal that the health impact of sitting for too many hours a day can be compared to the effects that smoking has on our health.

A sedentary lifestyle has been linked to;
  • Cancer
  • Diabetes
  • Obesity
  • Cardiovascular disease
  • Weakened immune system.

Let’s explore some ways to ensure that you don’t fall symptom to these diseases.

Shocking!  How Many Hours Of Sitting We Do In A Day

There is the time in the car on the way to and from work.  The 8 hours at the office.  All in addition to spending time each night on the couch in front of the television, computer or on your phone.

The winter months in Canada can be particularly difficult to get motivated to work out or to be more active.  But there are some simple things that you can add to your daily routine to increase your activity level without having to brave the elements of winter.

Set A Goal To Be Active 10 Minutes Each Hour That You Are Awake!

If you wake up at 6 am and go to bed at 10 pm, then you have 160 minutes to fill with activity.  Don’t panic.  Activity doesn’t mean that you have to be actively exercising.

Activity could be as simple as;
  • Standing at your desk while you make phone calls
  • Tidying your house
  • Preparing dinner
  • Walking to the car (I suggest parking at the far end of the parking lot at work and the grocery store to increase your activity) 
  • Taking a walk on your lunch break
  • Taking a yoga or pilates class, or any other form of exercise that you enjoy

Click here to read, “10 Desk Exercises You Should Be Doing Every Day”.

If you are pressed for time to fit in exercise, try multitasking.

When you drop the kids off at their extracurricular activities, rather than sitting and waiting for them to be finished, use this time to do an impromptu workout.  Walk around the block or if the weather isn’t nice, go to a nearby shopping centre and do a quick lap around the store.

If you are prone to watching a lot of television during the winter, then during the commercial breaks, get up and do a small work out.

Do three reps of 15 squats, lunges, push-ups, sit-ups, or go through a quick yoga flow of stretches.

Get a fitness tracker and aim to hit around 10,000 steps per day.

Especially if you are the type of person that needs to visually see your progress throughout the day.

The benefits of an active lifestyle are far reaching and include;
  • Higher energy levels
  • More restful sleep
  • Lower body mass index
  • Detoxification
  • Better mental clarity

By bringing awareness to our level of activity we can easily make adjustments to our lifestyle.  All this to ensure that we are taking care good of our health and maximizing our longevity.

With Sources From:

http://www.nchpad.org/403/2216/Sedentary~Lifestyle~is~Dangerous~to~Your~Health

Meditation isn’t Supposed to be Frustrating!

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I don’t know about you, but whenever I sit down to meditate, I have instant anxiety! I have got a to-do list that is growing by the minute, I have so many balls in the air that I feel like if I take my eye off of one just long enough to take my first meditative breath, they are all going to come crashing down.

Which is EXACTLY why I need to meditate!!!

So I am going to start meditating more regularly, and actively trying to turn off the panic that rushes toward me whenever I take a mini-break for myself to recharge.

I encourage you to join me in daily meditation!

Because really, what better way can we spend just 5 minutes than bettering ourselves!!

Meditation is an excellent way to reduce stress and improve your focus (once you get past the panic!! just kidding.)

It is particularly important for people who feel daily stress and find themselves in a routine that they can’t quite keep up with. It is an excellent way to quiet your mind and clear your thoughts of trivial issues to make room for more meaningful ideas to surface.

The best part is, you can carve out time for meditation any time you’d like throughout the day. Some people prefer to meditation first thing in the morning, to set the tone for their day, while others prefer to take a break over lunch, and find a quiet spot to meditate mid-day. It can also be quite nice to spend some time in the evenings meditating before you get ready for bed. This can be very helpful in turning off the days’ thoughts, aiding restful sleep, and calming your mind.

Here are some tips to make your meditation productive and enjoyable:

1. Find a comfortable place to relax. If sitting cross legged on the floor doesn’t do it for you, find a comfy chair. Make sure you are warm enough, because as you are not moving and potentially calming your heart rate, you may feel chilled. Throw on a warm sweater.

2. Make your new comfy spot a place that is relatively quiet. Especially for beginners, it is so easy to get distracted by others talking or moving about. If you can have a quiet room with a door that can close, even better!

3. It’s okay if you have racing thoughts. Part of the whole point is to take some time separating yourself from those racing thoughts to position yourself to be able to just observe them. Rather than connecting with them and feeling like the pressure of whatever you are thinking about, simply take the vantage point of looking down upon your thoughts and watching them float by. With no attachment, you can hover above them and not be affected by them.

4. What are you supposed to think about?? Well, nothing and everything! A great way to just let thoughts come and go is to focus on your breath. Be still and be one with each inhalation and exhalation. Notice how your breath feels inside your body. Notice the pause you take between inhaling and exhaling. That is really how you are in life while meditating – embrace the pause!! Feel the rhythm of your breath and imagine it is like the ocean waves. In and out, powerful and strong. Feel the gratitude that comes with feeling this moment of just being alive!

5. Guided meditations are a very nice option to listen to a recorded voice that will guide you along a visualization meditation. There are many on YouTube that you can enjoy that also have beautiful music accompanying your visualized journey.

Most importantly, the best tip is to try to meditate daily. The more consistent you become with your practice, the more you will look forward to this time you spend benefiting your whole being.

Just remember, an athlete doesn’t just work out when they’ve gotten out of shape – they work out every day to be their best self. It’s the same with meditation – we can’t just meditate when we feel stressed already – it should be part of our daily schedule.

5 Tips You Must Know to Destroy Stress Today!

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What are you doing to manage your stress? It seems like every day we are inundated by more and more triggers, and the world just seems to be speeding up.

If you can’t keep up, what if you just stopped? What if you just turned off the pace of the rest of the world and went inside for a bit?

The thing is, most of the daily stresses in our lives will not matter in five years. Maybe not even in 5 days! But they are serious triggers in a moment-by-moment day.

Obviously, there are the major stresses, such as the passing of a loved one, major life decisions, new career opportunities, relationships ending and children arriving into your life, but for the daily stresses, how can we manage that better?

Most of us are on the clock.

The majority of stress is because we have way too many things to complete in a day, than the clock gives us time to do!

It’s always speeding up and the to-do list tends to continue to grow.

Between responsibilities at home, at work, at your children’s school, caring for aging parents, creating healthy meals, working on your relationships and squeezing in a little social time, it is really hard to balance everything that life demands of us.

Here are some tips that will sound crazy, and your stressed-out brain will say “ABSOLUTELY NOT! I HAVE NO MORE TIME IN THE DAY FOR ANYTHING!”

But I promise you, that after just a couple weeks, (and in some cases just a couple of days) your life will feel more put together than you could ever imagine in this moment.

1. Quit Sugar, Quit Caffeine, Quit Smoking, Quit Drinking (Yes, you read that right!)

All of these substances wreak havoc on your adrenals and your stress response system. Your body does not need any other external stresses to deal with, and sugar, caffeine, nicotine and alcohol are all very serious triggers for your body. It sends your body out of equilibrium by introducing external substances that are meant to excite or depress you. Your body must fight to expel these substances and adds an extra burden to your health.

Stop the sugary foods – pasta, breads, rice, muffins, cereal, and focus on consuming a colourful plant based diet. Limit your caffeine intake to one coffee per day, no more soda and no more energy drinks! Even switching to herbal tea would make a huge impact! Get off the cigarettes and curb your evening wine or drinks. It all interferes with your entire system.

2. Begin a Daily Stress Reduction Practice

Even for 5 minutes a day, sit in a relaxed position and let you mind focus on gratitude. Focus on your breath, the easiest thing you can be grateful for. Follow your breath and feel its powerful rhythm. Enjoy the moment between inhalation and exhalation – the pause – as there is power in the stillness. This little bit of time will help to centre you for your day.

3. Move that Body!

Seriously, for even 15 minutes a day. Turn the music up and dance! Or speed walk around the neighbourhood with your family. Be silly, take turns seeing who can walk the fastest! Get your heart rate up and have fun! Try a class at the gym, do a yoga video on YouTube, or try a high intensity interval training session. Just move it more often and your body will reward you by feeling energized and more alive.

4. Master Your Mind

Decide what demands your attention and what can wait. Prioritize your to-do list and understand that you can only do what you can do. Try to stop focusing on staying ahead of the clock. What are you rushing against anyway? We all end up in the same place, so why rush through life so quickly?

5. Get Adjusted!

Your spine needs to be in alignment to let you function at 100%! Get adjusted regularly and know that the interferences that find their way into your spine via stress, injuries, repetition and toxins are being removed by your Doctor of Chiropractic.

Stressed to the MAX!

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Hippocrates in 460-377 BC was aware of ‘stress’.  So why has it taken so long for ‘stress’ and mental health issues to finally receive some acknowledgement in OUR time?  Walter Cannon in 1929 confirmed that the stress response is part of a unified body-mind system to take flight or fight. Canadian scientist Hans Selye spent 40 years of his career extending Cannon’s concepts and has since made stress a major concept in psychology and medicine today.

Lately, everyone seems to be getting on this ‘hot’ topic. The media, talk shows, books, research, the Occupational Health & Safety Act, Worker’s Safety and Insurance Board, and the list goes on, finally want to talk about stress and mental health issues. What took them so long?

The World Health Organization (WHO) defines Mental Health as, ‘The state of well-being in which every individual realizes his or her own potential, can cope with the normal stresses of life, can work productively and fruitfully, and is able to make a contribution to her or his community.’

The Canadian Mental Health Association defines Stress as ‘the body’s response to a real or perceived threat. That response is meant to get people ready for some kind of action to get them out of danger. But most of the threats people face today aren’t something that they can fight or run away from. These threats are usually problems that people have to work through. Stress is a reaction to a situation—it isn’t about the actual situation.’

Here are my thoughts about stress and mental health issues:

They are REAL. They EXIST.

Very few understand the IMPACT stress and mental health issues have to one’s life, unless you’ve been there, or know someone that’s been there. For those of you who are still sitting on the fence as to whether or not you think this is truly an illness, I would say, ‘it’s time to wake up’. This illness is affecting 1 out of 4 people daily! People lose their relationships, their jobs, their motivation to live, their clarity, their understanding of self AND finding all that again, takes time, patience and plenty of love and support. It’s a long and up hill battle to get your life back, and to eventually find out that your life will never be the same because, THIS stress, mental health issue, changes you, forever.

Have a heart.

If you feel a friend or a loved one is not their self, take the take to listen and extend a helping hand. Suggest natural therapies such as homeopathy, naturopathy, counseling, chiropractic and other modalities to assist them back to health, to work, and to their life again. Slowly, with understanding and guidance, those experiencing stress and mental health issues, will make a recovery to a place of wellness. Until then, direct them to organizations such as the Canadian Mental Health Association or Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, or a psychologist, psychiatrist, social worker or other professional that has an expertise in the field. Together, we can make a difference in someone’s life with compassion and genuine interest by acknowledging and honoring the stress they are going through with support and direction to expert care.

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Blog by Guest Author:

Pic-of-LucieLucie M.H. Fournier RN, COHN(C), BA (Psych)
Founder/Workplace Health Strategist
With over 30 years of experience in disability management, and a return on investment on average of 1:7, Fournier disAbility & Health provides customized and results oriented services in Absenteeism Management including Attendance, Sick Time/Short, Long Term Disability, and WSIB claims for employers across Ontario.
Expertise in 5 distinct niches of disAbility management include:
1. Complex claims management resolution
2. Mental health claim return to work & accommodations
3. Advanced level training for internal claims manager to make a significant impact on the health of the employee and wealth of the organization
4. Transitional Leadership when moving to & from a 3rd party disAbility Management company
5. Sensitive claims & disAbility management of professional staff, such as HR, health team, and/or executives such as supervisors, managers, directors
Find Lucie at www.FournierHealth.com and https://www.facebook.com/fournierhealth/ and https://www.linkedin.com/in/luciemhfournier