Good Posture Meditation

As a youth, my mother would always stay on me about my posture.  She would come behind me and straighten my shoulders up, saying that young ladies should walk with their backs straight.  Being the tomboy that I was,  I never paid her any attention.  Besides,  it felt wayyy better to slouch.  It was just comfortable and unfortunately became a really bad habit over the years.  Not to mention, working at a desk eight hours a day, only increased my slouching.  But as a mother myself now,  I find that I too, often come behind my daughter and tell her to keep her posture straight.  The only difference, is that I  give her a little better explanation as to why she should be conscious in her posture.  In my more mature years now, I've come to realize that good posture is important for more than how a "young lady should walk". I try to convey these benefits to my daughter when she ask WHY must she stand, walk, sit, straight.  Here are a few benefits that I've found through my research thanks to Celestine Chua:

1. Facilitates breathing: A good posture naturally enables you to breathe properly.
2. Increases concentration and thinking ability: When you are breathing properly, you increase your thinking ability too. More air, more oxygen. More oxygen, more brain food. More brain food leads to more thoughts and ideas.
3. Improve your image: People with good postures look smarter and more attractive. Someone with a good posture naturally exudes an aura of assertiveness and appeal.
4. Feel even better about yourself: When you have a good posture, it helps to make you feel more self-confident, without even doing anything else different. Try sitting in a bad posture now for 30 seconds. Now, switch to a good posture for 30 seconds as well. Is there any difference in how you felt?
5. Avoid health complications: A bad posture results in several complications over time, such as increased risks of slipped disc, back aches, back pain, pressure inside your chest, poor blood circulation.

Some helpful ways to improve your posture are:

Get a good chair at the workplace
Eliminate bad habits that cultivate bad postures (i.e. no exercise, sleeping on your stomach)
Treat yourself to a massage (head, shoulder, and back)
Invest in a good bed and pillow
Ground your feet when sitting or standing

Those are only a few suggestions, but the long term benefits will be great!  I always thought my father was just a proud man because he walked with his head held high and his shoulders and back straight.  While, this may be true, he is also fully aware of the benefits from having such a stature.  So I plan to follow suit and try to stay conscious in my posture. I will admit, it is a little uncomfortable at first, but hopefully sooner than later it will become natural habit.   I hope this little tid bit of info was helpful to you and that you will also take heed.

Have a great weekend!