Shoulder
Dancing Smart Newsletter,
January 23, 2004
Brrrrrr… Hope everyone is keeping warm. Thanks to all of you who wrote in with questions this week. I will be addressing most of them in upcoming newsletters.
Here’s this week’s question.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
What are some exercises for adults who take dance classes and have round shoulders? Some work behind the computers, or they carry heavy bags. Thanks for the opportunity to ask questions. Maggie
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
That’s a great question, Maggie. This makes a great point about how our daily activities influence what’s happening in the dance class more than our dance classes influencing our movement outside of class. Spending 4-8 hours at the computer or desk, waitressing, being a student (slumped in a poorly made chair, writing for hours at a time), all can have a potentially detrimental effect on our posture and alignment.
Another way to state this is how you stand, sit and move outside of class has everything to do with how well you can move in class!
My answer to your question is two-fold. I would first have you look at the computer setup. Check to see if the height of your chair to your keyboard is conducive to sitting up straight. There is lots of good information on the Internet on setting up your workspace correctly.
Carrying heavy bags is also a problem over a long period of time, not only to your shoulders, but also to your back. Perhaps backpacks are not the current fashion rage, but I still use one when needing to carry heavy objects, such as books or my variety of teaching materials I take to class.
Now lets talk about the shoulder girdle and its alignment. I am constantly correcting student and clients on how they are ‘standing up straight’. So many of them stand up straight by putting the shoulder blades back in a military type posture. When they stop thinking about their posture, their shoulders round back forward. When they slump and round the upper back forward, this rounds the shoulders. The trick is to get the spine aligned, lengthening the spine, and allowing the shoulder girdle to rest on top of the ribs.
It is easy to forget that standing up straight is a function of the spine, and not the shoulder girdle. The bones of the shoulders girdle are the collarbone (clavicle), scapula (shoulder blades), and humerus (upper arm bone). The clavicle and scapula rest on the ribcage, or you can think of them hanging and resting down towards your waist.
With rounded shoulders typically the pattern requires you to release the front of the shoulder, which are the pectoralis muscles, and strengthen the muscles on the backside of the shoulder. First and foremost, you need to address elongating the spine and coming into a more anatomically efficient alignment — then your stretching and strengthening will really make a difference!
Here are some ways to stretch those tight muscles in front of the shoulder.
The pec stretch that everyone knows is done on a wall. You are stretching one arm/shoulder at a time by placing your arm at shoulder height with your palm against the wall. Slowly and carefully rotate the shoulders away from the wall until you feel the stretch.
The next variation again has the arm behind you on the wall, but this time with your elbow bent at a 90-degree angle and touching the wall. Again turn slowly and gently away from the wall. It often doesn’t take much turning to feel a really good stretch! Make sure you are keeping the stretch feeling comfortable, not painful.
The last variation is working in a doorway. You want to place your hand behind the top of a doorway and move your body forward while maintaining hand contact with the top of the doorway. Make sure you keep your ribs down while doing this. It is similar to doing port de bras in 5th and then taking the arms behind you.
Stay warm, and I’ll talk to you next week!
Deborah
"Education is the key to injury prevention"
DeborahVogel@thebodyseries.com