By: Maplewood Chiropractic Health Center

Embrace Your Inner Wisdom

Life is a balancing act.  Chiropractors recognize that there is a balancing act between different forces on us both from outside and inside of our bodies.  A fascinating aspect of our bodies is that there are forces that build our body up and forces that break us down.  Astronauts, for example, suffer from all manner of ailments if they spend extended time out of earth's gravity, like decreased muscle and bone strength, for example.  Gravity on the other hand, can cause us to hunch forward and become stooped and bent over, over time.  The key is that the right balance of forces is critical for our body to be able to fully express great health, and to heal from stress, trauma and injury,

In day to day life, the positive stress of physical activity is another example of forces that are necessary for the body.  Regular physical activity is a set of forces that our bodies respond to positively and get stronger with over time.  Bed rest, alternately, is one of the most harmful activities for the body, as extended bed rest is known to rapidly re-create the effects of aging.

Chiropractic is a specific force designed to restore function, alignment, and healing.  Applying the right amount and right kind of forces is a critical part of a healthy, vibrant, functioning body.  Chiropractic can help you line up the right forces and avoid the wrong ones.

"Don't Make Your Chiropractor Say 'Yikes!'"

Your body loves variety.  A variety of movement and a variety of different postures.  Chiropractors know that our current society has a problem - a sitting problem.  A sitting problem at work, when we travel, and even at home.

Recent estimates have found that we sit on the average of 9-10 hours per day, according to a recent piece called "Sitting Ducks" by the British Journal of Sports Medicine.  With an average sleeping time of 7 hours, this leaves barely a quarter of the day for anything else besides sleeping and sitting.  It's no wonder that chiropractors are getting a little bit uncomfortable about the current state of affairs when it comes to people's health.  They know that the body does best with a wide array of different types of movement, and that this variety puts the right types of positive stress on all of our bodies' different systems.

When the amount of sitting gets high enough, the harmful effects of being sedentary can't even be fully overcome by regular exercise.  This publication also details how even for people with regular physical activity, excess sitting still increases mortality risk in research studies, despite the presence of exercise.

So if you find yourself stuck too long in the chair, take frequent breaks and get up and walk around - a proven strategy to reduce the stress of too much sitting.  It will help your chiropractor's state of mind. Because the way society is sitting around right now, they are saying "Yikes!"