Does our job affect the way our body holds itself in space and what we can do about it
Our job is something we do for a great number of hours a day, repetitively, multiplied by weeks and years. Our body, and specifically as it concerns this post the musculoskeletal system, has the amazing ability to adapt to our physical demands.
When we do something repetitively for a period of time, the musculoskeletal system will adapt to allow for that activity to the best of its capacity.
Our job is therefore something that will undoubtedly be one of the big directors in the orchestra of our musculoskeletal system.
Of course, we can prepare our body to withstand the demands our job exerts on our body, so that this doesn’t get to dictate over our health. We’ll talk about lower down the post.
If our job will play a big role in determining how our body holds itself in space, we need to understand how, as well as the implications that this has in our health.
We know that the human body is capable of incredible transformation when the demand exerted over it changes. We see this on a daily basis in our friends and family as well as on social media through individuals fitness transformations. We also witness negative transformations, when physical activity ceases.
Having this transformational ability of our body in mind, I want to focus exclusively in this post on the fascial system. The reason being, this system has the greatest ability of all systems in our body to affect how our body holds itself in space.
One of the known functions of the fascial system is acting as connective tissue, holding everything in place. The detail of this spider web-like tissue is remarkable. If we were able to extract everything else from someone’s body but this connective network of fascia, we would be left with a perfectly detailed three dimensional version of the person.
Our job is something we do for a great number of hours a day, repetitively, multiplied by weeks and years. Our body, and specifically as it concerns this post the musculoskeletal system, has the amazing ability to adapt to our physical demands.
When we do something repetitively for a period of time, the musculoskeletal system will adapt to allow for that activity to the best of its capacity.
Our job is therefore something that will undoubtedly be one of the big directors in the orchestra of our musculoskeletal system.
Of course, we can prepare our body to withstand the demands our job exerts on our body, so that this doesn’t get to dictate over our health. We’ll talk about lower down the post.
If our job will play a big role in determining how our body holds itself in space, we need to understand how, as well as the implications that this has in our health.
We know that the human body is capable of incredible transformation when the demand exerted over it changes. We see this on a daily basis in our friends and family as well as on social media through individuals fitness transformations. We also witness negative transformations, when physical activity ceases.
Having this transformational ability of our body in mind, I want to focus exclusively in this post on the fascial system. The reason being, this system has the greatest ability of all systems in our body to affect how our body holds itself in space.
One of the known functions of the fascial system is acting as connective tissue, holding everything in place. The detail of this spider web-like tissue is remarkable. If we were able to extract everything else from someone’s body but this connective network of fascia, we would be left with a perfectly detailed three dimensional version of the person.
So we know that the fascial web has a structural and balancing duty, affecting how the body holds itself in space. The next question is, how does it change with our job?
Apart from a structural function or/and as part of it, the fascial net’s abilities don’t stop there. Far from being an inert tissue which wraps and gives support to muscles and other organ in place, this fascinating system (ignored for many years in the dissection room) has more nerve endings than any other tissue in the body with scientific insight now suggesting that it holds the key to pain and immune dysfunction.
Now answering to our question, how does the fascia change with our job? Let’s look at the most common job pattern in our society, sitting at a desc.
This lively fascial network responds to changes in pressure and load as well as other triggers. This means that when the person sits at the desk and rarely with a balanced posture for hours, the fascia will sense areas of added pressure within the musculoskeletal system and will start a chain reaction of events in order to lay extra layers of fascia in the direction the pressure is applied and in order to help the body hold that posture, as that is the demand we’re making.
The bigger the force the greater amount of fascial lining is needed.
Someone with a forward head posture at the desk, or someone slouching or sinking at the thoracic area is exerting proportionally more force on, for example, their mid back area or neck than someone that has the core engagement and the ability to sit more neutrally.
This is important because as the fascial tissue thickens under this conditions, it looses flexibility and becomes stiffer. This thicker fascia doesn’t slide as easily and it presents a problem on the long term, causing pain and structural imbalances as well as increasing the odds of injury.
Going back to our sitting desk person. When seated, the legs are bent and the arms and the head most of the times held forward. What this can cause if held for long periods of times and not taken care of is a shortening and thickening of the fascia at the front of the body, which is a problem when we then want to stand up and these tissues are locked short. In contraposition, the fascia at the back of our sitted person’s body is normally stretched and weak.
It’s in the elongated and weak tissue where the pain usually appears although it’s on the tissue that’s locked short where great part of the therapist’s work also needs to be concentrated.
This seated pattern, if not accounted for and treated, is source for lower back presentations, breathing problems, as well as neck and shoulder pain and presentations between others.
So we know that the fascial web has a structural and balancing duty, affecting how the body holds itself in space. The next question is, how does it change with our job?
Apart from a structural function or/and as part of it, the fascial net’s abilities don’t stop there. Far from being an inert tissue which wraps and gives support to muscles and other organ in place, this fascinating system (ignored for many years in the dissection room) has more nerve endings than any other tissue in the body with scientific insight now suggesting that it holds the key to pain and immune dysfunction.
Now answering to our question, how does the fascia change with our job? Let’s look at the most common job pattern in our society, sitting at a desc.
This lively fascial network responds to changes in pressure and load as well as other triggers. This means that when the person sits at the desk and rarely with a balanced posture for hours, the fascia will sense areas of added pressure within the musculoskeletal system and will start a chain reaction of events in order to lay extra layers of fascia in the direction the pressure is applied and in order to help the body hold that posture, as that is the demand we’re making.
The bigger the force the greater amount of fascial lining is needed.
Someone with a forward head posture at the desk, or someone slouching or sinking at the thoracic area is exerting proportionally more force on, for example, their mid back area or neck than someone that has the core engagement and the ability to sit more neutrally.
This is important because as the fascial tissue thickens under this conditions, it looses flexibility and becomes stiffer. This thicker fascia doesn’t slide as easily and it presents a problem on the long term, causing pain and structural imbalances as well as increasing the odds of injury.
Going back to our sitting desk person. When seated, the legs are bent and the arms and the head most of the times held forward. What this can cause if held for long periods of times and not taken care of is a shortening and thickening of the fascia at the front of the body, which is a problem when we then want to stand up and these tissues are locked short. In contraposition, the fascia at the back of our sitted person’s body is normally stretched and weak.
It’s in the elongated and weak tissue where the pain usually appears although it’s on the tissue that’s locked short where great part of the therapist’s work also needs to be concentrated.
This seated pattern, if not accounted for and treated, is source for lower back presentations, breathing problems, as well as neck and shoulder pain and presentations between others.
Like sitting, any job has a repetitiveness to it.
Think for example of a musician and their posture, a violinist, can you see how many areas of trouble that posture has? Now think of a construction worker or a waiter, or a soft tissue therapist! more of the same. I could write a book about my journey over the years on this matter!
You can now imagine how a job can cause postural patterns, locked areas in the myofascial trains, both locked short and locked long, twists and compensatory patterns arising from there.
Of course our job is not the only moment when our body mechanics are challenged and affected, with something as simple as standing upright and walking becoming very complicated. The reality is that we can start experiencing imbalance when we are really young.
When we move functionally and neutrally, our body is more prepared to withstand whatever task we throw at it.
If we prepared our body to move functionally or neutrally from a young age, it would save the world a lot of pain and money! Unfortunately they don’t teach this in school, so we have to learn it as we go along.
Either way and due to the amazing ability of our body to change, as we described above, we are the real directors in our body and we have the capacity to modify our reality and our musculoskeletal health independently of what our job is.
Imbalance in our fascial system is of course not only cause by mechanical forces, as described in this post. Our fascia also responds to a wide variety of stressors, from diet, to stress (this one being a very powerful stressor for this tissue), to injury ect.
Of course, imbalances in the fascial network not only affect our body structurally and physically but they also affect our feeling of wellbeing and general health. This means that addressing the fascia we’ll also be improving on these areas.
We have the power to prepare our body to better withstand our job’s demand. Someone that regularly releases the areas that tend to become locked short and trains their body to functionally being able to move functionally and hold a more neutral position will increase their chance to have a healthier and fully functional life for longer than someone that doesn’t have these into consideration or doesn’t have the tools to do it.
The effort required to prepare our body and to look after it, it’s overridden by the benefits and the feeling of wellbeing that comes with it.
Like sitting, any job has a repetitiveness to it. Think for example of a musician and their posture, a violinist, can you see how many areas of trouble that posture has? Now think of a construction worker or a waiter, or a soft tissue therapist! more of the same. I could write a book about my journey over the years on this matter!
You can now imagine how a job can cause postural patterns, locked areas in the myofascial trains, both locked short and locked long, twists and compensatory patterns arising from there.
Of course our job is not the only moment when our body mechanics are challenged and affected, with something as simple as standing upright and walking becoming very complicated. The reality is that we can start experiencing imbalance when we are really young.
When we move functionally and neutrally, our body is more prepared to withstand whatever task we throw at it.
If we prepared our body to move functionally or neutrally from a young age, it would save the world a lot of pain and money! Unfortunately they don’t teach this in school, so we have to learn it as we go along.
Either way and due to the amazing ability of our body to change, as we described above, we are the real directors in our body and we have the capacity to modify our reality and our musculoskeletal health independently of what our job is.
Imbalance in our fascial system is of course not only cause by mechanical forces, as described in this post. Our fascia also responds to a wide variety of stressors, from diet, to stress (this one being a very powerful stressor for this tissue), to injury ect.
Of course, imbalances in the fascial network not only affect our body structurally and physically but they also affect our feeling of wellbeing and general health. This means that addressing the fascia we’ll also be improving on these areas.
We have the power to prepare our body to better withstand our job’s demand. Someone that regularly releases the areas that tend to become locked short and trains their body to functionally being able to move functionally and hold a more neutral position will increase their chance to have a healthier and fully functional life for longer than someone that doesn’t have these into consideration or doesn’t have the tools to do it.
The effort required to prepare our body and to look after it, it’s overridden by the benefits and the feeling of wellbeing that comes with it.