Nature designed us to thrive in simpler times. We used to eat more simply, live more simply, and move around a lot more. Humans evolved to be physical creatures, hunting game, picking nuts and berries, building weapons, and gathering logs and leaves to make shelters.
But today we operate in a technological world in which so much of our physical labor has been replaced by psychological labor. Whether you’re a teacher marking books, a retail assistant spending eight hours a day behind a high-tech checkout, an accountant bending towards your computer screen, a professional driver crouched over the steering wheel of your taxi or truck, or a studying student, a significant amount of your daily work is not muscle-based but brain-based.
This is a massive shift in how we are all spending our daily lives. And it’s having a terrible effect on our posture. As we bend our busy brains towards our modern forms of work—and our televisions, tablets, and phones when we’re not at work—we’re changing the ways that our bodies function. For some of us, standing up straight with good posture can feel unnatural. For others, sitting up straight can be a real effort. Modern sedentary living is weakening all kinds of different muscles that are designed to support our skeleton. This can cause a whole host of problems, including back pain, shoulder pain and headaches.
One hugely important set of muscles that is woefully underused for many of us is our bottom muscles, or glutes. Our glutes are a keystone muscle, which means they’re such a crucial part of our muscle network that, if we allow them to weaken through inactivity, it can have a negative effect on other parts of our body, from the shoulders right down to the feet.
But it’s not just our glutes. Many important muscles, such as the ones that control our shoulder blades and our deep abdominal muscles (also known as our core), don’t work as efficiently as they should and often stay switched off when they should be switched on. And because they are not doing the job they are supposed to be doing, our bodies start to compensate. Other muscles in the body try to take up the slack, but this comes at a cost. It’s often not long before that has a knock-on effect and some muscles start to overwork, joints become overused and, before you know it, a little niggle turns into chronic, debilitating pain. Just as problematic is the fact that, if you don’t use certain muscles or put your joints through their full range of motion, your body becomes less efficient and deskilled at performing certain basic movements. This is often the reason behind those classic cases of people bending over to pick up a pen and putting their back out.
The following two Balance health snacks have been designed to wake up your sleepy muscles and allow your body to experience the full range of movement that it’s being starved of in our modern lives. They’ve been created in collaboration with Gary Ward (@garyward_aim), one of the world’s leading thinkers on human movement.
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You can listen to my Feel Better, Live More podcast to learn more about the importance of these Balance health snacks. Here are some great episodes to start with: drchatterjee.com/71 | https://drchatterjee.com/stay-pain-free-foot-collective/ | https://drchatterjee.com/garyward/ |
DESK JOCKEY WORKOUT
Spend five minutes undoing the damage of sitting down all day.
This health snack is particularly good if you spend most of your day sitting down, perhaps looking at screens. It can be incredibly helpful for back pain, neck pain, shoulder discomfort, and stiffness. It involves doing the following four exercises in sequence in the order prescribed.
WALL COGS
FRONTAL COGS
ARM SPIRALS
THE CRUCIFIX
Work through the above four exercises in sequence and then repeat. This will take you approximately five minutes.
WALL COGS
This exercise will open up and mobilize your shoulder blades, spine, pelvis, and ribcage.
•Stand with your back to the wall. The back of your head, your shoulders, and your bottom should be touching the wall and your feet should be two to three inches away from it. Your arms should hang down naturally, palms facing in.
•For the duration of this exercise, ensure that there are always three points of contact with the wall: your bottom, your upper back and the back of your head.
•Picture on left Slide the back of your head up the wall. As you do this, you will feel your chin coming towards your chest a little. At the same time, feel as though your ribcage is lifting up and your chest is expanding. Imagine you are wearing a belt and the buckle is pointing towards the floor as the arch in your lower back gets bigger.
•As you’re doing this, twist your hands outward, so that your palms face outwards and your thumbs point behind you. This will help to open up your shoulders and bring your shoulder blades towards each other, encouraging a full range of motion.
•Picture on right Now do the reverse. Slide your head back down the wall, past your starting position, until your eyes are looking up a little. At the same time, bring your ribcage down. Try to close the gap between your lower back and the wall so they become flush. As you do this, your imaginary belt buckle will start to point towards the ceiling. Your hands and arms will turn inwards, like a corkscrew.
•Move in and out of both positions. Repeat the above sequence ten times, while focusing on smooth and controlled movements. Quality is much more important than quantity, so stop as soon as you feel your form worsening.
To watch a video of this move, go to drchatterjee.com/wallcogs
FRONTAL COGS
Frontal cogs are similar to wall cogs but work your body in a different plane. In this workout, you will use your back and chest muscles as well as your ribs.
•Stand up tall and straight.
•Bend your right knee forward while keeping both feet on the floor. As you do, feel the weight going into your left hip. Your left hip will hitch up and now be higher than your right hip.
•As you do this, reach your right arm up towards the ceiling. Really push it as high as it can go—a common mistake is not to reach high enough!
•Now do the reverse. Bend the left knee forward as the right knee straightens. Your right hip will now be higher than your left. Reach your left arm up as high as it will go. It is the reach that is most important here. Think about reaching all the way into your fingertips.
•Move in and out of both positions. Repeat the above sequence ten times, while focusing on smooth and controlled movements. Quality is much more important than quantity, so stop as soon as you feel your form worsening.
To watch a video of this move, go to drchatterjee.com/frontalcogs
ARM SPIRALS
Our arms and shoulder blades are often chronically underused, especially in people who are stuck in chairs all day with their arms relatively immobile. This can lead to pain in our necks and shoulders and, sometimes, contribute to headaches. Arm spirals are a brilliant way to wake up your arms and shoulder blades and get them moving.
•Stand upright with both arms hanging by your sides in a relaxed manner. Your thumbs should be pointing out in front of you.
•Picture on left Turn your thumbs inwards as far as they will go so that they are pointing at the wall behind you. Your arms will feel like corkscrews as you do this movement and you will notice your shoulders rounding.
•Picture on right Now do the opposite. Turn out both your hands, arms and elbows as far as they’ll go. Your thumbs will go full circle by coming round to point at the wall in front of you and then continuing until they point behind you. You should feel as if you’re standing up nice and tall. Your shoulder blades should be squeezed together and your ribs and chest will be upright and open.
•Move in and out of both positions. Repeat the above sequence ten times, while focusing on smooth and controlled movements. Quality is much more important than quantity, so stop as soon as you feel your form worsening.
To watch a video of this move, go to drchatterjee.com/armspirals
THE CRUCIFIX
I’ve been doing the crucifix most days for years and it’s helped enormously with my back pain and my posture. The beauty of this exercise is that it can be done anywhere, with no equipment, and it doesn’t even get you sweaty.
•Stand up tall and straight with your arms in a “T” position. Your thumbs should be pointing straight out in front of you.
•Picture on left Turn your left arm fully inwards by bringing your left thumb down so that it starts to point to the floor and ends up pointing behind you. At the same time, turn your right arm fully outwards so that your right thumb starts to point towards the ceiling and ends up pointing behind you.
•Your left shoulder should become fully rounded so that, if you were to look over your left shoulder, you’d be able to see the top of your left shoulder blade.
•Picture on right From here, go to the opposite movement, with your right arm turning fully inwards and your left arm fully outwards.
•While performing each movement, try to keep your head level and feel as though your right and left arms are reaching out as far as possible, as if you’re trying your best to pull your shoulder blades apart.
•Move in and out of both positions. Repeat the above sequence ten times, while focusing on smooth and controlled movements. Quality is much more important than quantity, so stop as soon as you feel your form worsening.
To watch a video of this move, go to drchatterjee.com/crucifix
THE CLOCK WORKOUT
Wake up your body by moving it in all directions.
Much of our lives are spent moving our bodies in only one direction. Whether we’re sitting on a chair, flexing our neck up and down to look at screens or moving between floors by going up and down stairs, we’re drastically limited in our range of motions. Our bodies were designed to move in three dimensions, yet modern life forces us to largely move in only one.
This can contribute to pain and stiffness all over our body. Over the years, our bodies change and adapt to the lives that we have led, the injuries we have experienced and the repetitive behaviors we have employed. Certain muscles get overused while others don’t get used enough. This can result in us experiencing problems when we try to be active. For example, some of us can no longer walk or run with optimal form, which can result in us experiencing pain or getting injured.
This clock workout is especially good for those of us who like to be active but spend a lot of time during the day sitting down. It can certainly help improve shoulder problems, elbow pain, hip stiffness, and back discomfort. But it’s also a brilliant workout for prepping your body for your life when not sitting down. I often do it before I go for a run or swim.
LUNGE CLOCK
SHOULDER CLOCK
CORE CLOCK
twelve o’clock
nine o’clock
seven o’clock
six o’clock
four o’clock
two o’clock
LUNGE CLOCK
This exercise will get your glutes working in every possible direction. Many cases of back pain have weak glutes as a contributory factor. The lunge clock is particularly beneficial for those who feel stiffness and pain in their lower back or who sit down all day at work. It will improve your strength, which will help you go up stairs more efficiently, run faster, and walk better. My approach prioritizes functionality over looks, but the simple fact is that when your bottom muscles are firing more efficiently, their shape will almost always improve.
•Stand with both your feet together.
•Lunge out towards twelve o’clock on an imaginary clock face with the left leg. Try to feel as if your weight is in the front of your left foot. Allow your body to go where it wants to go. It is perfectly OK for your knee to go past your ankle in this exercise, as this encourages full mobility in the feet.
•Bring the left leg back to the starting position.
•Lunge out to eleven o’clock with your left foot then return to the starting position. As you lunge, ensure that your right foot is still facing forward.
•Continue doing this sequence all the way round the clock.
•When you get to nine o’clock you will feel as though you are doing a sideways lunge (see photo).
•Lunging to six o’clock will feel like a reverse lunge, as most of your weight will be on your right foot. This will be the same for five o’clock, four o’clock and three o’clock.
•When you get to two o’clock, the left leg will again start to take most of the weight as it comes round and over (see photo).
•Repeat with the other leg. To do both sides will take approximately 90 seconds.
As you get better at doing the clock motions, you can make them more interesting, and challenging, by holding weights, water bottles, or cans of beans in each hand.
To watch a video of this move, as well as some tips on making them even more beneficial, go to drchatterjee.com/lungeclocks
twelve o’clock
one o’clock
four o’clock
SHOULDER CLOCK
This exercise helps you to free up your upper back and shoulders from the prison of sedentary life. It can help if you suffer from shoulder or neck pain and stiffness. It can also help ease headaches.
The first time I did this exercise I felt as though my shoulder blades were being moved into positions they had never been in before. It felt fantastic.
•Stand facing a wall, about 12 inches away from it.
•Rest your bent forearms against the wall, out in front of your chest.
•Maintaining arm contact with the wall, reach up with your right hand to twelve o’clock. Reach as far as you can. The more you reach, the more movement you’re exposing your shoulder joints and muscles to.
•Allow your body to follow your arm. Don’t try to keep your body still—allow it to move in a way that enables you to reach your arm as far as possible along the clock point.
•Bring your right hand back to the starting position.
•Reach out with your left hand to twelve o’clock as far as you can, then bring your left hand back to the starting position.
•Now reach your right hand to one o’clock, and back.
•Repeat with the left hand.
•Continue this sequence, alternating hands around the whole clock face.
•When you are reaching with your left hand, say, to four o’clock, feel free to use the back of your hand rather than the palm (see photo).
•To go around the entire clock face will take approximately 90 seconds.
To watch a video of this move, go to drchatterjee.com/shoulderclocks
twelve o’clock
nine o’clock
eight o’clock
CORE CLOCK
This exercise moves your whole body in a variety of different directions. It strengthens and mobilizes your abdominals, back, shoulder muscles, and spine. It is a brilliant whole-body movement that can be really helpful if you have pain and stiffness in your body at the end of a busy working day or as a great warm-up before you do something more active, such as going for a bike ride, a walk, or a run.
•Start off on all fours, with your knees under your hips and your hands under your shoulders. Slide your left hand out as far as possible in front of you to the twelve o’clock position.
•Reach as far as possible with your left hand and allow your body to follow. You will need to bend your right elbow to allow yourself to reach further. If your hips want to go out to the side to allow you to do this, great—don’t stop them.
•Bring the left hand back to the starting position and repeat with the right hand. Remember to reach out as far as you can.
•Bring the right hand back to the starting position and then reach the left hand out as far as you can to eleven o’clock, then back. Repeat with the right hand.
•Keep going, around as many of the clock-face positions as you can, alternating from left to right hand.
•As you start to reach the side of the clock-face, you will sometimes need to use the back of your hands to reach. For example, when reaching out to nine o’clock (as in the photo opposite), your left hand will reach out with the palm facing down and your right hand will reach out with the palm facing up. Remember to reach your hand as far as you can.
•Once you have gone around as many clock positions as you can, return to the starting position.
•To go around the entire clock face will take approximately 90 seconds.
As you get stronger, you will soon be able to do this clock workout with your knees off the floor, in the starting position of a plank (forearms on the floor). To make the movement even more challenging, you can start off in a push-up position. With one arm supporting you, reach out the other to as many of the clock-face numbers as possible.
To watch a video of this move, go to drchatterjee.com/coreclocks
CASE STUDY
Ian was one of those patients who don't really come to the doctor’s much, even when they are poorly. He worked at a help desk for a transport company and he told me that over the last few months he'd been suffering from lower-back pain and that it would get progressively worse as the day went on. By the end of his shift, he’d often also feel a little niggle at the base of his neck on the right-hand side. He'd asked for a standing desk but had been denied permission by his boss. He’d been treating himself with strong over-the-counter painkillers. He came to see me when the pain began interfering with his Saturday park-run sessions, which were the one thing he’d look forward to all week.
When I saw Ian, there was a six-week wait in our practice for a physical therapist. During this period, I gave him the Desk Jockey Workout to do. I told him there were multiple things that could be contributing to his pain, including bending over a screen and being on the phone all day. Our body is designed to move with a whole different range of motions, but our jobs often restrict us to one plane or dimension of movement. I told Ian that this particular workout would remind his entire body of all the different movements that it was regularly neglecting.
Within days, Ian found that his back was a bit looser and the niggles in his neck started to reduce in strength and frequency. By the time I saw him two weeks later, his neck pain had gone completely. “My back is still pretty bad,” he said, “but it certainly feels a lot looser after I've done the exercise.”
Because he’d felt the difference the Desk Jockey Workout could make for him, he promised to start doing it at work as well. As soon as it hit one o’clock he’d go to a storage room that didn’t get used much and spend five minutes doing the workout. Three weeks later I got a message to say that Ian had canceled his appointment with the phyiscal therapist.