An integral part of any warm-up routine should be setting your posture. Correct posture is a fundamental prerequisite for any movement. Just think of lubricating your joints – head to toe – with the 12 following movements.

Head Forward Flexion

Position

  • Always maintain your “Me” posture (as described in the Basic Posture section)
  • Shoulders back and down
  • “Dime” pinched
  • Knees soft
  • “Zipper” zipped
  • Feet light, relaxed and shoulder width apart or closer

Action

  • Lower your chin until you feel you are going to lose proper “Me” posture
  • Lift your chin until you feel you are going to lose proper “Me” posture

Tips

  • Head movement should stay within your Range of Motion – slow and controlled
  • Keep your feet relaxed
  • Make sure that your weight is equal on both feet at all times

Head Rotation

Position

  • Always maintain your “Me” posture (as described in the Basic Posture section)
  • Shoulders back and down
  • “Dime” pinched
  • Knees soft
  • “Zipper” zipped
  • Feet light, relaxed and shoulder width apart or closer

Action

  • Slowly rotate your head to one side until you feel you are going to lose proper “Me” posture
  • Slowly rotate your head to the other side until you feel you are going to lose proper “Me” posture
  • Check your posture for a moment as you return to a neutral position
  • Repeat

Tips

  • Head movement should stay within your Range of Motion – slow and controlled
  • Keep your feet relaxed
  • Make sure that your weight is equal on both feet at all times

Lateral Flexion

Position

  • Always maintain your “Me” posture (as described in the Basic Posture section)
  • Shoulders back and down
  • “Dime” pinched
  • Knees soft
  • “Zipper” zipped
  • Feet light, relaxed and shoulder width apart or closer

Action

  • Slowly tilt your head towards one shoulder until you feel you are going to lose proper “Me” posture
  • Check your posture for a moment as you return to a neutral position
  • Slowly tilt your head towards the other shoulder until you feel you are going to lose proper “Me” posture
  • Repeat

Tips

  • Head movement should stay within your Range of Motion – slow and controlled
  • Keep your feet relaxed
  • Make sure that your weight is equal on both feet at all times

Shoulder Rolls

Position

  • Always maintain your “Me” posture (as described in the Basic Posture section) — shoulders back and down, “Dime” pinched, knees soft and “Zipper” zipped
  • Keep feet light, relaxed and shoulder width apart or closer

Action

  • Keeping balanced over your “center line”, lift your shoulders straight up
  • Now roll your shoulders back (pinching the shoulder blades) while keeping “Zipper” zipped, “Dime” pinched and knees soft
  • Set your shoulders down, keeping tension on the muscles
  • Repeat, lifting your shoulders straight up (not forward)

Tips

  • Don’t let the shoulders move forward as we naturally do that all the time, whether we slouch, lift, sit or lock our knees, our entire body typically sets forward.
  • Many of the exercises in this app offset the effects of this tendency by pulling the spine and shoulders back to open the chest.

Torso Rotation

This moment can be tricky because here you move half the body while isolating the other. This movement and the following one (Hip Rotation) tend to be cemented into one movement and can be a bit challenging to master.

If you focus on the “Me” posture consistently it will get easier. Why are most of us frustrated with our core? It’s simple! We don’t engage it.

Position

  • Always maintain your “Me” posture (as described in the Basic Posture section)
  • Shoulders back and down
  • “Dime” pinched
  • Knees soft
  • “Zipper” zipped
  • Feet light, relaxed and shoulder width apart or closer
  • Action
  • Pretend that your spine is a pencil: draw an imaginary circle on the ceiling with the top of your head (your “pencil”), while pivoting from the bottom of your spine (between the hip bones)
  • Let’s break the movement down into segments:
    • Tip the spine to the right, only going as far as you can without losing “Me” posture. Maintain shoulders, “Dime”, knees, “Zipper” and keep your feet light.
    • Circle to the front while keeping “Me” posture with shoulders, hips and knees facing forward
    • Continue to rotate spine around to the left, still keeping alignment and “Me” posture with equal weight on both feet at all times
    • Finish by returning to a neutral position, finishing with good “Me” posture and alignment
    • Repeat a couple of times in the same direction
    • Repeat the entire exercise in the opposite direction
    • Tips
  • This movement pattern is often neglected and misunderstood. Learn this pattern well (along with the next one): it will do wonders for engaging the core. If you have the patience, the result may be a real eye opener!
  • Do small movements at the beginning – otherwise you will compensate with other parts of your body and never fully isolate and engage your core
  • Keep posture points intact: shoulders, “dime”, knees, “zipper” and feet relaxed, with weight equal and on all four corners of your feet
  • This movement is really important!

Hip Circles

Position

  • Always maintain your “Me” posture (as described in the Basic Posture section)
  • Shoulders back and down
  • “Dime” pinched
  • Knees soft
  • “Zipper” zipped
  • Feet light, relaxed and shoulder width apart or closer

Action

  • Imagine that you are very slowly using a hula hoop around your hips – but use a much smaller movement
  • When you begin, move the hips in a circle no larger than what allows you maintain “Me” posture: shoulders, “Dime” and knees…with feet relaxed and even weight on all four corners
  • Always keep your shoulders, hips and knees facing forward with your inner thighs drawn towards one another
  • Reverse and repeat
  • Tips
  • This movement and Torso Rotation (previous movement) are essential to a successful exercise program. The body region (the “core”) of these movements must be engaged at all times
  • Hip Circles and Torso Rotation need to be separate decoupled movements – for most of us they fuse together…
    • When that happens we stop using this area, our core…not good!
    • This typically is the first (and most important) body region to emphasize: we can’t strengthen it if we don’t engage it!

Knee Circles

Position

  • Always maintain your “Me” posture (as described in the Basic Posture section)
  • Shoulders back and down
  • “Dime” pinched
  • Knees soft
  • “Zipper” zipped
  • Feet light, relaxed and shoulder width apart or closer

Action

  • Circle knees in one direction, keeping shoulders, hips and knees facing forward
  • Repeat in the opposite direction

Tips

  • Only use a Range of Motion that lets you keep all four corners of the feet on the ground
  • Watch to make sure you keep your “Zipper” zipped and “Dime” pinched

Ankle Rotation

Position

  • Always maintain your “Me” posture (as described in the Basic Posture section)
  • Shoulders back and down
  • “Dime” pinched
  • Knees soft
  • “Zipper” zipped
  • Weight on one leg, with the other foot out slightly in front with weight on the ball of the foot
  • Keep hip, knees, and toe facing forwards

Action

  • Circle ankles to the outside a few times
  • Rotate to the inside a few times
  • Repeat both directions on the other foot

Tips

  • In order to stay balanced, only use a Range of Motion that allows you to maintain “Me” posture
  • Keep the hips, knees, and toes facing forward so that you engage your weaker muscles

Point and Flex Feet

Position

  • Always maintain your “Me” posture (as described in the Basic Posture section)
  • Shoulders back and down
  • “Dime” pinched
  • Knees soft
  • “Zipper” zipped
  • Feet light, relaxed and shoulder width apart or closer

Action

  • Lift one leg out in front (maintaining “Me” posture)
  • Point and flex the foot
  • Rotate the ankle around in a circle a few times
  • Repeat rotation in the other direction
  • Switch legs and repeat

Tips

  • Make sure that hip, knee and toe are aligned
  • Leading from inner thigh, keep slight inward rotation
  • Foot should be relaxed, not leading the inward rotation

Hamstring Curls

Position

  • Always maintain your “Me” posture (as described in the Basic Posture section)
  • Shoulders back and down
  • “Dime” pinched
  • Knees soft
  • “Zipper” zipped
  • Feet light, relaxed and shoulder width apart or closer

Action

  • Slowly bring one heel up towards the buttocks (only as far as you can maintain “Me” posture and alignment)
  • Slowly return to starting position while keeping the tension on the back of the thigh
  • Repeat a few times
  • Repeat entire movement with the other leg

Tips

  • Use caution: begin with small movements
  • Maintaining posture and alignment is essential
  • You can not change habits overnight, so go slowly on this one
  • This pattern has a lot going on: what helps the most is correcting bad habits we have built in to our everyday life, such as tucking our feet, locking our knees, not engaging the inner thighs
  • The more you incorporate the “Me” posture during the day, the better you will feel. You will reach your goals more quickly
  • Work on this one during the day – especially if you have a sit down job or one that requires a lot of travel

Hip Abduction/Adduction

Position

  • Always maintain your “Me” posture (as described in the Basic Posture section)
  • Shoulders back and down
  • “Dime” pinched
  • Knees soft
  • “Zipper” zipped
  • Feet light, relaxed and shoulder width apart or closer

Action

  • Balance on one leg using “Me” posture
  • Other leg is slightly held out in front (hip knees and toes facing forward)
  • Slowly bring leg out to the side while keeping alignment (hips even)
  • Thinking from the inner thigh, slowly move back towards the center
  • Continue to cross over the midline
  • Repeat a few times
  • Repeat on the other leg

Hip Rotation

Position

  • Always maintain your “Me” posture (as described in the Basic Posture section)
  • Shoulders back and down
  • “Dime” pinched
  • Knees soft
  • “Zipper” zipped
  • Feet light, relaxed and shoulder width apart or closer

Action

  • Lift one leg up in front while balancing on the other
  • Position the knee directly in line with hip
  • Foot out in front of knee, relaxed
  • Check for correct posture
  • Keeping knee in one place, pivot from the hip
  • Pivot in and out
  • Repeat a few times
  • Repeat entire movement with the other leg

Tips

  • “Think” from the hip: the rest of the leg will follow
  • Be sure to keep the knee directly in front of the hip