Modern humans have quite�the conundrum. Instead of spending all waking hours spear throwing, digging up roots, building shelter, cooking over a fire and playing with body paint, homo sapiens have evolved to sit and stare at a box. Well, maybe not a box anymore. More like a flat panel LCD, fold into your pocket, accomplish all you’ll ever need in one finger tap wonder pod. Our brains have taken over our bodies main purpose. We might as well�wipe the vast majority of our genome�and metamorphasize into�floating brains with jelly fish bodies. Sounds very Wall-E esque’.
Fearing a world of blobby brains I put together a list of random techniques you can use everyday to scorch excess calories and keep your metabolism humming. All of which fit in between all your various duties, chores, and braininess.
1.) Idolize Mr. Clean: Mopping, dishes, vaccuming and sweeping need to get done. For the rest of your life you will have to pick up after yourself and possibly a kido or two, so might as well make it a workout. Think of those dirty deeds as a chance to keep your blood pumping. Blast music while you rock out between rooms. Put a time frame on how fast you can sweep and mop the kitchen. Fold laundry like a pro while adding some squats to the ritual. Fold a shirt, take a squat, fold some socks, hit the floor for a push up, etc.
2.) Sit Erect: Poor posture while sitting causes all sorts of back, neck and shoulder pain as I am sure many of you have felt while working on a computer or lounging on a puffy couch. Set reminders on your computer to sit tall. Drop your shoulders down your back and open your collar bones without sticking out your chest. Imagine you have a really tall collar on your shirt and your neck can’t touch it on any side. Your core postural muscles will most likely ache in strife, but you’ll eventually get to the point where you can sit erect with little effort. Follow along for instant relief.
3.) Stand More Often: When you’re paying the bills, cutting vegetables, reading the mail and the like, forget the chair and stand up tall. Standing up burns far more calories then sitting and prevents posture issues associated with slumping in a seat. Keep your weight evenly distributed over both feet; front, back and side to side for ideal alignment.
4.) Be A Lady: When sitting, avoid crossing your legs. Practice squeezing the knees and ankles together in a parallel position straight out from the hips. After a few minutes your inner thighs should shake in disbelief at how hard it is to keep your legs together but keep it up. Sitting like a lady is pure isometric work for the inner thighs and invariably your postural muscles from sitting so perfectly. A few more calories roasted!
5.) Move From Your Core: When reaching for your bag in the back seat, shuffling around with the mop, carrying groceries, or any action for that matter, initiate the movement from you core. We are talking abs, back, shoulders and hips here. For example, if you are swinging a mop side to side along the floor, instead of using your arms so much try to move from your abdominals. Stabilize the shoulder blades down and zip up the abdominals by pulling them into the spine. Then twist from your obliques allowing the upper torso to follow suit. In this way you are starting from your center, reducing the strain on tight shoulders and neck. This makes the movement more full bodied thus upping the calories expended.
6.) Make Everything Full Body: Contrary to typical gym going mentality the body does not function in sections. Isolating biceps, pecs, and hamstrings with free weights and various torture machines found on gym floors doesn’t aide us in our everyday mobility. The body is connected across vaste networks of fascia, nerves, ligaments and tendons beyond the somewhat superficial muscle groups. That’s why pressing a point on your foot can eleviate tension in your neck. With this in mind experiment with making your daily tasks involve more muscles.
For example, if you are getting up from your chair to get a cup-o-joe pull in those abs, drop your shoulders, and imagine you are coming out of a perfect squat. Give your butt a good squeeze as you stand fully upright. If you have arms on your chair even better! Place your hands on each arm and push yourself up to standing with abs in and shoulders blades stable. Don’t let them come up to your ears. Do some tricep dips while you are at it.
7.) Quality: Number 5 and 6 touch on the importance of the quality of your movement. If you take away one thing from this article let it be this…quality and form of any movement is more important than anything else. If you aim to work in perfect form not only will you have to do less to achieve the same results, but you will prevent injury later down the line.
8.) Heels Go Everywhere: Stairs or elavator? Hopefully this is an obvious answer. But if for some reason you find yourself working in an 20+ story office building hop in the elavator, but add some heel raises. Simply stand with your feet hip width apart and lift your heels keep your legs straight. The elavator will challenge your balance. Do 20 heel lifts and then balance at the top of the lift as you arrive at your destination floor. Heel lifts are awesome because they can be done anywhere and don’t make you look too crazy :D.
9.) Head Bang: If there’s music let there be head banging. In the car, in your bedroom and especially out on the town let your hair down and shake it. A few hours on the dance floor or even rocking out in your car burns calories and stress!
10.) Scrub a Dub Dub: I did say this list was random didn’t I? A fantastic way to wake up the mind and body in the shower is to scrub your entire body vigorously. Known as body brushing, you can use a special brush or even a rough hand towel and get to work massaging and rubbing down every inch of skin. Start at your feet and work in circles. Movement for improved circulation (fantastic for cellulite!) and the best way to stay so fresh and so clean clean.
