posture

Aside from making you look instantly thinner, posture is important to a healthy body. Before you get worried stiff that your slouching is irreversible, we found an app, sports bra, and handy belt to help. Because posture affects everything from digestion to achieving flat abs, consider one of these three helpful reminders for work or workout.

• LUMOback: The LUMOback ($149) is perfect for anyone who spends long hours at a desk. A small belt that you can wear anywhere, LUMOback will gently vibrate when you slouch from your lower back, reminding you to sit or stand straight. It then uses Bluetooth to track your progress and give you feedback over time. Not only will you start to feel better, reversing the negative effects of poor posture, but you'll look better too!
• IntelliSkin: When it comes to fitness, good posture can prevent injury and improve performance. IntelliSkin makes garments like tops and sports bras to cue your muscles to work together for better postural awareness. Many athletes, like surfers and volleyball players, use IntelliSkin during practice, but you can also wear them as undergarments at work. Could these possibly be considered an athletic version of Spanx?
• Upright: Yes, your smartphone can help you stand taller! Upright ($3) is an app that helps to improve your posture by alerting you every time you slouch. Once it's calibrated, keep your phone in your pocket, and you'll be altered every time you begin to hunch. You can even start with baby steps, configuring the time period and "slouch-sensitivity."

Good posture not only makes you look confident, but it can also make you look up to 10 pounds thinner. No matter how toned those abs might be, slouching curves the spine forward, creating rolls on the belly. It can also make you appear inches shorter than you truly are. From my time in the Pilates studio, I can tell you the majority of my clients tuck the pelvis under and let the ribs fall behind their center, allowing the shoulders to round forward. This makes a giant C-cure out of the spine. And this is definitely not good posture.

The solution to the droopy spine and tucked pelvis is pretty simple:

1. Stick out your booty: You need to correct the pelvis before you can affect the rest of the torso. To untuck your pelvis, you need the pubic bone and the two bones at the top of the pelvis (known as ASIS) to form a triangle perpendicular to the ground. To find your ASIS, put your hands on your hips just like the gal in the photo.
2. Move ribs forward: Once the pelvis is aligned straight up and down, you need to place the ribcage on top of it. I like to think of the pelvis and the ribcage as the building blocks of the torso. Moving your ribcage forward over your pelvis, rather than having it hang back, lengthens the front of your torso, which naturally helps to pull the abs in. Think of the ribcage moving up and forward. With the ribs and pelvis in alignment, pulling the deep abs to the spine — without squeezing your butt or rounding the spine — will help maintain this neutral position of the back.
3. Open your chest: Slouching allows the shoulders to roll forward and inward, closing down the chest. Simply think of expanding your shoulders wide to the sides. Your breast bone (aka sternum) is technically part of your ribcage, so continue the process by moving that forward-and-up feeling in your chest, too.

This postural tip works whether you're sporting a bikini or a one-piece, wearing a halter dress or short shorts. Not only will you look good, but your spine will appreciate your good posture too.

Chances are, if you're sitting at a desk, you're hunching. Rounded shoulders and back are symptoms of all those hours spent sitting in a chair. While the long-term solution to the problem is to create an ergonomic desk environment, for immediate relief of tension and strain, take two minutes to do these quick stretches now to realign your shoulders, straighten up, and feel better fast.

Behind-the-Back Stretch

While you do this stretch, focus on squeezing your shoulder blades together to open your shoulders.

• Stand and reach both hands behind you, below your back.
• Hold your left wrist with your right hand and use your right hand to gently pull and straighten your left arm away from you.
• Move your head to your right side to give your neck a stretch. Hold for 30 seconds and switch.

Read on for one more one-minute stretch to do in your office.

Consider good posture a full-time job that will pay off with loads of benefits. Although it takes thought (at first) to reverse those bad habits, it's important for your body, workout, and overall health. The good news is, you don't need a crazy plan to make the change; you simply need to become more aware of your posture. Because it affects everything from digestion to achieving flat abs, here are five reasons why posture makes perfect.

1. Good digestion: Because posture begins with your core, it directly affects digestion. Poor posture can contribute to acid reflux by weakening your esophagus. Siting in a hunched position or lying down directly after a meal places stress on the stomach that promotes heartburn and indigestion. If you're looking to ease digestion and practice better posture after a meal, consider this yoga series.
2. Better breathing: Deep breathing can become second nature, not just a yoga luxury. Rather than compressing your abdomen and chest, prevent shallow chest breathing by standing up straight and sitting tall at your desk. Good posture allows the front of your body to open and your diaphragm to work at its best. Still in doubt? Test it for yourself — right now — and notice the difference.
3. Tightens your core: Poor posture may be the one thing preventing you from getting that six-pack. When you slouch, you start to reverse the benefits all those planks. By practicing better posture, you'll keep your entire core engaged, even when you're not at the gym. Sitting on an exercise ball at work is a great way to enforce good posture and tighten your core while on the job.

Two more benefits of good posture, after the break!

You've heard it before, and it's true — all the time we spend sitting at our desks can affect our posture and can make us look heavier and shorter. Here are some exercises to incorporate into your routine to combat the hunch by balancing out your body.

Tipping Row

Add this move to your arsenal and you'll be working your entire body while focusing on your posterior muscles — from your hamstrings and butt to your upper back. And the move doesn't require any special equipment, just a set of dumbbells, so it's easy to incorporate.

• Start by grabbing a set of five- to eight-pound dumbbells and standing with your feet hip-width apart, holding the dumbbells by your side. Lift one leg back and tip your torso forward so you are balancing on the opposite leg.
• Once your body is parallel to the floor, your arms should be straight, facing the floor. Move your arms in a rowing motion by bending your elbows and pulling them back, pushing your shoulder blades together.
• Complete the row by extending your arms back down to the floor. Come back to standing position.
• Do two to three sets of 10 on each leg.

Bridge Pose

Photo: Jenny Sugar

This yoga pose, also called the Half Wheel, opens up your chest and shoulders while giving your muscles and spine a much-needed stretch. Check out more yoga poses for posture here!

• Begin lying flat on your back with your arms along the sides of your body, palms facing down. Bend your knees, placing your heels as close as you can to your butt.
• With your palms and feet pressing firmly into the ground, lift your hips up. Keep your palms on the mat or clasp your hands together below your pelvis, extending through your arms. Or you can also bend your elbows and rest your hands on your lower back. If your feet are close enough, you can also hold your ankles.
• Stay here for five deep breaths, lifting your hips up as high as you can.

Keep reading for more ways to strengthen your back.

We are pumped to share one of our favorite stories from Health here on FitSugar.

By Jenny Everett

In yoga class not long ago, I was positioning myself for Sunrise Salutation—feet together, hands in prayer, gaze forward—when I caught my reflection in the mirror. How could I look so deeply uncomfortable in this simple pose? Granted, this was my first yoga class in two years, but I looked like it was my first class ever. My shoulders were in my ears and my back felt crazy tight. Nothing, it seemed, was lining up correctly.

A few days later, I downloaded an app that analyzes posture (PostureScreen Mobile, $10; iTunes) just to reassure myself that the yoga gods weren't exacting revenge on my spine for that two-year hiatus. After uploading a couple of photos, I waited for the results, purposely standing tall as if that would help skew them in my favor. The verdict: My right shoulder is higher than my left, my head juts forward, and I hunch a bit.

I have to be honest: This freaks me out. As a teenager I busted a vertebra and spent nearly a year in a body cast (not hot at the prom). Genetics aren't exactly in my corner, either. My grandmother has arthritis and bone loss in her back that's severe enough to limit mobility and require steroid and experimental bone-growing injections. This sure isn't where I want to be in 40 years.

Health.com: 11 Mistakes Women Make in Middle Age

An easy fix
Turns out, I don't have to be. "Most of us have posture that's compromised in some way, but it doesn't take a lot of work to correct it," says Ezriel Kornel, MD, a spinal surgeon and professor at the Cornell University School of Medicine. "Your body simply needs to be taught to experience proper posture so that that becomes the place it naturally wants to be."

There are plenty of reasons to take posture seriously. First, there's the obvious body bonus: When you stand tall, you look long and lean. Dr. Kornel estimates that you can add 1/16th- to 1/8th-inch of space between each disk in your lower back when you're perfectly upright—that's a full extra inch of height.

Then there are the health consequences of succumbing to slumping. When your body is out of alignment for long periods of time, your spine is subjected to uneven—and excess—pressure on joints and disks. This causes an overgrowth of cartilage lining the joints (the very thing that plagues my grandmother) and can lead to compressed nerves, resulting in pain and numbness in your arms and legs—and, of course, herniated disks and other serious problems.

Beyond that, hunched posture can cause headaches due to upper-body muscle tension and constipation because the intestinal tract is physically constricted. It can also decrease respiratory capacity by up to 30 percent, making you more susceptible to infections because the lungs can't clear bacteria properly.

Health.com: 10 Ways to Have Great Posture as You Age

Keep reading to learn how to get your posture back plus the four biggest posture culprits.

Back bulge plagues plenty of women, but targeting key muscles will strengthen and tone your back — while making your posture prettier. Time to put your back into it and get moving with these three exercises.

Superman

Dropping to your belly to move through some simple Supermans will tone up and strengthen your lower back:

• Lie face down on your stomach with arms and legs extended. Keep your neck in a neutral position.
• Keeping your arms and legs straight (but not locked) and torso stationary, simultaneously lift your arms and legs up toward the ceiling to form an elongated "U" shape with your body — back arches and arms and legs several inches off the floor.
• Hold for two to five seconds and lower back down to complete one.
• Do three sets of 12.

Standing Reverse Fly

Having good posture can make you look 10 lbs. thinner! Try out this standing reverse fly to improve your posture while working your upper back muscles, plus the back of your shoulders:

• Stand with your feet shoulder-width apart, keeping a slight bend in the knees. With straight arms, hold the exercise band in front of you with your hands slightly lower than your shoulders. Keep your elbows slightly soft to avoid hyperextending the joint.
• On an exhale, pull abs to spine to stabilize your torso as you open your arms out to the sides, focusing on the shoulder blades sliding together. Inhale as you slowly return your arms back to starting position.
• It's easy to arch your spine and push your ribcage forward when opening your arms, so really focus on the abs keeping the spine stable. Do imagine yourself growing taller as you open your arms to reinforce good posture.
• Do three sets of 12 to 15 reps.

Keep reading for one more move on the ball.

How many times have you been told to pull your shoulders away from your ears in a studio cycling class? Keeping your shoulders down not only makes your neck feel better, it improves overall efficiency, from your posture to your pedal stroke. While spinning my pedals in a studio cycling class at Equinox, instructor Lisa Horowitz reminded us all that the position of the shoulder affects the rest of the body too. The concept, known as joint centration, means what goes on in one joint affects the joints above and below it — what's happening at the shoulder affects the spine and the hips.

When on a bike, whether indoor or out, many people hunch the shoulders up while leaning over the handlebars, which leads to a rounded spine — not the ideal position for cycling. Pulling the shoulder blades down and back opens up your chest and diaphragm: this makes it easier to breathe and helps put the back in a neutral position, which restores the arch to the lumbar spine and corrects the angle of the pelvis. With the spine and pelvis in correct alignment, the hip flexors can fire effectively, improving your pedal stroke. Correct shoulder positioning also engages the lats and turns on the abs to help support the torso.

Lisa also suggested raising the handlebars on a stationary bike a little higher than usual to see if it helps posture and positioning. Try it and let us know how it goes.

Rounded shoulders and bad posture have the unfortunate effect of making us all look heavier than we really are, especially in the midsection. If you spend hours hunched over a computer, you need to combat the inevitable slouch so you can rock your bikini at the beach or wow your wedding guests as you walk down the aisle.

Having good posture can really make you look 10 pounds thinner! So try this variation on the reverse fly I learned from my Equinox trainer, Lauren; it's the perfect antidote to bad posture. It not only strengthens the upper back muscles (both the rhomboids and the middle part of the trapezius), it tones the back of the shoulder, too (aka posterior deltoid).

Learn how to do this variation on a reverse fly after the break.