8 exercises to improve posture with RPG

Muscles don’t stop working: when breathing, when staying upright, when walking… they are in constant activity and, sometimes, in permanent tension.

The RPG or Global Postural Reeducation allows us to become aware of how our body is and reposition it for its optimal functioning.

According to the RPG, all muscles are connected and, when one becomes destabilized, tense or contracted, it causes the rest of the muscles, tendons and fascias that make up the chain to which that muscle belongs to relocate through imbalances and tensions to counteract the pain.

So, a imbalance in the pelvis it can be the cause of a shorter-looking leg; a strain in the diaphragm, from lumbar pain; and flaccidity in the buttocks, pains on knees.

Postural diagnosis: how to detect and correct a bad posture?

Two years ago, walking down the street, I sprained an ankle. but i forgot of the incident, and kept walking.

After a few months, I began to feel severe pain in my lower back. First, I attributed it to excessive working hours in front of the computer; then, to the fact that I had carried too much weight in a recent move; until the pain became unbearable and I went, on the recommendation of a friend, to an RPG specialist.

For an hour the therapist exhaustively analyzed my bodymy posture, my way of walking, breathing, moving and my particular history of “accidents”. He concluded that my low back pain was the result of a sprained ankle! who had suffered long ago!

“How can that be?” I asked, stunned, “but it’s been months since it happened… and my ankle doesn’t hurt.”

His explanation was simple and clear: “Our body is a global entity and is connected by muscular chains. Muscles do not work in isolation and when one suffers a trauma, the others adapt and compensate to avoid pain.”

When I sprained my ankle the muscles that are responsible for stabilizing the joint contracted automatically to protect the injured ligaments.

Myself –explained the therapist– unconsciously and to avoid pain I took it upon myself to change the supports on my feet to walk. With this, both the knee and the hip changed their position to adapt to the new way of walking.

So did the pelvis, which tilted for balance, thereby putting stress on the lower back. At the same time, the rest of the back muscles tried to balance this imbalance lumbar with others in different areas of the spine.

After months of juggling and tensions in different musclesmy lower back could not stand and contracted sharply to protect itself.

The Global Postural Reeducation method

The RPG, created in 1981 by Phillipe Souchard, a physiotherapist of French originis based on a paradox: the same muscles that keep us upright, at the same time, crush us.

Read Also: Do you shower with cold water? Dare and revitalize your body

It classifies muscles into two large groups:

dynamic or phasic. They are the ones who make large movements and can relax due to factors such as a sedentary lifestyle; For example, the abs.static or tonic. His activity is constant: keep us standing or hold our backs. Between them are the spinal cords. This last group, which constitutes 80% of the skeletal musculature, tends to contract and shorten frequently. When that happens, there are deviations and, as a consequence, joint compensations. RPG investigates how static muscles work in order to rectify those that are not working properly.

RPG courses are taught to doctors and physiotherapists: there are six thousand graduates in the world. It’s not a gymbut in a way to harmonize the body and prevent new blockages or ailments.

Postural re-education is carried out based on stretch those that are shortened, remove excess tone to those who are overloaded or strengthen those who need it.

What are the Global Postural Reeducation (RPG) sessions like?

RPG allows the patient become aware of how your body is and how it should be to function correctly.

According to José María Llagostera, physiotherapist specializing in RPGThe most important thing is the patient’s awareness of how his body is. “It is basic to see how you carry your body, and how you would have to carry it to work harmoniously.”

The first thread that the therapist pulls to carry out research and therapy is the pain that directs you towards the real cause of the ailment. The therapist “reads” which muscles are tight or shortened to figure out the reason for that tightness or ailment.

Unlike other treatments and therapies that focus on the painful area, RPG proposes global –and not local– stretching to balance the body.

Once the therapist has thoroughly studied the body to detect the cause of the pain, he proposes a series of stretching exercises through which it can experience how it feels when your body is in a good posture.

When a bad habit is deep-rootedsuch as having the head crooked, it is difficult for the patient, when the therapist aligns it, to have the feeling that this is the correct posture. There must be a change in the internalized mental pattern, which It requires some adaptation time.

This homework, manual and individualized, it is not always easy, since the cause is usually overlapped by different muscular compensations. Each person is unique and manifests itself differently, that’s why no two RPG treatments are the same.

The work usually lasts from 8 to 10 one-on-one sessions of one hour duration. Between each one of them, specific exercises at home and the new session allows to check the progress or vary the exercises.

Read Also: Endangered animals with photos

Each is accompanied by a deep breathingwhich allows the body to relax and function harmoniously.

RPG Benefits: Eliminate Pain and Frustrations

According to the WHO, 75% of the world population suffers sometime throughout his life pathologies derived from muscle aches or pains.

The RPG is very effective both to recover body harmony and to solve very diverse situations, from spinal problems (herniated discs, scoliosis, hyperlordosis…) flat feetnumbness in the hands, detached scapulae, sunken chest…

Even people who are 1 or 2 cm short in height to oppose a security body they can obtain them by aligning their organization well with RPG.

The versatility of the RPG allows it to also be Beneficial for children, adolescents or elderly people. When a child or adolescent stops practicing a sport or activity because gets tired, maybe it’s because some position has been acquired in your daily life (when you sit in front of the computer, sleeping or walking) it blocks your energy.

On numerous occasions, muscular pathologies are the result of stress, anxiety, sedentary lifestyle or misuse of the body, and they are accompanied, not only by pain, but also by mood and character changes. Some contractures, shortenings or tensions in turn reflect mental attitudes.

Through stretching exercises and deep, conscious breathing, the RPG allows not only to free oneself from physical discomfort, but also from the internal discomfort that these entail.

After the first sessions, the person already begins to notice the effects: not only how his body is freed from pain, but also how the frustrations, hang-ups and backpacks he was carrying, also disappear.

Basic global postural reeducation exercises

1. Feel the body

Is about sit with the soles of the feet together, one facing the other, bending the knees. The back and neck are stretched, as if they were gently pulling our head up.

One has to breathe about ten times feeling the overall benefit. With the help of the RPG therapist it is easy to feel how the posterior chain is stretched in this posture.

It turns out very suitable for scoliosis.

2. Stand and walk correctly

the lower back

When the lower back is very tucked in a deviation of the column is given. To make up for it, the upper part of the back recedeswhile the shoulders rotate forward and the cervicals and the head also tilt, which leads the gaze to the ground.

This very common position causes a blockage in the knee jointswhich hyperextend posteriorly (genu recurvatum), as well as poor support from the soles of the feetwhich impairs the balance of the body.

Read Also: Endometriosis: what it is and how to cure it with natural remedies

The first step to correct a bad posture is to become aware of how we are in it and how the tensions and decompensations that it causes in the rest of the body affect us.

The next step is to achieve a good alignment. To do this, you have to literally feel your head on your shoulders and look straight ahead. The head-and-shoulders line runs perpendicularly through the pelvis, hips, and knees.

It is important support the feet well and notice how the abdomen flattens. With the body aligned in this way, you breathe about ten times to become aware of the posture and its benefits.

Bowed or crooked knees

When the knees are bent inward genu valgus is given a imbalance in the pelvis that affects both the hip and the spinecausing tension and blockages in different parts of the body.

It is very frequent that, when this happens, the person present flat feet. The RPG fixes them without templates when realigning legs and knees.

Instead, when knees bent out in genu varus (3b) cause imbalance in the pelvis, hip and spine, and in the lower cause cavus feet.

Correct the support of the foot and the dynamics when walking

when we are standing the plants must be well supported on the ground to allow the balance of the body.

Feet should be held on three points: the first and fifth metatarsals, as well as at a point the center of the heel.

when walking is necessary feel how the sole of each foot rests on the ground, and become aware of pressing the three points mentioned above, as if it were a tripod.

When taking the next step, after raising one foot, you also have to feel how it is supported, first in the center of the heeland then, at the same time, on the first and fifth metatarsals.