The PERFECT Mobility Routine to FIX YOUR SIT (3 Min/Day)

If you sit most of the day and your body looks and feels locked up and stiff, then you've got two choices. Leave it and let it get worse, or fix it in just three minutes a day with three simple exercises. Since you're here, I'm guessing you want to look and feel better, so let's get right into it. Starting with a pretty crazy study that looked into how you can reverse the effects of sitting. Researchers had participants sit for four and a half hours a day to see how it affected their muscle stiffness. Exciting, I know, but bear with me. Sure. Sure enough, everyone's back got tighter and tighter as the time dragged on. But they found something interesting. You see, the participants were actually split into three different groups. The control group literally just sat there and did nothing. But with the test groups, the researchers used something called a neuromuscular electrical stimulator to send 17 electrical currents into their back muscles at regular intervals. However, one group received a low level current, which felt like a tingling sensation throughout their back, whereas the other group received a high amplitude current that actually caused their back muscles to contract, just like how they do during exercise. So what did they find? Well, at first, nothing surprising. You see, when you sit for a long time, your joints are stuck in one position and your body essentially turns off the muscles you're not using. So what happens is, over time, you not only lose your ability to move these joints, but after sitting for a while, your body will create the feeling of stiffness in your unused muscles in an attempt to get you to move and exercise, actually use them. And this happens even if you tried to sit with perfect posture. And this is exactly what the researchers found in both the control group and the group, given just a low level current, their backs got increasingly stiff. And it's also worth pointing out that this was just after four and a half hours of sitting. So imagine what happens to your back if you sit all day, every day, for years. But anyway, here's the surprising part. For the high amplitude group, those whose muscles actually contracted from the current, the stiffness in their backs almost completely reverse. So what does this mean for you? Well, for starters, if you haven't already picked up your very own neuromuscular electrical stimulator machine code Jeremy for 15% off. What the heck are you waiting for? Just kidding. No, the real takeaway is actually a lot simpler. You don't need to run electrical currents through your back while you're at your desk. Although I guess that could work. But if you want an even better solution, one that will not only relieve muscle tension in your back, but also in your shoulders and hips and improve your posture so you naturally stand up taller and straighter and increase your range of motion so you can have more effective sessions at the gym. Then you simply need to start moving the joints and contracting the muscles that you don't use when you're sitting all day. That said, I know how hard it can be to stick to a stretching or mobility routine consistently. So that's why, rather than giving you an extensive list of movements, my team and I have worked together to find the three exercises that focus on the most problematic of areas. At first, I recommend you start by introducing these exercises into your day just a few times each week, but work towards doing them once or twice a day to break up your sitting. The first exercise is great for improving rounded locked up shoulders. Not only will it loosen your delts and chest, it'll also strengthen the weakened muscles in your upper back and shoulders. For long term posture improvements, it's called the wall clock. To perform it, stand sideways with your fingertips touching the wall and your thumb pointing down. Engage your core and without arching your back, slowly draw your palm in a big semicircle forward and up the wall. Let your shoulder blade move forward and then up. As you do so, you should feel a stretch in your chest on the way up and some of your shoulder and upper back muscles working. Then complete the circle by moving your arm back and down the wall, letting your shoulder blade move back and down as your arm travels behind you. Reverse the circle to get back to the starting position and and spend about 30 seconds on each side. And the nice thing is, you can decide how much of a stretch is right for you based on how close you stand to the wall. Closer you are, the harder it will be. But harder isn't necessarily better here, especially if you're experiencing any sort of pain or discomfort. Aim for a stretch that feels like a 4, maybe 5 out of 10. Just don't overdo it. Now we're going to focus on the back and neck. When you've been sitting for a while and you finally get up, what's the first stretch you do? Chances are it's this one. Your body is basically telling you to wake up and use all those muscles in your back that have been on standby. But if you want a better way to contract them, to completely reverse the sitting position and to go through their full range of motion, you'll want to do this exercise. Get on all fours with your hands directly under your shoulders. Then spin your elbows towards your thighs to engage your lats. Inhale and gently lift your tailbone towards the ceiling and reach your chest forward through your biceps to stretch your abs. Squeeze your shoulder blades together as you lift your chin up towards the ceiling. When done properly, you should actually feel the muscles in your mid back activated. This is the first half of the exercise. Then you'll want to go in the other direction. Exhale and imagine there was a rope pulling your mid back up towards the ceiling and rounding your spine. As you do this, push the floor away to open up your shoulder blades. Then use your neck muscles to tuck your chin by looking towards your knees or even your belly button. You should feel a deep stretch in your back muscles as well as your neck. Do this for about 30 seconds and then for the next 30 seconds will move your spine in a way you probably don't do all day. Come back to a neutral position and turn and look towards your left foot. This will stretch the muscles on the right side of your lower back and ribcage. Then return to center after that same on the other side. Turn and look at your right foot and a good way to manage your breathing is to inhale when you return to neutral and exhale as you look towards either foot. Finally, the perfect three minute mobility routine wouldn't be complete without an exercise to target the hips. When you're sitting all day, your hips are literally just locked into one position, but they're designed to move in all sorts of directions. So we need an exercise that moves them into as many different positions as possible while strengthening the muscles that weaken from sitting too much. Exercise three does exactly that. We'll start at a level one version and then build up to level three, which is the most effective variation for level one, sit on the floor and bend one leg in front of your body at around a 90 degree angle and then do the same with the back one. You can use your hands for support if you need to. Then sit up tall and try to position your shoulders square to the front of your shin. Keep your spine tall and exhale as you reach your chest forward, hinging over your front leg until you feel a deep stretch on the outside of your front leg's hip or glute area. Try not to round your spine. Instead, focus on bending at the hip. Inhale as you come back to the starting position and exhale as you get into your next rep. For level one, do 30 seconds on each side, trying to get deeper into the stretch with each rep. Level 2 now focuses on activating some of your weak hip muscles, which is the key to relieving stiffness. You're going to maintain that same 90 degree leg position, but this time as you lean forward, push your front shin down into the ground and lift your hips up to get your torso upright. You should feel some of your glute muscles working and you should feel the hip flexors and groin muscles of your back leg stretching. Once you get to the top, then you're going to reverse this by lowering as slowly as you can while leaning forward. Again, aim to do 30 seconds on each side. Once you're comfortable with level two, you can advance to level three. In this case, you're going to repeat what we did in Level two, but instead of sticking to just one side at a time for deeper stretch in your groin and hip flexors and you're going to windshield wiper your knees directly over to the other side on the way down and repeat this motion back and forth to help you stay upright. Reach your arms out in front of you and engage your core during the transition. And again, you can always use your hands for support here if you need it. Now these exercises are great, but if you want to truly fix your posture and mobility issues for good, then there's one thing that you have to add to this list. It's an extremely underrated exercise for preventing aches and pains and surprisingly, for burning fat as well. Give this video a watch next to find out what it is and how to use it. If you guys want a free PDF of this routine to remind you how they're done with step by step pictures, I've added a download link in the description box down below. And lastly, for those who want an all in one fitness program to transform your body while fixing your mobility and posture issues for good, just head over to builtwithscience.com thanks so much for watching and see you next time.