The New Rules of Posture: How to Sit, Stand, and Move in the Modern World
Product ID: 1702478
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A manual for understanding the anatomical and emotional components of posture in order to heal chronic pain • Contains self-help exercises and ergonomics information to help correct unhealthy movement patterns • Teaches how to adopt suitable posture in the modern sedentary world Many people cause their own back and body pain through their everyday bad postural and movement habits. Many sense that their poor posture is probably the root of the problem, but they are unable to change long-standing habits. In The New Rules of Posture , Mary Bond approaches postural changes from the inside out. She explains that healthy posture comes from a new sense we can learn to feel, not by training our muscles into an ideal shape. Drawing from 35 years of helping people improve their bodies, she shows how habitual movement patterns and emotional factors lead to unhealthy posture. She contends that posture is the physical action we take to orient ourselves in relation to situations, emotions, and people; in order to improve our posture, we need to examine both our physical postural traits and the self-expression that underlies the way we sit, stand, and move. The way we walk, she says, is our body’s signature. Bond identifies the key anatomical features that impact alignment, particularly in light of our modern sedentary lives, and proposes six zones that help create postural changes: the pelvic floor, the breathing muscles, the abdomen, the hands, the feet, and the head. She offers self-help exercises that enable healthy function in each zone as well as information on basic ergonomics and case histories to inspire us to think about our own habitual movements. This book is a resource for Pilates, yoga, and dance instructors as well as healthcare professionals in educating people about postural self-care so they can relieve chronic pain and enjoy all life activities with greater ease. Review: Best rehab book EVER - I was always a bit skeptical of all these vaguely new age-y fitness books. Then I reluctantly started doing Yoga after a car accident a few years back. Long story short, yoga really helped me a lot, so after that I read some books like these. I'm still a bit skeptical of these books, but it turns out some of these people are onto something - like the author of this book. Buy it. It's great. If you've been injured and you read it, there's a decent chance it'll help you recover better once you're done healing if you're anything like me. A lot of the fitness field of late is nonsense about chakras and auras and whatnot that seems to be making it up as it goes along, but this book is the real deal. It has exercises and activities that work, it promotes bodily awareness and wonderful insight into ergonomics through real-life examples. No chakras (OK, a little about chakras, I think) or auras or Mayan 2012 anything here. The author is a dance instructor with a Master's degree who really seems to have a way with explaining this stuff and how to be more aware of your body. She is also very aware of anatomy and the book often has good pictures to show what she's talking about and which muscles are involved. Most importantly, her methods work. I was running slower than usual and I wasn't doing very well on my squat. No clue why. Then I read this book. I realized that after an ankle sprain a few months ago, I'd still been holding on to the rails on stairs, ramps, etc even though the ankle on that side had healed. I consciously altered that behavior. Before, I hadn't even realized it. Back to adding weight to my squat and jogging up and down the stairs (I didn't even notice I'd stopped doing that!). The closest analogy I can come up with is when I teach kids reading skills and they have that "uh-huh" moment where they finally comprehend what they read as they do it. That's how I felt after reading this and started to think about how I sit and stand and walk as I do it and how I could make it better. The wall exercise was really interesting in demonstrating the pelvic floor. This book teaches you body awareness skills. Simple, but really quite profound stuff. Highly recommended to anyone who likes to stay fit. Helpful in setting up office ergonomics, too. Review: This book should be read by EVERYONE -- it shouldn't be a niche thing - I can't believe I only found this book now. I struggled with back pain and posture problems for many years despite being an athletic, gym-going, healthy-weight guy in his 30's. I did searches on desertcart and tried so many things -- Alexander technique, Feldenkrais, yoga, somatic meditation, and much more. I picked up bits and pieces which seemed to help, but I couldn't find anything that explained *all* the components of good posture and how they all fit together. Finally, while researching books on Rolfing, I found this book. I just finished reading it and it is literally the holy grail of posture. Finally, someone is actually explaining *all* aspects of posture, not in a handwavy new-agey way but with plenty of references to scientific papers... but also admitting and embracing fully how much posture is related to emotions and attitudes. It explains the theory but is also chock-full of exercises for both discovery and practice. And this knowledge is so vitally important and can affect so many aspects of your life, it deserves to be read by *everyone*, seriously. When I was trying to understand my back pain, one of the first books I came to was the top result on desertcart for "back pain", specifically "8 Steps to a Pain-Free Back" by Esther Gokhale. Not only did that book not help, but it actually made things *worse* (e.g. her advice to center weight over the heels, or to breathe more with chest and less with belly, both of are terrible and contradict what Mary Bond teaches, and don't even get me started on Gokhale's truly bizarre "kidney bean" standing which actually left me in pain for a week). It really bothers me that Gokhale's book is currently ranked #4,000 while Bond's is ranked #30,000. If you're reading this review, buy this book -- if you read it and practice the exercises, it will literally change your life.
| Customer Reviews | 4.5 out of 5 stars 251 Reviews |
M**E
Best rehab book EVER
I was always a bit skeptical of all these vaguely new age-y fitness books. Then I reluctantly started doing Yoga after a car accident a few years back. Long story short, yoga really helped me a lot, so after that I read some books like these. I'm still a bit skeptical of these books, but it turns out some of these people are onto something - like the author of this book. Buy it. It's great. If you've been injured and you read it, there's a decent chance it'll help you recover better once you're done healing if you're anything like me. A lot of the fitness field of late is nonsense about chakras and auras and whatnot that seems to be making it up as it goes along, but this book is the real deal. It has exercises and activities that work, it promotes bodily awareness and wonderful insight into ergonomics through real-life examples. No chakras (OK, a little about chakras, I think) or auras or Mayan 2012 anything here. The author is a dance instructor with a Master's degree who really seems to have a way with explaining this stuff and how to be more aware of your body. She is also very aware of anatomy and the book often has good pictures to show what she's talking about and which muscles are involved. Most importantly, her methods work. I was running slower than usual and I wasn't doing very well on my squat. No clue why. Then I read this book. I realized that after an ankle sprain a few months ago, I'd still been holding on to the rails on stairs, ramps, etc even though the ankle on that side had healed. I consciously altered that behavior. Before, I hadn't even realized it. Back to adding weight to my squat and jogging up and down the stairs (I didn't even notice I'd stopped doing that!). The closest analogy I can come up with is when I teach kids reading skills and they have that "uh-huh" moment where they finally comprehend what they read as they do it. That's how I felt after reading this and started to think about how I sit and stand and walk as I do it and how I could make it better. The wall exercise was really interesting in demonstrating the pelvic floor. This book teaches you body awareness skills. Simple, but really quite profound stuff. Highly recommended to anyone who likes to stay fit. Helpful in setting up office ergonomics, too.
M**L
This book should be read by EVERYONE -- it shouldn't be a niche thing
I can't believe I only found this book now. I struggled with back pain and posture problems for many years despite being an athletic, gym-going, healthy-weight guy in his 30's. I did searches on Amazon and tried so many things -- Alexander technique, Feldenkrais, yoga, somatic meditation, and much more. I picked up bits and pieces which seemed to help, but I couldn't find anything that explained *all* the components of good posture and how they all fit together. Finally, while researching books on Rolfing, I found this book. I just finished reading it and it is literally the holy grail of posture. Finally, someone is actually explaining *all* aspects of posture, not in a handwavy new-agey way but with plenty of references to scientific papers... but also admitting and embracing fully how much posture is related to emotions and attitudes. It explains the theory but is also chock-full of exercises for both discovery and practice. And this knowledge is so vitally important and can affect so many aspects of your life, it deserves to be read by *everyone*, seriously. When I was trying to understand my back pain, one of the first books I came to was the top result on Amazon for "back pain", specifically "8 Steps to a Pain-Free Back" by Esther Gokhale. Not only did that book not help, but it actually made things *worse* (e.g. her advice to center weight over the heels, or to breathe more with chest and less with belly, both of are terrible and contradict what Mary Bond teaches, and don't even get me started on Gokhale's truly bizarre "kidney bean" standing which actually left me in pain for a week). It really bothers me that Gokhale's book is currently ranked #4,000 while Bond's is ranked #30,000. If you're reading this review, buy this book -- if you read it and practice the exercises, it will literally change your life.
A**R
Delighted with the book
This is from a Feldenkrais practitioner. And I'll not make it long, because many before me wrote in detail. Applause to the lucid and concise style, the inner logic that makes sense of it all, the effective guidance through my actually experiencing Mary's suggestions for what I should DO, the clear illustrations -- everything. No wonder Moshe was befriended with Ida. In my opinion, it is both a "take care of yourself" book, an essential companion for Moshe's ideas, and, more generally -- a model of lucidly unfolding a corpus of theory and practice both for the pleasures of the professional in related fields and for the general reader who experiences for the first time this method, or any method of a similar orientation (i.e., recruiting knowing and doing in the quest of being ever more human).
C**S
Good... but so many type-os?
Did anybody else notice the gratuitous type-os?Just me? I have the Kindle version of this book, and at one point there are several paragraphs where the text becomes literally unreadable. I wish I was exaggerating. A mistake here or there I can understand, but there were so many that it made me reconsider the integrity of the entire book. I have to trust it will help me based on all the positive reviews... but I have never seen anything like this is a book before, especially one I had to pay money for.
A**R
Everyday Awareness for Everyone
I've been a Mary Bond fan ever since I read Balancing Your Body: A Self-Help Approach to Rolfing Movement . The New Rules of Posture is even better. I can relate to the people in this book and see my posture habits in theirs. In addition, I can incorporate the suggestions and exercises into my everyday life. When I start to feel tension in my shoulders, I do "Handprints on the Wall," and recommend this to everyone I know who has weak or tight shoulders. The suggestions for bending forward are invaluable, as is the concept of the inner corset. Everyone can benefit from this book; it should be part of our general physical edication. --Anita Boser, author of Relieve Stiffness and Feel Young Again with Undulation
L**S
Too long
I wanted a quick guide, this book is really long. Has good info though, but I did't have time to read all of it. I would really love a summary of this book.
P**A
This is a great book and I use it as a reference all ...
This is a great book and I use it as a reference all the time. I am a Pilates instructor and teacher trainer and find many of the exercises beneficial for my clients. This is a book that should be mandatory reading for anyone who wants to improve their movement patterns and posture. I love how Mary describes overcoming some simple aspects of how we move, sit or stand. It is the small things that can make the biggest changes long term. I have recommended this book to all of my students to help them deepen their own body knowledge.
Y**V
Holistic approach to changing your posture
This book treat posture not as a problem that can be mechanically "fixed" by doing some exercises (e.g. wall stands) but as an expression of our bodies. To me it was very helpful to understand how different zones in our body contribute to our posture and how doing simple exercises when can change it. It can be dense in medical terms (I used a dictionary a lot) but you get a clear picture how your body works. So much more than just a book on fixing a posture.
C**N
Es necesario desarrollar otra vez confianza al trasladarse, sobre todo en las banquetas
Útil para personas de la tercera edad como yo
M**O
I little corny but very informative
This is not an academic book, and there are a lot of story telling examples of how the practices of this book will affect the lives of peple. I.e. Jack was a plumber and used to have back pain and then one day started doing this and got better... etc etc etc. But, I quite liked this approach, as it did instill a sense of how to apply these concepts in your day to day life, and what to watch for on various levels, both physical and psychological, that may influence your movement health. The book, between stories, also outlines concepts in a straightforward manner, and gives many exercises for assimilating these concepts in to your day to day life. I think these concepts would be very useful for people in their day to day life, and if a person goes through this book, takes a bit of this and bit of that for their own particular needs, and then apply the overall philosophy to their daily life, it can really serve as a good starting platform for a life of better physical health and awareness. Less concerned with getting shredded than moving through your world in a happy, confident, pain free way.
D**N
Une approche nouvelle et efficace Une référence.
Un excellent guide pour explorer pas à pas ses zones corporelles par les sensations et des connaissances atomiques. afin d' ajuster progressivement sa posture. Réellement efficace pour se sentir beaucoup mieux dans son corps. Très efficace aussi contrôle stress. Une méthode de fond originale.
た**た
This book saved me years of medical bills
Everything written in this book is eye-opening. If you're struggling with physical problems like imbalanced posture or back pain, or any other chronic conditions, this book will be your doctor.
F**E
Un po' noioso
Un po' noioso, poche illustrazioni e poco utili. Da un libro del genere mi aspettavo un numero maggiore di foto a complemento del testo.
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