“Posture has long been thought of in terms of standing and sitting, and correct posture as the erect position assumed when one is under inspection, but posture should really be considered as the sum total of the positions and movements of the body throughout the day and throughout life.”1From an article “Dynamic Posture” by Beckett Howorth, MD, in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
“Posture comprises the flow in spacetime of all activity of bodily support and movement in the course
of living.”2From my book The Posturality of the Person.
Posture is thus a full-time job, and its effects, for better or worse, continue in all our activities during all our waking and sleeping hours.
Posture has quality as a function of its efficiency relative both to gravity and to the task at hand; it is convenient and accurate to refer to this essential concept of postural quality as posturality.
Posturality varies from moment to moment. We don’t have good or bad posture, we use ourselves variably as a function of our postural habits, acquired through out life.
To the great extent that postural habit is unconsciously learned, it can through conscious effort be re-learned or modified.
Thus we should aspire to a more and more normal, which is a lengthened, posturality.
Which is why you should consider cultivating postural awareness and skill through study of the Alexander Technique.
