Mini Posturecise – 30 Seconds a Day is all it Takes

September 20, 2018

Failure isn’t falling down. Failure is not getting up after you have fallen down. Richard Nixon

Are youexercising daily? Have you enrolled in one of my courses, started out supermotivated and then after a week or a couple days or maybe even a day, left itand never returned? Perhaps you are still thinking you need to give your bodyalignment (posture) some attention, but you just haven’t started.

30 seconds is all it takes

Wherever you are at with your health regime, this post is going to have you finally succeed … but only if you finish reading and actually do what I suggest. AND, I promise, it will only take you 30 seconds.

Are youwilling to give 30 seconds a day to improve your posture? Great! I’m guessing 30seconds is reasonable enough, for even the most persistent procrastinator.

Habits

I love toread. Mostly I love to read non-fiction books on health, success, goals andpersonal growth – super geek alert!

One of the first books on habit creation I read was The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg. Basically, he explains that successful habits depend on three things:

  • cue

  • behavior

  • reward

You can use these steps to create a new habit or change an unwanted habit. Duhigg recommends keeping the same cue and simply changing the behavior and seeing which leads to the greatest reward.

As an example, I’m currently working on creating a new habit of getting out of bed 30 minutes earlier. My usual wake time is 7am. 6.30am rising leaves me with more energy (seems counter intuitive, but it’s true), gives me a sense of purpose and I find I’m generally happier. Those are my rewards.

Let’s review the process. The cue is my phone alarm going off at 6.30am – and by the way, I leave the phone in the bathroom, so I have to get up to shut it off! Remember Duhigg suggests only adjusting the behaviors, while keeping the same cue.

These are the different behaviors I have tried so far:

  • Just getting straight up – that resulted in my peeing, and going straight back to bed … sigh

  • Getting up and going right into the shower – This worked quite well, but I prefer showing at night before bed, because I like getting into clean sheets with a clean body; AND I’m always cold in the winter, so love a shower to warm me up before bed.

  • Reading – this one I really enjoy. I have a wee and then I cozy back into my warm bed (with Milo) and read. I did that this morning, but my eyelids were so heavy, I almost fell back to sleep. It also feels like a bit of a cheat!

  • Dry skin brushing – this is my newest behavior choice. I used to skin brush regularly but have got out of the habit. Basically, the theory goes that brushing the skin (our largest organ) helps to rid the body of toxins, improving alertness and overall health. It’s a bit of a shocker first thing, but certainly does the trick waking me up!

It’s earlydays, so I haven’t chosen the exact behavior I will settle on, but skinbrushing is currently a good contender. Which ever one I choose, I already delightin the rewards of 6.30am rising.

Stop saying you’re fine

Recently I read Mel Robbin’s book, Stop Saying You’re Fine. Good book! The first 100 pages are a bit repetitive. You’re never going to feel like it, she says about 1,000 different ways. Then her book gets really good. Here is her book summarized for you in five easy steps:

  1. You’re never going to feel like it

  2. You get motivated from action

  3. Use the 5 second rule

  4. Make a pebble plan

  5. Choose a punishment

Basically, your brain is never going to tell you it’s fun to get up early, or to not eat chocolate cake, or turn off the TV to read, or go to the gym. You’re NEVER going to feel like it, so stop waiting for the right feeling and do it anyway!

Stop waitingto feel motivated! Motivation comes from action. If you are waiting to feelmotivated, you may be waiting a long time. Take an action; any action and watchthe motivation grow.

When you think of something you know you should do – calling your mother, paying a bill, going to the gym, making healthy soup or walking the dog – use the 5 second rule. Count down from five, four, three, two, one and be sure you begin to act within the five seconds or your brain will convince you not to do it. Act quickly to ride the action wave!

Robbins explains that in order to cross a river, you step pebble to pebble or rock to rock, until you get to the other side. If you have a goal to lose 50 pounds, you need a plan. Grab a big sheet of paper and some colored markers. That is my go-to, when pebble planning.

Write outyour goal in the middle of the page – LOSE 50 POUNDS – Now draw 18 pebbles orstones on the paper, nice and large. Fill in all the stones – whatever comes tomind:

  • Geta really good recipe for healthy green breakfast smoothy

  • Call3 friends and ask them for 3 ideas

  • Walkkids to school 1 day a week

  • Makeone healthy crockpot meal (every Sunday)

  • Researchweight loss blogs

  • Createa gold star chart for the fridge

  • etc.

Choose a punishment – this is the answer to what if I don’t do it. Choose a pebble a day, or each week and do it! If you don’t do it, you need some sort of retribution. I’ve chosen my buddy Tara – she and I did pebble plans over beers at a Toronto distillery a couple weeks ago. We tell each other which pebble we are doing each week, and so far we are loving it.

Robbin’s suggested reprimand is slightly brutal – but I like it! She suggests throwing $20 dollars out the window, when you are driving. Imagine how much that would hurt. Ouch!

Mini Habits

Currently I’m reading Mini Habits by Stephen Guise. It’s a tiny – read in one day – sort of book. It’s no masterpiece; he isn’t a great writer, but it’s a nice little winner.

I’ve onlyread 50 pages and basically the science is simple. If exercising (orPosturecising) for an hour every day feels way to tough, then make itridiculously simple. I’ve been saying this to my patients and students foryears!

Make it so silly simple, you can’t possibly fail.

This is how I began Posturecising and creating a healthy daily habit for life. I now Posturecise without fail, every morning. If I miss a day, it’s no biggy, because I’ve neurologically wired it into my brain; so it’s easy to simply pick up again.

Mini Posturecise

Have you been struggling to create your own daily posture exercise routine? If you’ve already enrolled on one of my courses, great. At least you won’t waste time thinking about which exercise to do and in what order.

So if 30 lectures feels a little overwhelming, or working on your posture for 60 minutes daily, like a mountain to climb, then what you need is a new mini posture habit.

A mini habitis just that – a super small, stupidly simply task. One you can not fail tocomplete.

Tasks

File all mybusiness receipts (a task I despise) 

mini task – file one receipt a day

Learn to dochin ups (a goal I’ve been talking about for years) 

mini task – hang from bar 5
sec daily

Eat 5+servings of veg daily 

mini task – eat one radish a day

Get 6-packabs 

mini task – do a 5 second plank daily

I’m guessing all of you could do the four mini tasks I listed above.

Posturecise Task

You want to havegood looking posture, am I right? Let’s break it down. Ideally I’d have you eachcompleting my Posturecise program daily.

But you’restruggling, or I’m guessing you wouldn’t still be reading. If I were to giveyou a list of exercises to choose from, you could pick the one most relevant toyou. Or just choose the one that looks like the most fun.

Take a lookthrough the list – watch as many of the videos as you like, until you’ve chosenyour exercise. Once you’ve selected your exercise, I want you to drop what youare doing, set the timer on your phone for 30 seconds and do the exercise for30 seconds.

Does thatsound easy? It is!

Recap

  • choose your exercise from the list above

  • set the timer on your phone for 30 seconds

  • do the exercise

  • set your phone alarm to go off same time each day

  • do the exercise daily for the next 30 days

CONGRATULATIONS, you have a new mini Posturecise habit! What exercise did you choose?

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