Daily Exercises
With more people working from home, it’s important that strength and balance is being retained. The following exercises can be incorporated into part of a daily routine to help with this
With more people working from home, there’s been an increase in people becoming more sedentary with their daily activities. This is meaning that strength and balance has been affected. These exercises can help prevent this.
The first exercise we’re going to look at is going to be the bridge. What I’m going to want you to do is I’m going to want you to lay down, either on the floor or on your bed, with your knees bent and your feet on the floor. What you’re going to do is you’re going to suck in your stomach, squeeze your bottom together, and then I want you to push your hips off of the bed and then nice and slowly come back down again. Make sure you keep your knees slightly apart while completing this, and I’d like you to complete three times eight repetitions throughout the day.
We’ll move on from the bridge, and then I want you to start introducing the squat. The important thing to remember through this squat is to keep your feet shoulder width apart and standing up nice and tall. Next, I want you to lower yourself down, imagining you’re sitting yourself down on a physical chair, and then stand up nice and straight again. Like with the bridge, I’d like you to complete three times eight of repetitions. While completing a squat, it’s important to remember to not let your knees go past your toes.
We’re then going to move on to a strengthening exercise which incorporates a bit of balance. This is going to be the reverse lunge. What I want you to do, like with the squat, is to stand up nice and tall. You can take a step backwards, lower the back knee down so it’s almost touching the floor, and come back up again and return to your starting position. Then when completing this exercise, I want you to complete four repetitions on each side, and again three reps of that throughout the day.
We’re then going to move onto the balance component of these exercises. The first exercise I would like you to do is called a tandem balance. For this, all you’re going to do is stand heel to toe. If you find this too easy, what you can do is you can progress this, so you’re going to involve some movement, so you’re going to walk forwards and backwards, imagining you’re walking along a tightrope. It can be quite handy to complete these exercises somewhere with tiles, because then you have a nice line for you to follow as a marking point.
The final exercise I’d like you to do is clock face balance. What you’re going to do is you’re going to stand on one leg, and imagining standing in the center of a clock. Then with your left foot off the ground, I want you to reach, imagining you’re trying to hit each number on the clock face. Going around the initial first half should be relatively easy, but then as you start to have to reach behind you and incorporating twists, it should be a little bit harder. Once you reach about three-quarters of the way around, I want you to start making your way back, until you begin at the starting point. If you complete this exercise three to five times a day, then hopefully you’ll start seeing some improvements with your strength and your balance. If you do have any questions regarding your strength and balance, please don’t hesitate to get in contact with Perfect Balance Clinic, and one of our specialists should be able to help you.