Gaudette

The body is meant to move in three dimensions. While walking or moving the limbs (or both together), our body needs the ability to move safely and without discomfort: forward, backward, side to side, diagonally and in rotation. Step back a moment and picture how a child moves compared to an older adult. Children move in many different directions constantly whereas an older person seems uncomfortable walking sideways or crossing one foot over the other. Whether the chicken or the egg came first, we need to focus on multi-dimension mobility and tasks as we age.

Moving in all dimensions should not be limited to children, for anyone — including children — sitting at a desk, driving a vehicle or doing a repetitive task job can lead to movement issues down the road. This, along with being sedentary or movement limited by discomfort, is like a snowball rolling downhill. It only gathers more problems, becomes larger and travels faster. It becomes a habit to not move. We live in the front and back plane of motion for the majority of our day. Moving side to side, diagonally and in rotation tend to get overlooked, which creates problems with joints that are designed to move in those planes.

As we age, for many reasons, we lose the ability or desire to perform primal movements. Primal movements are movements that our predecessors did millions of years ago to survive: lifting, climbing, running, pushing and pulling. Now we have chairs, cars, electric heat and nearly automated everything. Unless you are actively engaged in a planned fitness program that utilizes this old-new philosophy you are narrowing your natural movement sphere even further. The seven primal movements are; bending forward and back upright, squatting, lunging, rotation, pushing, pulling and gait or moving.

Primal movement in combination with movement in all dimensions can be accomplished at home easily doing your household or outdoors activities. When at the kitchen counter, instead of turning to get to the drawer 4 feet from you, step side to side. Try walking lunges down your hallway once a day, reaching your right arm across your chest to the left and vice versa as you go. Instead of bending forward to get the clothes from the dryer, squat — try feet wide and feet narrow stances. Walk more because even though you are moving front and back there are joints involved in the mechanics of walking that are rotating and moving side to side. Moving in this manner will also stimulate coordination, balance, stability, flexibility, power and stamina.

The RAPRD aquatic instructors recently completed a mentorship training program, designed for aquatic exercisers, regarding moving in all planes of motion. Most aquatic exercisers choose to exercise in water because exercising on land isn’t safe for them. When we were thrown into quarantine our educators developed a land based video program of moving in 3-D for aquatic participants or anyone who needs to move. Master educator Laurie Denomme created these videos for you. The videos are a great place to start — to warm-up before exercise or activity, to begin an exercise program, to help with movement reeducation, or to alleviate the effects of sitting and being sedentary. Available to everyone on YouTube, they are short, free and amazing. The testimonials we are receiving are indicating this is helping so many people. Log on YouTube, go to Water Exercise Coach channel, click on the Video tab, the short videos are 6 in 1 Movement Breaks — all videos are land based and can be done by anyone. Try this, your body will thank you.