A healthy back has a lot to do with your posture.

Did I ever tell you that I do injury massage for people? Well, I do and I learned that in order to ensure that my gymnasts (I was the Kedah State gymnastic coach.) can be taken care of should any soft tissue, muscles or joint injury occur. I did not think of using it until a friend with a painful back problem complained about not being able to find relief. I mobilised his spinal vertebral and he recovered. From then on, I have been doing massage for people who need it.

Last night, I saw someone rubbing her legs and complaining about pain. I did an examination and told her about her back problem. Back problems could be due to accidents, falls or poor posture. Perhaps it is difficult to prevent accidents or falls as such things happen due to a careless moment in time which is sometimes beyond our control.

However, our posture is within our control every second of the day. There are many books on the market on achieving good posture. Therefore I do not wish to write one concerning the matter. However, that does not deter me from telling others that good posture can be cultivated; or if it is already a little too late, improved on.

First, is your body, be it in a sitting or standing position, straight? Well, I suppose you have heard of balancing a book on top of the head as you stand, walk and sit down. Another way to find out if the body is straight and balanced is the use of a plumb line. A plumb line can be made by hanging a string from a spot higher than your head with a weight tied to the bottom of the string. Place your body beside the plumb line and get a friend to see if the line goes through the spot where the ear is, down the middle portion of the body to the ankle. If you are unable to get that, then your head could be a little too far in front or there is a hump somewhere on your spinal column. Both can eventually bring on problems.

Viewed from the front, a person's standing position can reveal whether one of the legs could be shorter. Is there a bent knee? Is there a shoulder lower on one side? Is the back curved towards one side? Even if there is no problem now, such a posture will one day lead to pain as one side of the body or a leg bears most of the weight, leading to one part becoming weaker as another part become strained. With this knowledge, anyone can consciously undo the harm by standing with both legs straight and placed firmly on the ground. If that still presents a problem, then there may be the need to have the sole of the shoe on the shorter leg raised so that you can stand straight. If there is curve in the spine, parents must observe whether this is a problem in their children when they are young so that bone specialists can give advice and act to i)overcome the problem with steel implants to straighten the spine, ii)slow the curvature of the spine with appropriate exercises and/or iii)strengthen the right muscles to help the body hold up the spine.

Everybody, Including myself, have weaknesses in his/her posture. Take as an example, our sitting posture. Most, if not all, slouch in front of the television on couches that are shaped not to help us have good postures. (However, blame not the chairs but take action on the posture.) How do you sit when you are driving? Do your buttocks slide forward a little? Well, the next time it happens, wriggle those bums backwards and you would be fine.

Today we have the computer where many concentrate onto its screen without realising that our head is protruding forward towards the screen. Before you get a little hump at the back of your neck which could bring problems later, not forgetting the ladies not wishing to have an ugly part exposed when they wear their low-necked dress; bring your shoulders and the neck back away from the screen. Do not put your face too near for it will never kiss you no matter how attractive you can be. It can only bring you strain and pain one day. And it is a difficult hump to treat, so beware.

Another way to ensure a good posture is to exercise. The various parts of the body has interacting muscle to hold everything properly in place. For the spine, the stomach muscles and the back muscles are important. Both act to hold up the spine straight.

And for the ladies, try not to wear high-heels as they put your body off balance, having to stand on your poor toes for so long. To counter the imbalance caused by the high-heels, bums jut out too far, the spine curve forward and backwards too much and after many years of that, the body becomes so poorly formed that the joints would be just waiting for a sudden tearing movement to put them into trouble. Before that happens, the calves of the legs would have shortened and thickened into ugly lumps with the Achilles tendon unable to relax and lengthen, giving pain when going bare-footed or flat-heeled.

Well, it is not difficult to ensure a good posture. Knowledge is available. Use it and it can save us from problems, strain and pain.