Have you ever paid attention to the way a toddler reaches for something on the ground? They reach for something on the ground a lot different than adults do. As adults, we are more likely going to reach for something by keeping our legs straight and rounding at the hips and shoulders to reach down for something. If we really aren’t that flexible, we are probably bending our knees slightly and moving them forward while possibly lifting our heals off of the ground too. A toddler, on the other hand, keeps their feet flat on the ground, brings their butt to the ground and keeps their chest lifted, which ladies and gentleman are called a perfect basic squat.
The toddler is bringing its body towards the toy on the ground, a very primal fundamental movement that our bodies, while the adult has tight hips and lazily just tries to move as little of its body as possible to reach whatever it is on the ground that they need to pick up. There are many reasons as to why a toddler and an adult move differently from one another but the biggest problem is due to how much we sit in our lifetimes.
Another problem with our society today is that too many of us are focused on trying to be flashy. We are constantly flooded day in and day out with social media. We are being exposed to an endless amount of pictures and words, so in order to stand out, there are plenty of people that are trying to come up with flashy moves rather than practical moves. Don’t get me wrong, I am really not trying to speak negatively about these people, as many of them have put in the time and effort to learn the fundamentals to be able to do the flashier moves like I discussed in yesterday’s blog. There is just a lot to be said in being able to squat like a toddler, a basic exercise we should all master.
The challenge I have for you is to try and incorporate more basic aka functional movements into your workouts. Start by striping down some of your favorite exercises and focus on parts of the movement that involve motions like, vertical presses, horizontal push/pull, and hip hinging.
Some of your workouts may include exercises that look more like –
- bent over single arm row
- box step-ups
- single arm chest press
- single leg deadlift
You may have noticed that a lot of these exercises require balance and only use one appendage at a time. This is because there are a lot of activities we do in our every day lives that only involve the strength of one appendage at a time.
