Mechanical Quadrant

The Mechanical Quadrant is about the physical body, which is influenced by how and how often you move it. We are created to move and be able to move for our entire lives, and how we care for it affects all other areas of our well-being, including our mental health.

Starter Tips

1. Take a Walk After Lunch and Dinner: Do you return from lunch looking more tired than when you left? Most people go from a meal right back to their desks or couch at home. However, our digestion system is begging us to move so it can use the sugars from our meals as energy rather than storing them as fat. One of the reasons you may be more tired after a meal is a spike in your blood sugar. Sheri Colberg-Ochs, diabetes and exercise research at Old Dominion University, suggests going for a walk soon after eating since glucose tends to peak 72 minutes after food intake.

2. Stretch the ‘Text Neck’ Muscles: “People spend an average of two to four hours a day with their heads tilted over reading and texting on their smartphones and devices,” said Dr. Kenneth K. Hansraj, chief of spine surgery at New York Spine Surgery and Rehabilitation Medicine. When our head is tilted 60 degrees (the common position for texting), we put as much as 60 pounds of force on our cervical spine, which Dr. Hansraj says raises the chances of early wear and tear, degeneration, and possible surgeries.  Try holding your devices more at eye level or angle your eyes, not your neck, down more to read.

Sources:

1. The Case for Taking a Walk After You Eat: https://time.com/5405778/walking-after-eating-good-for-you/  
2. Keep Your Head Up: ‘Text Neck’ Takes a Toll on Your Spine: https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2014/11/20/365473750/keep-your-head-up-text-neck-can-take-a-toll-on-the-spine