Click on NOTE CATEGORIES to browse by topic, read through the entire archives, or type a topic in the search box.Where have I been? More like where haven't I been? Or... perhaps even more appropriately, what have I been doing and what is coming up? If that is what you are wondering, you have come to the right place. This episode makes no excuses but it does make promises. So listen in, get the scoop, and get your move on because Katy (and the podcast) is back!
OVERVIEW
(time codes are approximate)
00:04:40 - Grow Wild, Podcast guest staring – (Jump to section)
00:06:00 - Exercise Advent and more - (Jump to section)
00:07:05 - Three Ways to Move Your DNA - (Jump to section)
00:12:10 - What’s Ahead on the Podcast front – (Jump to section)
LINKS AND RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THE SHOW
Nutritious Movement YouTube Channel
Katy Bowman - Super Podcast Guest
Fix Your Downhill Knees article
Three Ways to Move Your DNA article
Gordon Hewes’ Resting Positions Printable
PODCAST TRANSCRIPT
This is the Move Your DNA podcast, a show where movement science meets your everyday life. I’m Katy Bowman, biomechanist, author, and long-lost podcaster. All bodies are welcome here. Let’s get moving.
INTRO MUSIC
KATY: Hi friends, How are you? I have missed talking to you via the Move Your DNA podcast. But here’s the latest good news: we are bringing the podcast back on a regular basis! So, A little bit more on that in a second.
To start off, what have I been doing? Well, I have not been on a vacation, but rather I’ve been doing the equivalent of cleaning out the Nutritious Movement closets.
Closet number one is my YouTube channel. And I am not a YouTuber, but I did start posting videos. And these were clunky videos; most of them with Vertical Syndrome, before I knew better, but a variety of just exercises with different articles I had written. And I started in 2007. So it’s been a while that I've been posting stuff. Our videos did get better over time. So we had classes loaded up from our Virtual Studio and samples of exercises that you could follow along with from my Whole Body Biomechanics programs. Some made it on to YouTube and some didn’t. And to be honest, I didn’t even really think we had a YouTube channel, I mean I knew I had put the videos on YouTube but I never thought of myself as having a YouTube channel. It was just a means of being able to link to something in an article or share something on Social Media. But I looked at YouTube at the end of last year and I realized that I did have a page. Because as they changed their format, anyone who had a chance for a while was given an official-looking page. But I had never done anything with it. So when I looked at it, it looked like that hallway closet that you might have had in your house growing up that was full of old towels, and sheet sets that didn't match, and board games with missing parts that nobody had organized in, well, fourteen years, in this case.
So I did that. And now it’s a great place to find a bunch of free exercises and even full classes. Also, all the podcast interviews that I’ve done with other folks on other shows, and even some TV appearances. They are all ready for you to pursue when you want to get moving or learn more about movement.
And so, two things about our channel that are worth noting: it is not monetized and there is no commenting. What do you think about that? Anyhow, go check that out at nutritiousmovement.com/youtube and you subscribe to that video channel if you want notifications whenever we load up new video content.
A lot of press for my latest book Grow Wild, which is about why kids’ bodies need so much varied movement and what to do about it! When you release a book you do more interviews than normal. And this brings me to another thing we tidied up: all my podcast interviews on other shows can now be found on one webpage called Katy Bowman, Super Podcast Guest. And that's on my website. So, if you want to hear me discuss movement on all sorts of different shows, using different examples. The nice thing is I do shows in the movement family, but I also do a lot of shows that are not in the movement family. And those are almost more interesting because I tend to really think about who I'm talking to and craft analogies to those groups. So there's all sorts of different topics and making movement relevant to a very wide audience, not only those thinking about movement but maybe those thinking about something else like farming or sword fighting or... it's a kick. You can scroll through those. You can find this list of episodes linked on our new podcast landing page which is nutritiousmovement.com/podcast.
That’s a move a day for 24 days, December first through December twenty-fourth. If you missed that, you can always find all those moves - this is 24 exercises - plus the 24 moves from the previous seven years of exercise advents on my website. Just search "exercise advent" on the blog. And those moves will keep you busy for sure.
I’ve written a pile - a pile - of new blog posts and articles. My favorite one is Fix Your Downhill Knees. Check that one out if you haven’t yet. It's got one of my old-school crappy line drawings which I loved to do. Other articles include how to move more with kids, how minimal shoes work, dynamic holidays, 15 places to do the head ramp exercise, and the best walking pace. And if you don’t get these articles in your inbox, you should! Sign up for my newsletter. You can do that on my website and then you’ll be in the loop.
Three Ways to Move Your DNA. I did that because I think a lot of people think of resolutions at the beginning of the gregorian calendar year. And moving more is at the top in surveys I've done. It's at the top of most peoples' list of things that they'd like to change about their life. So, let me read these three ways to you:
One: Swap your sedentary seat for “active sitting”
Moving your whole person from place to place is necessary, but so is moving all of your parts. So to make sitting more active, you have to choose a way of sitting that uses or moves more of your own body to support you. Scooting forward and away from the back of a chair uses more of your torso. You can opt to sit on the floor (or a pillow, a stacked pillow or two, or even a lower ottoman or crate). Getting down and back up from these lower positions, uses your body more. And when you’re down there, you can cycle through a few different leg positions to open up those joints. So you can sit with your legs in a V, sit cross-legged, or in any way that challenges your particular stiff parts.
And we also just put up a new, if you've read Move Your DNA, or been a long time listener, I've probably talked about this poster that we have which shows the work of anthropologist Gordon Hewes who did research documenting all of the resting positions that were used in different parts of the world. We had that redrawn. It's just a really nice reminder that there's a lot of different ways to position your body for taking rest. Well, we just released a downloadable version. Just a small one that you can print out - high resolution. But you can just tack it up, you could tack it up by where you pull out your mat every day if you do exercise at home. You can put it next to your desk at work. I mean, there's a lot. You could put it next to your desk at school. It just reminds you to use your body differently.
Tip Two: Add two 15-minute walks to your day
Now, we’re often discouraged by a schedule that doesn’t allow for an hour-long walk. But not to worry because you will get similar benefits from multiple smaller walks, peppered throughout the day. So get up a half an hour earlier to fit in a mile or half-mile trip around your neighborhood. Get outside and snack on foot for a portion of your lunch break, if you get one of those from work. And make the family or a friend join you for an evening stroll. And I've written a ton about how to improve your walk and start walking more. And you can find those under our best foot, shoes, and walking resources on the website. And of course, we'll link that in the show notes.
Ok, And finally, this is tip three of three easy ways to Move Your DNA: Pick one movement to work on
So ten years ago I decided I would work on a chin-up. One year it was a squat, another year it was to do a 20-mile walk and another year it was jumping up to a 20” high surface. So my point here is to just pick one thing you want to do: so sitting cross-legged more comfortably, maybe it's hanging from a bar - not even doing the monkey bars, just hanging from a bar. Maybe you can already do that now you want to work on just crossing the monkey bars. You could work on lifting your toes one at a time, or sticking a 6’ jump, or maybe it's walking a mile without foot pain or hip pain. The point is that there’s no wrong choice. But I'm asking you to pick ONE so your focus and intention are clear. And once you’ve nailed down what you’re working on, your daily path (and then steps upon it) become more clear. So that's doing things like figuring out which corrective exercises you need or how you need to adjust your schedule to be able to accommodate this one thing that you want to work on. These steps become more clear.
I was hoping that everyone would find these 3 items actionable and not too overwhelming. And also, they scale really well. So, if you’re already walking an hour, that’s two more 15 minute walks for you. But if you’re not walking at all, then adding two 15 minute sessions is an equal challenge. I've written a couple of follow-up articles to these tips. As I mentioned, we’ve got a new downloadable printout with all the ways you could take a seat that’s not using a chair in the same old way, over and over again. And I explained some of the fitness guidelines on how to pace your walk. You can find those articles on my website. And here's a hint, you can be using music to pace yourself and push yourself when needed. All of these helpful articles are sent to newsletter subscribers, and you can also find them on the blog section of my website.
We are going back to bi-weekly podcast episodes. And while this totally seems like that means two episodes a week it is actually once every two weeks. That term always confused me. I don't know. Does it confuse you too? Anyhow, if you don’t already, follow or subscribe to this podcast on your favorite podcast platform so that you don't miss anything.
I have a new book in the works. And I actually have two. Which totally sounds like me. But one is going to be out much sooner than the other. So if you sign up for the newsletter you won't miss the pre-sales and the notifications of other cool projects in the works that I'm just not quite ready to talk about.
So, that’s it? That’s it. Bye now! Bi-monthly now. I mean I guess bi-weekly now. Which means there’s a new podcast in a couple days or something? I don't know. Wait. Never mind. Ciao.
(Music)
Hi, this is Ellie from Vancouver Island, Canada.
This has been Move Your DNA with Katy Bowman, a podcast about movement. Hopefully, you find the general information in this podcast informative and helpful but it is not intended to replace medical advice and shouldn't be used as such. Our theme music was performed by Dan MacCormack. This podcast was produced by Brock Armstrong. And transcripts are done by Annette Yen. Find out more about Katy, her books, and her movement programs at NutritiousMovement.com
(music fade)
