Why we need to avoid clickbait articles on diet and exercise
08/07/2024Mobility vs Flexibility
Joints are the places in the body where movement happens.
Muscles are the magical mechanisms that create that movement.
If a joint is tight, we will feel that we can't get into movements that we want to. If a muscle is tight, we will feel a tightness in that muscular area.
Making the distinction between joint stiffness (mobility) and muscle stiffness (flexibility) is very important. Most of us think of these as interchangeable terms but we should assess and address them differently.
Joints are places where bones meet. The bones move around one another to create movement.
Think of your knee. Your thigh bone meets your shin bone, and your knee joint "hinges" at that intersection.
But joints need muscles to create this movement. The only thing that a muscle can effectively do is contract, to shorten, and relax to lengthen. That is a pretty straightforward job so that is why we have many layers of muscle fabric that layer over and around our joints to create some pretty complex movements.
The knee remains simple with hinging and some rotation thrown in but think of the shoulder or hip joints that have multi-directional movements. It's exciting how much those joints can do. With the help of several layers of muscles, they create unique pulls, and therefore movement at that joint.
So, how do you know whether mobility (joint stiffness) or flexibility (muscle tightness) is what you should focus on?
OK, so we can assess either joint or muscle in a clinical setting but for the majority of us, we should just be aware to approach our movements from both angles. Also as a rough guideline, most office bound, sedentary-type workers should focus on joint mobility first. Sports people need to consider more muscle length when balancing their training demands.
As a Biokineticist, my sense is that most people over consider muscle length, and under consider joint stiffness. I therefore tend to spend time on emphasising the latter a bit more.
Joint stiffness leads to muscle weakness
This often comes as a surprise to my male patients who are comfortable with being stiff but usually less so with the idea of becoming weak. "I'm super tight" they tell me, "I'll never touch my toes." There is a feint pride sometimes or perhaps a resignation but I try to explain that this isn't something we can simply accept.
Let me explain: Imagine you have a stiff elbow. You can only bend the elbow about 90*, losing out on the last 45* of motion. You aren't bothered because you can still sort of get by functionally with this range of motion. But imagine how the biceps muscles feel about this. If the joint is stiff because of injury, immobility or incorrect technique, the biceps muscles eventually begin to weaken in that range of motion. They never shorten enough to make an impact there, so over time, they atrophy and get weaker.
Now we have a double problem, a stiff elbow joint, and muscles becoming progressively weaker.
Now this is all well and good in a straight forward joint like the elbow but again to reference our multi-directional hips and shoulders, for every joint movement you cannot access, you cannot get strong and you will become weaker over time. A compounding problem of stiffness that leads to weakness that leads to stiffness.
OK, so what is the solution?
This is the part where I tell you to attend our expertly-led, yoga and pilates classes focusing on mobility, flexibility, strength, balance and co-ordination :)
But, if that is not your jam, then my best piece of advice, and something I tell all my patients. More is more.
Move more.
Sitting is the new smoking.
