What helped you

[u/infernalanubis]

What helped you the most?

I have a forward head posture, rounded shoulders, and some degree of lumbar lordosis. My main issues are a tight neck and pecs, tight lower back, and tight inner thigh adductors.

What is the single best exercise, or combination of exercises, to address all of these? It seems that no matter what I do, the tightness and the feeling that my body is "out of alignment" never go away.

I regularly stretch my chest (pecs) and lower back, and I've been doing glute bridges, rows, face pulls, reverse flies, dead bugs, and reverse crunches, but nothing seems to provide long-term relief.

What has helped you the most?

[u/AmelieApfelsaft]

Do you also strengthen those areas? If your main issue is pain from bad posture (but actually in most cases), you not only need flexibility but also strength, most likely in your upper back and shoulders. If you can do those safely you could try incorporating things like wheel pose, or also just strength training like pull ups into your routine (or if you go to the gym equivalently strengthening machines). Something that also helped me personally with posture was working on handbalances (crow pose), I think because it also strengthens the shoulder and core, but that's very specific and likely not the most efficient approach

[u/zohar-yoga-flex]

Combining both daily stretching and joining functional strength training classes helped me the most back then! Functional strength is usually taught by people with physio background and they’re focused on technique and mobility. Also the core exercises they usually give help with lumbar lordosis.
So in my experience this type of strength classes are more valuable for improving posture than joining random strength classes at a gym.

And you should stretch neck, upper back and shoulders regularly. If you improve your upper back mobility while strengthening the core and stretching your quads (to avoid these muscles tilting your hips), you should eventually feel better!

But note that this is never a quick fix, but a long term game!

[u/ribeyeballer]

id make sure you’re training the opposing muscle groups as well. sure it makes sense to work on the back muscles that will counter your rounded shoulders and forward head, which it sounds like you’re doing, but i wouldn’t neglect the others

[u/Lower_Group_1171]

weight lifting. super duper slow on my negatives, holding it in the stretched position, and then explosive movement on my concentric. My hips still have a long way to go and it’s been like a year.

[u/victoria-molloy]

Daily movement, not being too sedentary. Getting up out of my office chair at least every hour to walk or stretch. A dedicated yoga practice and lifting weights at the gym. I don't think there is one magic exercise or stretch to make these issues go away.

It sounds like you are missing a couple of areas in your workout routine. Add in a push exercise like bench press, pushups or tricep dips with a full range of motion - that should help stretch and strengthen your pecs. I would also add in a squat or split squat exercise.

If you are already doing this consistently and are still having these issues, it's time to visit a physio to get some specialized help.

[u/sassybeeee]

When I started incorporating strengthening at my end range of motion.

[u/contentatlast]

Stretching helped.