"Flexibility Exercise -
Stretching Done Properly"

Flexibility exercise is particularly important for people who wake in the morning with a good deal of muscle pain or tightness.

Stretching done properly keeps the muscles flexible, decrease soreness, and diminish the chances of injury. Studies have shown that “long-term stretching can provide overall flexibility.”

You may want to invest in a device called the stretch strap to get the most from your flexibility and stretching efforts.

Stretching exercises can be started even before you get out of bed. While lying on your back, simply stretch your arms up over your head.  Also, stretch your legs toward the bottom of the bed.

It is important that you breathe in and out while gently arching and flattening your back a number of different times.

Bringing your knees up to your chest, and then back down, can help you if you feel stiffness in your lower back or hips when awakening.

Also try lying on your back and bringing your knees to a good bend and then gently rolling from one side to the other. If you sleep all curled up awakening stiffly, lie on your stomach and raise yourself up to your elbows gently stretching your back.

Here are some additional flexible exercise tips that you can use...

• Tissue stretching is good when you are feeling tight. You don't need to stretch every part of the body but for some joints, you just need to move within the range of motion you already possess.

• Never force the stretch but provide gradual pressure moving gently within your comfort zone until you feel a little bit of tension or a slight bit of stretching while never bouncing.

• There are certain stretching exercises where you will want to hold that position for about 20 seconds as you breathe naturally while relaxing. You can repeat this several times for effective use.

• Some other exercises will be simply repeated a number of different times between two different positions while employing a hold in the stretch between the two positions for about 20 seconds.

• Always use stretching exercises in cool-down sessions after you exercise. Doing so will help you to not only avoid soreness but injury as well during intense exercise sessions.

• You will find that stretching exercises will also provide you with a great deal of relief from pain. This is especially true conducting flexibility exercises several times a day.
  

• Try using stretching exercises for daily back and neck pain control both in the morning when you wake and at night before you go to bed.

• Listen to your body when conducting stretching exercises. Often, when first beginning, you will find a great deal of tenderness as well as discomfort. If you've been inactive for quite some time or, in many cases, after a night of sleep. You may find discomfort at first, but do not continue exercising if you are indeed in pain.

• Breathing normally is highly recommended while performing any flexibility exercises.

• You should never hold your breath when stretching. Also, do not breathe heavily in and out but as naturally and comfortably as possible. You'll discover as you continue exercising, you will become more relaxed and your breathing rate will naturally flow as it should.

Follow these tips and you will find that using flexibility exercises will help you maintain a healthier and less painful existence.

Stretch properly,  and improve your flexibility & fitness quickly and safely.

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