Joint mobility, what is it and why should you do it?

Yoga has gained a lot of popularity in the last two decades and while it is a great practice for a lot of people, joint mobility gives an alternative that is similar but different in a lot of ways. 

The goal of Joint Mobility training is to help lubricate the joints and keep them functioning at their ideal range of motion.  Some of the benefits of a regular joint mobility practice are healthier joints, greater range of motion, more fluid movement and improved flexibility. As your awareness of your mobility increases you can build on these basics and develop mobile spine, shoulders, and hips that are more resistant to injury and more responsive and fluid when in movement.

Immediate benefits:

1. Once you have finished a whole-body joint mobility session, you will feel completely relaxed. Most tension that was present at the start of the session has either been eliminated or softened.

2. You will restore health at each joint in your body by washing them with synovial fluid (joint lubrication). Prior to adolescence, our body would automatically feed our joints with nutrition. After puberty, the body stops doing this, and the only nutrition that our joints receive is that which we feed it through movement. So, if we don’t move through a full range of motion at each joint, we are literally starving our joints.

3. Another immediate benefit of joint mobility is that it provides a method connecting with your body and learning the areas that move well vs those that have more limitations.  As you become more of an expert with your own body, you will find that you can pinpoint the locations that need more focused attention and address specifically.