How to Use Machines Safely in the Gym

The best way to save money on healthcare is to avoid injury. A large majority of people going to the gym today have little, if any understanding of biomechanical anatomy. I thought this article might offer a quick education for anyone who wants to avoid getting hurt while trying to get healthy at the local gym.
I want to point out that when you go to the gym, you actually bring your machine with you – it’s called your body. Your body is so intelligent that it works best when all the pieces and parts work perfectly together. Just like an orchestra needs each instrument to play in tune in order to create quality music, the body needs all the muscles acting as a whole to perform optimally and maintain a pain free experience.
I believe many people over use machines because they generally don’t know any better. They assume they get to sit down and exercise in a safe way that will help their bodies get stronger. Unfortunately if you are using these machines all the time, you will slowly begin to disrupt your nervous systems ability to move your body in harmony.
Machine training can be safe as long as you exercise your stabilizer muscles first. That means you should perform exercises that allow your gluts, low back and core muscles to work together. Natural movements include freestanding body squats, lunges, bends, cable or swiss ball exercises to strengthen your body as if your muscles were an orchestra. Once you have worked the system as a whole, it’s safe to use a few machines or floor exercises to tone your body.
It’s important to note that every time you sit or lie down on a piece of equipment, you shut off the stabilizer muscles that would normally be responsible for keeping you safe while the other body parts are moving. To prevent injury to the body excessive isolated movements should be avoided. It’s no different than if you have a rusty old car with no brakes and you spend every weekend working on the engine. What good is going fast when you won’t be able to stabilize yourself through the corners? The car would simply fall apart just as your body begins to deteriorate when you only work on the powerful muscle groups separate from the stabilizers.
Your body is the most beautiful, complex piece of creation in the whole universe. Allow it to get strong and healthy by letting it be itself. Keep machine training balanced with functional exercise. Think of all the money you’ll save at the doctor’s office and you’ll be more capable of doing many other daily activities without ever experiencing joint pain or injury.