Surviving Collapse: Mobility

Remaining physically functional when you need it the most

We don't know when things collapse or how. Perhaps we all incinerate in the blinding light of nuclear Armageddon. Or maybe it's a slow erosion of living standards over the course of years.

It's best not to bet on a quick end. Prepare for the grind, and if you go out in a flash you won't live to regret it anyway. On the flipside, if you neglect to prepare and it turns out we ride this all the way down you're going to wish you started investing in yourself today.

One of my biggest fears is that I become old and infirm in the future when society has no resources to support the elderly, leaving me in a ditch to die because I broke a hip. I also fear becoming a burden and not being able to contribute at a time when physical labour is needed to sustain life.

I invest a lot of time to ensure I can maintain mobility as time passes. It's essential in the best of times. But if the perks of modern civilization cease to exist, I must ensure I'm capable of using my body to the best of its ability.

Adding to my accidental series on "Surviving Collapse", today I'll talk about mobility. Simple things you can do today to ensure your body functions in the future.

Recently, I discussed the importance of strength training. Strong skeletal muscles are protective and provide important functional benefits. However, mobility is a bit more nuanced and these two types of training go hand-in-hand.

There are 3 components of mobility training everyone should do:

Groundwork

This might sound silly, but the more you do things on the ground the more you develop your mobility.

What do I mean? Sit, work, play on the ground. Watch TV while sitting on the ground. Crouch down to garden or do work. Shift positions on the ground. Play with your dog at dog-level. By doing so you'll naturally build hip mobility, balance, strength and flexibility as you move, adjust and stand.

Squatting, working and playing on the ground is a natural position for humans. Observe children or people from non-Western cultures and you'll see this is quite common.

Indeed, groundwork has been correlated with increased lifespans and quality of life in places like Okinawa. Academic studies support the idea that the ability to frequently rise from the ground is associated with longevity.

woman in black bubble jacket standing beside silver car — Photo by Kristian Pavlov / Unsplash

Do the movement

Another way to protect your ability to move as you age is to frequently do the movements you want to maintain. If you want to easily climb stairs as an 80 year old, you better climb stairs every day.

Reach for things, climb stairs, walk, push things, pull things, jump. Use your full range of motion in your shoulders and hips.

Essentially, I'm suggesting your daily life needs to include constant and varied activity. If you spend 80% of your time in the same closed position (e.g. sitting), your ability to function in other ways will atrophy.

Living a varied lifestyle - gardening, cooking, walking, dancing, building, etc. - can help tremendously. Note, this is different from purposeful exercise.

Balance

I'm not talking about fall prevention. Rather, this is about neuromuscular balance.

There are many opposing muscle groups in the body. For instance, pushing motions use the chest, front shoulders and triceps. Pulling motions use the opposing muscles: the back, rear shoulders and biceps.

Doing too much of one motion over the opposite can overdevelop muscles on one side of the opposing group. This neuromuscular imbalance can cause all sorts of chronic issues with posture and joints, including pain, weakness and limited range of motion.

A healthy, functional body requires balanced muscular development. This requires a purposeful effort to work opposing muscle groups.

I used to work out for aesthetics. As I age, most of my exercises are constructed around injury prevention and functional maintenance. I perform many exercises strictly to maintain strength balance so I don't develop chronic pain as I age.

It's an uphill battle and you'll never match your teenaged self, but with the right set of activities and consistency you can maintain functional mobility as you age into a deteriorating, uncertain world.

My "accidental" series on surviving collapse: