The Most Natural Human Position You've Completely Forgotten How to Do
A toddler squats perfectly. Knees tracking over toes, hips below parallel, back straight, completely at ease. Now try it yourself — heels flat, hips below knees, chest upright.
If you are like most adults who have spent years on chairs and sofas, you cannot do it. Your heels lift. Your knees cave. Your back rounds. You wobble.
You have forgotten one of the most fundamental human movements. And that forgetting is costing you your back, your hips, your posture, and your gut health.
Quick answer
The deep squat — heels flat, hips below the knees, chest upright — is the body's natural resting and toileting position. Chairs and sit-down toilets have largely replaced it in the last two centuries, and most adults have lost the ankle, hip and lower-back mobility to do it. Rebuilding it is simple: hold a supported squat for 30–90 seconds, twice a day, lowering the support over about six weeks. Squatting keeps the spine and hips mobile, switches the lower body back on, and on the toilet it opens the anorectal angle from about 100° (sitting) to about 126° (squatting), so there is far less to strain against.
This article is part of the The Desk-Bound Body guide — the hub that pulls every article on this topic into one place.
For 99% of Human History, Humans Squatted
The flush toilet was invented in 1596. The sit-down pedestal toilet didn't become common until around 1851 — less than 200 years ago.
Before that, every culture, every civilisation, every continent — humans squatted to rest, to cook, to work, to socialise. The squat was not a gym exercise. It was a basic resting position as natural as standing or lying down.
Across Asia, Africa, and the Middle East — squat toilets are still the norm. These populations have measurably lower rates of the exact conditions the Western sitting toilet produces.
The squat position is not primitive. The chair is the experiment. And after 200 years, the experiment is producing mounting evidence of failure.
What Sitting on a Chair Does to Your Body
When you sit in a chair with back support, every major muscle in your lower body and core switches off. The glutes go completely inactive. Hip flexors shorten. The lumbar spine loses its natural curve.
Then you stay there for eight, nine, ten hours a day.
Research shows this decline accumulates rapidly. Just ten days of not using a muscle significantly weakens and shrinks it. Then when chair-weakened people bend to lift something, their body is brittle. It breaks.
The Muscles Squatting Wakes Up
A deep squat performed daily is a full lower body activation event.
Glutes
The gluteus maximus, medius, and minimus stabilise the pelvis, protect the lower back, and power every major movement. Sitting deactivates them. Squatting wakes them up.
Hip Flexors
Years of sitting shorten hip flexors, tilting the pelvis forward and driving chronic lower back pain. The deep squat stretches and lengthens them every time.
Ankles & Calves
A flat-footed squat requires full ankle dorsiflexion. Most shoe-wearing adults have lost this. Squatting rebuilds it — improving gait, knee health, and balance.
Deep Core
Not the six-pack — the multifidus, transverse abdominis, and pelvic floor. These protect your spine during every daily movement. They only activate when you get out of your chair.
Most adults cannot squat correctly even without added weight. The only way many can match a toddler's form is lying on their backs — proving that range of motion is not the problem. Under even bodyweight load, the deep stabilisers have been deactivated by decades of chair dependence.
Your Posture Is a Story Your Body Is Telling
Stand in front of a mirror. Rounded shoulders. Head jutting forward. Pelvis tilted. A slight hunch through the upper back.
This is not just aesthetics. This is the physical record of every hour spent in a chair.
By day, we unconsciously crane our necks forward and slope our shoulders to open obstructed airways. The weight of the head stresses back muscles, leading to pain. The kink in the neck adds pressure to the brain stem, triggering headaches.
The squat corrects many of these patterns simultaneously — forcing the pelvis neutral, demanding an open chest, engaging the posterior chain that posture depends on and that sitting switches off.
The Part Nobody Talks About
The modern sit-down toilet positions your body at approximately 90 degrees. It feels perfectly normal. It is also biomechanically completely wrong for the act it is designed for.
Running from the rectum to the anus is a muscle called the puborectalis. It acts as a kink — maintaining continence when standing or sitting. When you sit on a Western toilet, this kink remains partially in place, requiring you to strain against it.
Squatting relaxes the puborectalis muscle, straightening the anorectal angle and allowing the bowel to empty completely.
Four to fifteen minutes of daily straining versus one minute in a squat. Think about what that straining does to blood vessels in your anal canal — every single day, for decades.
How the Toilet Gave Millions Haemorrhoids
Haemorrhoids affect an estimated 75 percent of people at some point in Western countries. They are also almost entirely preventable.
The squatting posture reduces pressure on blood vessels in the anal area and minimises the risk of haemorrhoids. People in Asian and African countries where squat toilets remain common have lower rates of haemorrhoids and constipation.
Jimmy Carter's doctor said in Time magazine in 1978: "We were not meant to sit on toilets. We were meant to squat in the field." That was nearly 50 years ago. The haemorrhoid epidemic continues.
What to Do — Starting Today
You do not need to rip out your toilet. You need two things.
Add a Toilet Footstool
A 20–25cm stool raises your knees above your hips, straightening the anorectal angle and removing strain. Studies show people go more quickly, strain less, and empty bowels more completely.
Practise the Deep Squat Daily
Not as exercise — as a resting position. Start with 30 seconds holding something for balance. Work toward five minutes. Use it when on your phone or stretching in the morning.
Your Squat Progression
If you cannot get your heels flat yet — that is normal for most adults in shoe-wearing societies. The ankles will adapt with consistent practice.
The Coaching Floor
When a desk-bound client can't hold a squat, I tend to see the same three things. Tight hip flexors — the muscles at the front of the hip that a chair keeps switched into a short, folded position all day. A tight lower back to go with them. And, most of the time, weak glutes — the big muscles you are quite literally sitting on, switched off for hours at a stretch.
I can't prove the cause from where I stand, but the pattern is hard to miss, and I'd put it down to the hours and hours spent in that seated shape. Sit in one position long enough and the body adapts to it: the front of the hip forgets how to open, the back tightens to take up the slack, and the glutes stop pulling their weight. Rebuilding your squat is, in large part, undoing exactly that — opening the hip again and giving the glutes a reason to switch back on.
The Bigger Picture
The chair took away daily squatting from rest and work. The toilet took away squatting from the one daily act that remained. The shoe took away natural foot mechanics. The desk took away movement. The sofa took away the floor.
Each change seemed like an improvement. Together, they created a population that cannot perform the most basic movements of its own anatomy — then pays billions every year in back pain treatment, haemorrhoid surgery, and physiotherapy.
The solution is embarrassingly simple.
Get on the floor. Go low. Stay there a while.
Your body has been waiting.
— Shiva Malhotra, Barefoot Protocol
ACE Certified Personal Trainer · Food Technologist · Coaching online, worldwide
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I'm Shiva. I rebuilt my own body after 40 and now coach adults over 30 to do the same, without extreme diets or punishment workouts.
Read more about my story →"If your hips, knees, or lower back are constantly complaining, your movement patterns may be the cause. Let’s look at them."
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Frequently asked questions
Is squatting really better than sitting on the toilet?
For emptying the bowel, the mechanics favour it. When you squat, the puborectalis muscle relaxes and the anorectal angle opens from roughly 100° when sitting to about 126° when squatting, so there is less kink to strain against. You don't need to replace your toilet — a small footstool that lifts your knees above your hips gets most of the benefit.
Why can't I squat with my heels flat on the floor?
Usually tight ankles and hips from years in shoes and chairs, not a fault in your body. Start with your heels raised on a book or rolled mat, hold for 30 seconds twice a day, and lower the support over about six weeks. The ankles adapt with consistent practice.
How long does it take to get my squat back?
Most adults reach a flat-footed squat in around six weeks of daily practice — 30 seconds to begin with, building to 60–90 seconds twice a day. There is no prize for rushing it.
Is losing the squat a real health problem, or just stiffness?
Both. Sitting switches off the glutes and lower-body muscles, and disuse costs you quickly: ten days of not loading a muscle measurably weakens and shrinks it. Add the forward-head load a desk puts on your neck, and 'just stiffness' becomes real back, hip and neck problems over the years.
References
- Sikirov D. Comparison of straining during defecation in three positions: results and implications for human health. Digestive Diseases and Sciences. 2003;48(7):1201–1205. DOI: 10.1023/a:1024180319005
- Sakakibara R, Tsunoyama K, Hosoi H, et al. Influence of body position on defecation in humans. LUTS: Lower Urinary Tract Symptoms. 2010;2(1):16–21. DOI: 10.1111/j.1757-5672.2009.00057.x
- Kortebein P, Ferrando A, Lombeida J, Wolfe R, Evans WJ. Effect of 10 days of bed rest on skeletal muscle in healthy older adults. JAMA. 2007;297(16):1772–1774. DOI: 10.1001/jama.297.16.1772-b
- Hansraj KK. Assessment of stresses in the cervical spine caused by posture and position of the head. Surgical Technology International. 2014;25:277–279. PubMed: PMID 25393825