In this workshop I want to dispel the idea that you need to go and do special classes or exercises for your core strength. I want to show you how you can use your core muscles well in a normal yoga class.
I will teach you how to have your tummy muscles activate without you needing to think about it. This is called creating postural firmness. I will show you postures that will firm your tummy without you needing to try.
Because you need to put less effort into activating the tummy muscles (they will switch on naturally) you can free yourself up to try to feel relaxed and breathe naturally.
I admit, it sounds a little too good to be true. But it's not. Come along and see!
May 9 2015, 2-4 pm. $25. We will be practicing down by the steps where the ducks and swans come in front of the Water's Edge restaurant at Lake Burley Griffin. We cannot control the weather so dress appropriately. Please contact me if in doubt about weather situation--if it is raining or really really windy we might need to change venues or postpone!
In this post I show videos and step by step instructions on how to help unsquash the front of hips and lengthen lower back. They are great tips for people who spend a lot of time sitting, which is most of us in general.
Key Instructions
I have a limited repertoire of what I consider some basic instructions.
No matter what sequence I teach these instructions repeat themselves over and over.
They repeat themselves over and over in single class.
Sometimes I wonder why people keep coming back since I do say the same thing over and over again!
I like to think that it is perhaps my wit and good humour that brings people back.
But I am pretty sure it is because while these instructions sound simple, they are actually tricky to apply, to apply consistently, and to apply in different orientations to gravity.
One of those instructions is "sitting bones down, top of pelvis back, lengthen lower back."
For people who have tight lower backs, and even people who do not, this instruction feels amazing on the lower back.
However, I could also say, "sitting bones down, top of pelvis back, unsquash front of hips."
You see, depending where you focus, or perhaps where you feel more tightness, the same instruction can help in two places.
Most people live a lot of their lives squashing the front of hips. Well, those that sit for most of the day do.
So this instruction is a great way to help unsquash.
It is particularly useful to apply in forward bending postures.
I keep the front of groin open (unsquashed) when I practice forward bending postures.
It is the opposite of what many people practice--either deliberately or incidentally.
It means you work on spinal forward bending then hip flexion rather than just hip flexion, which often happens.
Some Thoughts Before You Watch And Practice
For me yoga is a spinal movement practice. In order to maintain the health of your spine you need to learn how to move it, and move it safely. Unsquashing is key. Being able to create firmness in they tummy in a way you can still feel the movement of the breath there while mobilising the spine are also key.
In the videos I chose a modified chandra namaskar to show the differences between squashing and unsquashing. One video shows me showing what squashing looks like versus unsquashing. The other video just shows a smooth unsquashing practice.
I have also taken still shots so you can compare the two side by side.
Perhaps watch unsquashing versus squashing first. Then look at the still shots. Then watch the unsquashing so you are left with a clear impression of unsquashing.
When watching these videos please consider that I mainly post things for my own students who come to me and whom I can watch carefully. Practicing from videos is a not the best, especially if you have pre-existing issues.
Also note that in the videos below I create firmness in my tummy in a way I can still breathe into it. I have written about this a lot before so please refer to those posts. Whenever I bend forward from the spine I create firmness first. I am trying to have core stability with mobility. Much of what I show will not work if you suck your tummy in tightly (using muscles of forced exhalation) because this will stiffen the spine.
Squashing Versus Unsquashing: The Video
This video shows me trying to highlight squashing versus unsquashing in the same poses.
Squashing Versus Unsquashing: The Still Shots
Below I show the shot of being squashed on the left and unsquashed on the right.
In the squashed shots I performed the actions of moving the top of my pelvis towards the front of thigh and pushing my sit bones up into the air.
In the unsquashed shots I performed the actions of moving my sitting bones down and top of pelvis back.
You can see I put my hand to the place that I am concentrating on. One finger is at top of front of pelvis and the other on the thigh bone.
In most shots you can see the 'air' in the unsquashed variation. You can also see that my lower back lengthens or is less 'archy'.
In all forward bends I try to firm my tummy in a way I can still breathe. I also feel that I am pushing both hips forward without actually moving them.
Unsquashing: The Movie
Here I show the whole sequence with just the unsquashing version.
The End
That's it from me today.
Happy and safe practicing. This is the type of thing I teach in classes, workshops, and my retreats in Canberra, Sri Lanka, and Bali. If you are around I would love to teach you.
Working
Towards Hanumanasana/Splits (James Brown Version—Gotta Go Up To Go Down)
Hanumanasana (henceforth to be called the
splits in this post) is a pose to work towards with caution.
It looks so impressive most people’s egos
get the better of them.
Or, perhaps it was just my ego?As I tell my students, when I first started
yoga I injured myself with over-zealous practice of the posture.
Actually, the practice was not
over-zealous.This was a case of pure
ego.I actually practiced mindfully and
diligently.The day I made it into the
pose after many months of practice I was so pleased with myself that later on
(several hours after my practice and we could almost call it the next day) I
met a friend and said ‘Look, I can do the splits!’
I proceeded to do the splits right there
and then, with no preparation.
Well, let’s say I managed the position but
did something to my butt that had me limping for a month!
These days I can do the pose almost first
thing in the morning as I have been practicing for many years. However, most people will need quite a bit of
preparation.
Hopefully my previous posts should have
lead you towards an understanding that the splits should not feel like too much
stretching.
It is not about splitting apart.
Using active movements means the pose is
actually about coming together again.
If you are working towards this posture I
recommend you work with an experienced yoga teacher to guide you.Do not confuse flexible with experienced and
also, I think it is better to make sure your teacher can do any pose they are
trying to instruct you in.
In the photos below I have shown one
progression.Watch the video above to see the movement in action. The video at the end of the post shows advanced variations of the posture
(intended for demonstration not for practice).
You remain at whatever stage you feel
comfortable in (feel like lengthening and relaxing, not stretching and
tugging).
There are two key things I am doing in each
stage.The first thing also has a
little subplot.
First, my front thigh is rolling out and my
back thigh is rolling in.
This means the thigh bone of the front leg
feels as though the side butt (near the crease) is firming slightly.What you see is that the knee might roll away
from the centre line of your body.
The back thigh is rolling in, which means
you might feel the inner thigh firming a little.If you could turn around and see your knee is
trying to move so it is more towards the centre line of your body.
The subplot here is that I am also trying
to move the side of front hip back and draw side of back hip forward.
If you are not mindful the opposite tends
to happen.That is, when you roll the
front thigh out it can often bring the side of front hip forward and when
rolling the back thigh in it can often send the side of back hip backward. So
you need to watch out for this.
The second key thing I am doing is to try
to suck my legs or feet together.
Yes.I am not actually trying to split them apart.
Sucking them together could be likened to
someone at foot trying to push your legs back together (what I am doing).
Whereas most beginners just try to let
their legs come apart, almost as though there is a person at either foot
pulling them in a tug-o-war.Actually,
they do not even do that so much as let the weight of their entire pelvis and
torso just hang and sag in the middle.
Ouch!It is obvious when put that way that it would not be a pleasant feeling.
Sucking it up is key.
This is where I put in the James Brown
analogy in class.He was a guy who sort
of did a type of a split while on-stage singing but leapt straight back up
again.It looked really cool as a dance
move.
In our yoga practice of this pose we need
to be thinking of trying to draw our feet back together again (while they move
apart).
This makes the posture active rather than
passive.
It will help make you stronger and more
mobile.
Step 1
A standing lunge. Stay here. I am trying to pull my feet together. No need to go further unless comfortable.
Step 2
Kneeling lunge. Be soft on the back knee by being active in the legs and feet. I am drawing front heel back and back knee forward. You can stay here. No need to go further.
Step 3
I start to move the front foot further away. I go slowly so I don't elicit a stretch reflex. You can see the back knee slightly raised. I try and draw my feet together as though trying to stand up. I am not sinking into my shoulders or hands at all.
Step 4
That front foot just keeps moving slowly forward.
Step 5
I have come all the way forward. I have moved my torso back while trying not to arch my lower back (tummy firm but calm). I am reaching forward and up through my armpits to lengthen my spine.
Of course, there is really no reason you
need to do this pose.It is fairly
extreme.
One of the benefits (which is not going to
make you a happier or healthier person by any means) is that if you are coming
into some other inverted postures like pincha mayurasana you can tap into the
pose with greater ease.
Below is a video of me coming into active hanumanasana with a variation.
Some additional points you might notice
from the videos:
I am not sinking into my hands or shoulders
at any point. I am trying to cultivate
lift and length and freedom in the spine through the actions of my legs. This is clearly shown in my fuller versions
of the posture where I take my hands off the ground, arms overhead, and reach
for the sky.
I am using my back foot strongly. You can do a
top of foot down version if you like.
I just prefer this one.
Most people think of this posture as
something to do with hamstrings. As soon
as you practice you should get an appreciation that the front of the thigh of
the back leg needs to be lengthened. If
it is not you can squash your lower back.
You can see that in my versions I begin to
move the whole spine back over the pelvis, trying to lengthen my spine while
coming into an upright position. This is
actually a pretty tough back bend and you need to monitor that the spine is not
squashing. I am firm in my tummy in a
way that I can still breathe into it, which helps.
I am reminding myself periodically to relax my face, my tongue, my lips.
I am breathing naturally.
I am enjoying the sun on my face, the
chirps of the birds, the call of loud children in the background playing with
their dog. I am feeling radiantly
alive! Firm but calm. Delighted with where I am and what I am
doing, whatever that is. I am connected to my body but not so inward
looking that I cannot sense others and I smile and nod as they pass by.
This is the type of thing we workshop in classes, and in our retreats in Bali and Sri Lanka. Hope to see you there. (www.artofliferetreats.com).
Sounds so easy but there's a bit more to it than that!
We had a great time opening ourselves to freer backbends on Saturday with several people doing their first ever urdhva dhanurasana! It was pretty exciting to watch.
One of the poses we practiced is not really a pose, but a prep pose. I call it mega stretch. When you try the name will be self evident. It may have another name but I'll stick to this one.
Mega stretch is not just about stretching it is about strengthening. When you combine strengthening with stretching you get a long, lean muscle that is less likely to be injured in intense positions.
I have a mega stretch video clip I made when I lived in Sri Lanka. You'll see me on my rooftop with a plant growing from the wall in the background. Love those wall plants! There's a bit of Eva Cassidy playing in the background from somewhere too.
We did a fair amount of preparation before mega stretch. This is not a pose to just leap into. Do some standing poses, including high lunges and low lunges, throw in a few warriors and twists, and come into this pose with an intention to be mindful to the sensations that are going to arise within you. Please read the tips before practicing.
In the the mega stretch on the video
clip there is little escape from the intensity of the stretch. So you need to go with
the flow and breathe. Of course, as always, be mindful of any strain that
might be leading to injury. In this pose the most likely strain would be
in the knee joint or possibly the lower back if you are not mindful.
Below I have outlined a few points about the integrity of the joints for
this pose:
fold up your mat like I do in the video clip. This is actually
just to act as a cushion for your knee. The thing about this pose is that
it looks like the pressure is on your knee, but your weight is actually not on
your knee cap but on the bottom of the thigh bone. I usually do this pose
against a wall without my mat, but, having said that, having a little
cushion does bring a bit of comfort.
watch the front knee does not come too far in front of the ankle. As a general guide, for most people keep the knee above the ankle.
in the video clip I fix my shin straight up the wall and then slip my
pelvis inside the heel of my foot to take it all the way back to the
wall. You do not need to do this and you should not force yourself to do
this. Remember, yoga is never about forcing. Your body will 'do'
when it is ready. Your pelvis can stay in front of your foot, it does not have
to go back to the wall, and that is completely ok! You can use
this pose as a lunge variation rather than as the virasana variation as I
move into. Work within your limits.
try not to let your lower ribs just jut out as though you are 'spilling your guts' or hanging in your lower back.
if you are going to take your arms overhead then take them up by pressing the armpits down and forward (letting the shoulder blades wrap around the ribcage) while simultaneously taking the elbows up and back. They do not need to go overhead and could stay in front of your face. Move them slowly and watch that your lower ribs don't start to jut out--you'll want to keep those softening back.
when you come into the lunge variation, try to move the back knee forward as though you were trying to bend at the hip that you are stretching. Also, try to press the sitting bone down and under and forward as though in an arc. These two actions should help free the spine and provide a strengthening element to the mega stretch.
ankles that are tight might make it a bit difficult to get into this
posture so that the wall foot is flat. If the front of your ankles are tight and you cannot get them
flat against the wall then roll up a little hand towel and place it between
your ankle and the wall.
See if you can hold the two poses
I demonstrate in the video clip for about a minute each. Focus on
steadying your breath as you do so. In between legs, get up and move
around. You will really feel the new 'freedom' in the leg that you have
just stretched. When finished perhaps take a pose like supta baddhakonasana or something that feels good for you.
Backbending is a wonderful way to counter the daily slump of our postural lives. We get up and hunch over the breakfast table, get in the car and hunch towards the steering wheel, and then a lot of us get to work and huddle up in front of a computer. Altogether too much time spent being forward and it's just not good for us!
In our workshop this weekend I am going to try and teach the art of effortless backbends to free your spine. I have taken the liberty of cheating and quoting myself below--this is an extract of a previous blogpost I wrote for my students in Sri Lanka. The text goes with the video above of me (with part of my head cut out) practicing my own 'effortless backbends'.
Effortless
backbends
Now that I
have ventured into the world of movie-making with myself as writer, producer,
sound guy, actress, stunt-woman, special effects coordinator, body double etc,
etc, I have noticed something I had not quite noticed before. I have tiny
little twig arms that look like they might snap in two! Yet, even with
said twig arms, I am able to come up from the floor into poses like urdhva
dhanurasana (let’s just call it urdhva D, which makes the pose sound a bit like
a rap song but a whole lot easier to read).
In class
people often talk about not feeling strong enough to come up into urdhva
D. However, strength is probably not the issue as you can see with my
twig arm practice.
Now, I know I am going to hear a whole host of
comments to the tune of I don’t have much to lift up (although these might just
imagined, comments since I can’t be sure anyone is actually reading this), but
coming up into a backbend is less about strength than it is about finding the
wind in your sail that billows out your chest and carries you high—imagine a
kite that gets picked up by a gust of wind.
Recently I
have been experimenting with different ways of coming up and down into urdhva D
so that I feel relaxed and free. There are many ways and methods of
coming up into urdhva D and this is just one I use at the moment. Maybe
some of the ideas might be helpful for you, which is why I am posting
them.
After you
watch the movie clip and read the blog, go away and remember to practice with
mindfulness and a sense of playful curiosity. Don’t get stuck in your
yoga practice and stuck in ways of doing things. The body needs to be
challenged or it gets dull. And (obligatory safety message although as
yogis hopefully the desire to be mindful and present in your poses will steer
you automatically towards safety) never move into pain. Have a chat with
your yoga teacher if you have any concerns.
Your
pelvis as a helium balloon
Our bums
and pelvis are getting good coverage in this blog so far and that continues
here. When you come down onto the floor, remember to place the feet
mindfully.
Really engage the power in the ball and outside edge of the
foot.
From here
send the knees away from you a few times and feel your pelvis float away from
you. It rises effortlessly. You don’t need to do anything.
You don’t need to squeeze, thrust, or push. You just need to let it float
up like a helium balloon. It does not need to come up very far at
all—just let it get lift-off so it becomes weightless.
And yes, even the
biggest of bums is going to feel weightless here.
Once it is
up there, let your pelvis and lower back be free. Move it gently around
like a hanging basket and experience this freedom.
Your
chest as a sail
With your
pelvis lifted (but not pushed, or thrust etc), bring your awareness to the
space between your shoulder blades and the corresponding place on the front of
your chest (just about the middle of your sternum). This part is going to
become like a sail on a sailboat. To come up into a nice urdhva D you are
going to have to catch the wind in this sail.
The tricky
part about this is trying to catch the wind in your sail and not the wind in
your tail. When you first start practicing this move your pelvis might
come up too but you are actually trying to isolate the two movements. So,
if your pelvis comes up, don’t worry about it, just let it float down again and
concentrate on getting lift in the sail (not the tail).
Another
good thing to remember is that the wind is going to billow out the sail in all
directions—your back is going to broaden and your chest is going to rise at the
same time.
In the
movie clip I add another movement here to really get my sail into full
bloom. The secret is in the arms. Can you see what I am
doing? It might look like I am just taking my elbows around in a circle
and then digging them into the floor. What I am actually doing is using
that movement of the elbows to help encourage my shoulder blades to move
further down towards my waist. This action is really important. I
will say it again just so you get how important it is. This action is
really important.
What I am
trying to do is to feel as though I have connected my outer armpits the top of
my pelvis. This action is going to help create the circle in urdhva
D.
Pause,
relax, and breathe
I have
never met anyone who cannot find a way to do those two actions (helium bum and
wind in the sail). It might take some practice, but it will come. And
when it does, come up, come down, come up, come down, and just enjoy the
movement.
Some days I
just stay here for a long time, really using the combined actions of sending my
pelvis one way and heart the other to create length and freedom in my
spine. In the movie clip I have come up much higher than you
really need to and that is just for effect. You can just stay low, pause,
relax, and breathe.
Do not skip
this stage. If you are a person who has trouble coming up into urdhva D,
you probably start to get anxious and stressed and start worrying about how you
will get up and if you will get up at this point. Rather than use your
energy in worrying, take time to just breathe. Feel what it is like to
just hang out here with no pressure, no idea of what is going to come
next.
Put
the hands in place
If you feel
relaxed and your spine feels free, then very casually put your hands in
place. As you do so, try as much as you can to keep those outer armpits
moving down to the waist.
If you
cannot get your hands on the floor without losing too much of the connection
between your armpits and your waist then you might just need to stay at the
previous stage until I write my blog on using a prop to help you. For
effortless backbending you really do need to keep those upper arms bones moving
into the body. You can still come up but it will feel much more like you
are levering yourself up and using brute strength.
If you can
get your hands mindfully into the floor then all you need to do is press
through the hands, press through the feet, catch the wind in the sail….and fly!
And
finally
Nothing
happens overnight. If you can’t get your hands into the floor then stick
with the initial stages. In the mean-time, your yoga teacher should be
able to give you some tips, props, and pointers, and may even help you find the
lift you need by assisting you.
In your own
practice, remember to be mindful and patient, and to work on catching the wind
in your sail combined with freedom in the lower back. Other parts of your
body will need to open to help you come into an effortless urdhva D, especially
around the shoulders and front of the hips, but this pose is always going to be
about relaxing rather than brute strength.
Enjoy your
practice! Hope to see you at the workshop on Saturday. We are braving the outdoors for the last time until the weather gets better but the BOM says it will be 22 on Sunday with very little wind and no rain so I think we will have a great day out. Please let me know if you are coming!
PS:
If you want
to see a real genuis backbender to inspire you, check out this youtube link of Paddydoing 'extreme
backbends'
Mettha,
Samantha
Classes (current at time of posting. See class schedule page for updated details):
