Featured Pose
bend over
(forward bend)
Illustrations by Chris DeCarlo
A lot of people experience lower back pain. This can be caused by any number of factors from bad posture while sitting to weak abdominal muscles not supporting the back. This pose can help to release some of the tightness in those lower back muscles.
Stand with your back against a wall, and walk your feet about 2-3 feet away from it.
Place the feet about 12 inches apart and parallel to each other.
Bend your knees slightly, and begin to fold forward from the waist, sliding your hands down the legs toward the ankles, coming into a forward bend with your butt against the wall.
Cross your arms at the elbows, and rest the hands in the creases of the arms.
Let the head and neck relax completely.
Draw your navel in and up, making room for the forward bend.
Take a deep inhale, directing the breath into the lower back and hips, and feel your back expand with the breath.
As you exhale, sigh out through the mouth, letting go completely as you sink deeper into the pose.
Take a few breaths here.
To take it a little further, shift your body weight forward so that your buttocks come away from the wall; feel an even distribution of weight in the soles of the feet.
To get a deeper stretch in the hamstrings, straighten the legs and engage the quadriceps; shift your body weight forward even more so that you feel more weight toward the front of the feet.
To come out of the pose, bend the knees slightly, let the arms drop down, and roll up the spine one vertebra at a time, keeping the chin to the chest and letting the arms and shoulders hang the whole way up.
The shoulders will naturally fall into place, and the head and the neck come up last.
