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Most of us think that we need a strong ‘core’

Most of us think that we need a strong ‘core’ to get into Headstand. But we don’t.

A great comment on getting into Headstand from the epic @thepilatesdifference ‘I work my core everyday, I know my core is plenty strong enough…that’s why I am sure it’s a technique that I need to understand’. Clever analysis.

We actually require very little strength to get up into a Headstand. It’s all about skill.

Knowing where your pelvis and legs should be placed and how to push into your hands or your forearms, depending on your version.

It’s all about shifting your centre of mass over your shoulders, and then PUSHING into the floor.
For us women, our centre of mass is around our pelvis - so think move your hips over your shoulders in Tripod or Forearm Headstand.
People like me with short arms, other people with less hamstring flexibility or longer legs may find it difficult to move hips over shoulders in forearm headstand because there is just less room to lean - my neck squishes and I get stuck.

Videos:
1. 2 straight legs up. Shift your hips as much as you can over your shoulders - you can bend your legs if you need to as having flexible hamstrings here really helps to walk in. When you feel you are as light as you can be on your toes - PUSH!
2. One bent leg. Bend your leg and take it as far behind your shoulders as you can. You will feel your other foot become light on the floor. PUSH!
3. 2 leg jump. Bring your feet behind your shoulders keeping your legs bent. No PUSH needed here.
4. One straight leg. This is hard if your hamstrings aren’t that flexible. Take your top leg high up and again you will feel the weight become less on your ground foot. PUSH!
5. NOT shifting my centre of mass with straight legs - nothing nothing nothing going up (concentric isn’t happening!). I managed a little lower to almost half way - abs burning - then collapse.

Be as strong as you need to be for YOUR body to do the things you want to do. 💪
#yogapracticemanual
#headstand
#headstandvariation

Swan diving in Yoga. Such a graceful AND strong mo

Swan diving in Yoga. Such a graceful AND strong movement. I love all the bodyweight strength work that relates to Swan diving.

We can Swan dive from Downward Dog to Chaturanga or from Handstand to Chaturanga. Both movements can be done in a controlled way as opposed to simply dropping into face smoosh on the floor. 😆

But as always - in pretty much every post I do - we need strength People! 💪 Especially us Yogis - we need to build up the strength to do many, many movements and poses in Yoga.

There are different bodyweight strengths required here. Negative push up strength - think lowering into Chaturanga slowly - and straight arm lean strength - think leaning forward in plank but way more.

Find where you are and work the progressions:

Video 4:
Swan dive from Downward Dog: This is such a great little negative push up strength builder for Chaturanga too. Keep your top leg tense. LEAN forward. Slowly slowly slowly bend arms - elbows can be in or out (yes yes yes - its fine 😂!).

Video 3:
Swan dive bodyweight strength work: Walk up the wall facing the wall. One leg off. Lean forward. PUSH with all your might to get back up.

Video 2:
Swan dive body weight strength work: Kick up to the wall. One leg off. Find your focus/dhristhi. Second leg off. Lean forward. PUSH EVEN HARDER to get back up. This is SOOOO hard.

Video 1:
Swan dive from Handstand: We need to lean forward here with straight arms. To control the drop it can be helpful to land with one leg first and then only bend the arms. Generally what happens is we bend the arms very quickly and…..face smoosh.

And of course add Chaturanga and push UPS too for your bodyweight strength work.

Be as strong as you need to be for YOUR body to do the things you want to do. 💪
#armstrength
#yogapracticemanual
#vinyasaflow

I never practice Headstand. Here’s why. Video 1

I never practice Headstand. Here’s why.

Video 1:
I can move my legs really quickly and I still don’t fall over. Because in Headstand we have a pretty much an equal amount of ‘base’ (our heads, forearms, side fist and side of our hands) on the floor as we do when we are standing - this is an estimated guess (maybe @fitness_pollenator PhD research guru can weigh in here). So after learning how to get up to Headstand it’s an easy balance.

Video 2:
Headstand requires almost no strength (yes not even CORE 🦹‍♀️ !). So I prefer doing a Headstand without my head on the floor (Headless Headstand is what we call it on our teacher training courses🤣). This version is more like Forearm balance where I look up slightly and I have to push hard with my upper arms/back to stay up. Builds some nice strength for other inversions and arm balances. Plus lots more skill work required and helpful for Handstands.

Video 3:
Know your proportions people! I have short upper arms so when I put my arms in a headstand position my head sticks out above my forearms. This means my neck has to compress a lot to get the top of my head in line with my forearms. This is also why I loathe dolphin as my head smooshes into the floor when I walk forward.

Video 5:
Yoga Teachers often say tripod headstand is problematic in terms of cervical (neck) compression whilst headstand is not. Both are compressive, how much depends on your weight, whether you have short arms, how much you are using your arms, and whether you have trained your neck to bear the weight (probably not). For me tripod is less compressive, and I use this version if I need to demonstrate a transition like headstand into crow.

Do you practice headstand????
Be as strong as you need to be for YOUR body to do the things you want to do. 💪

#headstandvariation
#headstandtutorial
#headstandpractice

Most people can get into the shape that Crow/Bakas

Most people can get into the shape that Crow/Bakasana or One legged Crow/Eka Pada Bakasana requires and understand where to place their legs on their arms (see previous posts if you still don’t know 💪). Often all that is missing is the the arm strength to do the pose.

And yet building arm strength for Crow/Bakasana is actually easy and surprisingly fast if we know what to do. For Crow and One legged Crow - push up variations, tricep dips, and ab work. You will be amazed how quickly - a few weeks - that you start build strength and how that strength translates to other poses and enhances your mental health too.

And....lucky us Yogis 💙 Two experts in the field of Strength and Yoga, @jenni_rawlings and @fitness_pollenator , have put together an incredible resource, Strength for Yoga @strengthforyoga

I was lucky enough to get a sneaky preview peak of the book last week (yay!!!) #sneakystrengthyoga. Lots and lots of Yoga poses are covered with easy ways to build up strength for Yoga poses.

This book is a much needed, super accessible, well researched and essential tool that will help Yoga Teachers and Practitioners add the missing element of strength to their practices. And the book offers other strength work that we don’t see in Yoga, to give us an all rounded strength programme.

Check out @strengthforyoga and sign up for their free E-book offer.

Be as strong as you need to be for YOUR body to do the things you want to do. 💪

#sneakystrengthyoga
#strengthforyoga
#armstrength

I CANT DO CROW POSE. Beginner Crow pose breakdown.

I CANT DO CROW POSE. Beginner Crow pose breakdown.

Here is a video on teaching beginners Bakasana/Crow Pose. Please share to anyone you know who wants to learn how to do Crow pose and to any teacher who might be interested in learning how to analysis Crow pose for their students.

I love looking at complex poses as just being progressions in a range of the pose. So Malasana/Squat in a Crow shape with your feet on the floor is simply just the first stage in the range of Crow variations. One legged crow is further along the range and so on. If we see all versions as simply a place in the range, it reframes the idea that we can or can’t do Bakasana/Crow. We are just in certain progression right now.

These videos are part of a much (much much much much😓😓) longer video that is a Pose Analysis of Crow that we use on our Yoga Teacher Training courses. All our Pose Analysis look at the flexibility, strength and skill requirements of poses and an individual’s body. And how we can work on those areas

Bakasana/Crow is a skill and strength pose. So to move further along the range we can build up more strength and more skill (how we do the pose).

Crow requires:
1. Shelf - a stable part of your arm on which to rest your legs/torso
2. Arm/shoulder activation - push strength
3. Lean- you need to lean to allow the legs to lift
4. Look - where you want to go
5. To progress, get stronger and work on skill

Be as strong as you need to be for YOUR body to do the things you want to do. 💪

How to do a Crow Pose Ever heard the cue in a Vin

How to do a Crow Pose

Ever heard the cue in a Vinyasa class ‘for those that wish to go into crow please do, everyone else stay where you are and breathe’. And you wonder how on earth to do that fancy arm balance the teacher is doing.

Cueing ‘just stay here and breathe’ is not teaching in my opinion. You can teach a Vinyasa class AND teach progressions to poses. Wellness Connection teachers learn how to create a Vinyasa sequence AND teach a complex pose. It our ‘thing.

Crow Progressions.
1. Know your proportions. Heavy, longer legs more difficult to lift. It just means you may need to be stronger 💪
2. Fear is a factor for most. It’s cool and sensible. Take it slow
3. You need to create an arm shelf for your shin to balance on. The bigger the shelf the safer and easier the balance. Chattaranga shape bent arms create the widest shelf.
4. You need to LOOK forward and DOWN - look where you want to go and down is not it 🤣
5. You need to lean lean lean forward (and only a little bit down!) The longer your legs the more you need to lean. Think see saw.
6. As you lean PUSH into the ground and draw your elbows towards each other - you may need to work on push up strength
7. Don’t flick your legs up. One foot at a time. As you lean your feet will float.
8. Play with different ideas and progressions - blocks, bolsters, wider arms, hips high, hips low explore what works for your body
9. Stuff takes time. None of the fancy posts you see happen immediately - a lot of work is put in behind the scenes.

💪 Be as strong as you need to be for YOUR body to do the things you want to do
#crowposebeginner
#crowposepractice

More Core work..... and shoulder work. And in my h

More Core work..... and shoulder work. And in my humble opinion one leg off Crow pose requires a huge amount of core and arm strength.

Taking one leg off in Crow is super hard. Well it was for me. If you have tiny light legs is WAY easier but there is no point in complaining that it’s not fair my legs are so heavy 🤣 You know what I like to say... Be as strong as you need to be for YOUR body to do the things you want to do. 💪

Crow press ups are a great way to build up the PUSH strength that you need to take your leg off in Crow pose.
The key is to sink and PUSH back up.
As always you can start with less load and build up the strength

1. Start with your toes on the floor in Crow and bend and straighten your arms. Then progress to one foot off the floor
2. Both feet off the floor, little push ups.
3. On blocks, which means you can lower a little more
4. In one leg Crow the second you take off your leg you need to PUSH into the ground with ALL your might or you will sink to the ground.

This is a great way to build core and shoulder strength for all your arm balances and for handstands. It will also help for those of you that wish to jump through your hands from Downward dog to seated.

Be as strong as you need to be for YOUR body to do the things you want to do. 💪

#crazycrowpose
#crowpose
#corework

Core work. My word! Real core work. Wow. 🔥My ab

Core work. My word! Real core work. Wow. 🔥My abdominal muscles burned!

I love all Yoga styles and other movement practices too. But I am soooooo glad I did 8 years of Iyengar yoga. Iyengar Yoga taught me that props are not just to modify a pose ie regress a pose or to help you if you can’t do a pose.

Iyengar Yoga taught me that props like chairs and walls and ropes can actually make poses and exercises HARDER so that we are able to build strength (and offer more variation & have a huge amount of fun too).

This core & shoulder push chair movement is a really great exercise for so many yoga poses and so much fun. The horizontal line with your feet on the wall makes it way harder than a plank or a diagonal wall hold.

Make sure you have a sticky mat, a solid chair and a not too slippy wall. Don’t wear socks! Well you can….it might be fun sliding down the wall.

Push hard into the wall with your feet.
Push hard into the chair with your arms.
Draw your knee into your chest and push even harder into your hands.

This nice chair movement is a mixture of 2 ideas that came from my favorites to Iyengar teacher @yogizain and my yoga science geek teacher @jenni_rawlings . @yogizain version used a one leg straight leg movement and @jenni_rawlings did her movement on blocks -woah….. nice! Try those out too. Their posts in my stories. Isn’t incredible how Instagram lets us share movement ideas? 💙

Be as strong as you need to be for YOUR body to do the things you want to do. 💪

Common Pregnancy Yoga ‘Rules’ taught on Yoga T

Common Pregnancy Yoga ‘Rules’ taught on Yoga Teacher Trainings.

1. Do not Twist - seated or standing
2. NEVER go upside down
3. Don’t forward bend (too much)
4. NEVER do any Yoga postures if you have never done yoga before
5. NEVER lie on your back after 16 weeks
6. NEVER lie on your tummy
7. No backbends ever
8. Don’t do Hot Yoga
9. No intense abdominal work
10. Avoid ‘over-stretching and hyperextending joints’
11. One legged balances risk falling

Not much left to practice, is there now?

OR………………

1. We could understand that pregnant women are strong, capable human beings who carry on a life outside of our Yoga room - which involves work, picking up heavy toddlers, twisting in the car to mop up baby spills, balance on one leg whilst holding a 2 year old and reaching for the groceries…..
2. We could note that the pregnant woman wants to be in a yoga class and see that as a strength and encourage it. Not allowing any of the above mentioned poses is essentially not allowing the pregnant woman to participate in a Yoga class.
3. Not allowing all of the above mentioned poses also tells the pregnant woman that she must never move in any of these ways outside of the Yoga room because its dangerous. What IS dangerous is encouraging fear of moving.
4. What we could do is teach prenatal yoga from a movement science point of view.
5. And we could use the progressive overload principle and build up strength in Yoga poses from where the individual is at that point in time.

Join @lauranorton_yoga for a 20hr YACEP Movement Science based Pregnancy Yoga Teacher Training course. Laura will be 8 months pregnant and still moving.

Online. 25-26 February https://wellnessconnection.co.za/pregnancy/

#pregnancyyoga
#pregnancyyogateacher
#pregnancyyogateachertraining

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