Camel Pose with Yoga Blocks

A couple of weeks in the past, I wrote a put up on easy methods to put together your physique for Camel Pose (Ustrasana). Camel Pose is a difficult backbend. It stretches the complete entrance physique, particularly the quadriceps, stomach, chest and shoulders. Within the put up, I outlined a sequence you possibly can apply so as to stretch and mobilize these important areas of the pose. In right now’s put up, I’ll describe how one can apply Camel Pose with Yoga Blocks to make the pose extra accessible and comfy.

A typical concern in training Camel Pose is that straining to succeed in your heels along with your fingers restricts respiration. Practising Camel Pose with Yoga Blocks raises your fingers and reduces the pressure in your chest, which might help ease your respiration.

Not everybody’s spinal construction helps straightforward backbending. As you possibly can see from the above picture, the lion’s share of the backbend happens within the lumbar backbone. (The thoracic backbone will not be actually designed for greater than minimal backbending.) Some folks’s lumbar spinous processes are giant and thick, that means that they’ll “hit” one another a lot ahead of shorter, thinner spinous course of do. This restricts vary of movement in spinal extension.

As well as, some practitioners have a extra pronounced thoracic kyphosis (convex curve). This additionally restricts vary of movement in backbending. So regardless that the thoracic backbone’s vary of movement in backbending is proscribed, even a small quantity of extension makes the pose simpler, whereas a curvier thoracic backbone will limit motion. All that is to say that training Camel Pose with Yoga Blocks could make the pose accessible to virtually everybody.

Learn how to Observe Camel Pose with Yoga Blocks

You’ll be able to apply Camel Pose with Yoga Blocks 3 ways. Yoga Blocks have three totally different peak choices: tall, medium and quick. (The above picture reveals blocks at their medium peak.) Right here’s easy methods to apply Camel Pose with Yoga Blocks.

1. Collect your props: a Yoga Mat and two Yoga Blocks. You may additionally place a folded Yoga Blanket below your knees for further padding should you like. If you happen to’re utilizing a blanket, fold it in order that it’s narrower than your mat, and place it within the middle of the mat.
2. Come to a kneeling place in your mat and/or folded blanket.
3. Place blocks at their highest stage on the outsides of your toes. If you happen to’re kneeling on a blanket, make sure that your blocks are in your mat or on the ground relatively than in your blanket to provide them a secure base. (This is applicable to stable flooring akin to wooden or concrete. I wouldn’t suggest utilizing blocks on plush carpeting.)
4. Place your fingers in your pelvic rim and press down, releasing your tailbone towards your knees.
5. Carry your chest and lengthen your backbone as you start to bend backward, reaching on your blocks.
6. Take a number of breaths with the blocks at their highest peak. Is your respiration free and unrestricted? If not, keep right here for a number of extra breaths to see if it turns into simpler.
7. In case your respiration is simple, be happy to show the blocks on their sides, to medium peak. Verify in once more along with your respiration. In case your respiration is free and simple, take a number of breaths right here. Then if you’d like, you possibly can decrease the blocks to their lowest stage. Once more, test your respiration.
8. Free, unrestricted respiration is far more vital than getting your fingers to your heels or to the bottom peak of your yoga block. So hold checking your respiration to ensure it feels relaxed.
9. Take 5 to eight deep breaths, wherever you might be within the pose. Then return to kneeling and both sit in your heels or sit on considered one of your Yoga Blocks as your knees permit.

One Extra Suggestion

Yoga Blocks can actually make Camel Pose extra comfy, nevertheless it’s equally vital to ensure that we put together the physique to the fullest extent doable earlier than we embark on Ustrasana. I extremely suggest that you just learn the put up I wrote a number of weeks in the past about easy methods to put together your physique for Camel Pose, and easy methods to calm down afterward to rebalance your physique. Your breath—and a pair Yoga Blocks—can information you right into a Camel Pose that’s each exhilarating and relaxed.

About Charlotte Bell

Charlotte Bell found yoga in 1982 and commenced educating in 1986. Charlotte is the writer of Conscious Yoga, Conscious Life: A Information for On a regular basis Observe and Yoga for Meditators, each printed by Rodmell Press. Her third e-book is titled Hip-Wholesome Asana: The Yoga Practitioner’s Information to Defending the Hips and Avoiding SI Joint Ache (Shambhala Publications). She writes a month-to-month column for CATALYST Journal and serves as editor for Yoga U On-line. Charlotte is a founding board member for GreenTREE Yoga, a non-profit that brings yoga to underserved populations. A lifelong musician, Charlotte performs oboe and English horn within the Salt Lake Symphony and people sextet Crimson Rock Rondo, whose DVD gained two Emmy awards.