Core & Abdominal Strength

Hi everyone, welcome to Yoga & You, rooted in India, flowing to you. I'm Sanjana Prasad and today is day 4 of the 7-day series for Diabetes Management. If you haven't yet practiced day 1 to 3, definitely watch those videos, practice them, and then hop on to this one. Day 4 is all about finding strength and stability through the spine and engaging your abdominals. So hop on to your mat and let's get started.

We're going to come up into a tabletop position to find that mobility through the spine first before we get into our back-bending practice. So stack the shoulders over the wrists, hips over the knees. As you inhale, lift your chest up, arch the back; exhale, round your back. Inhale, lift the chest up, arch the back. Exhale, and round your back. Inhale, lift the chest up, arch the back. Exhale, round your back, three. Let's do two more. Inhale, lift the chest up, arch the back. Exhale, and round your back. Last one, inhale, lift the chest up, arch the back. Exhale, and round your back.

Slowly come back to a neutral spine and you're going to lie down on your belly. When you lie down on the belly, the first thing we're going to practice is a little bit of extension through the spine here. So I want you to bend your elbows and you're going to stack your shoulder right over the elbow. Your palms are parallel to each other. Try to walk the hands back and we're not going to be passive here. I want you to press your palms and your forearms and lift the chest up. Stay here and breathe. One, two, three, four, five, exhale, and slowly come back down. We place the forehead down now on the mat.

We're going to practice Bhujangasana. Now with all these back bends, when you're extending the spine, you do feel a little bit of engagement and contraction in the back here, especially the lower back on either sides of the spine. Apart from the muscle activation, there is also an activation of the internal organs, especially the kidneys here. So it's very helpful and useful practice in our series.

So you're going to place the forehead down, palms on either side of your chest. Don't let the elbows collapse. You want to keep the elbows active and engaged towards the body. Forehead down from here. Root the feet into the floor. As you inhale, lift the chest up. Exhale down. This is a wonderful posture to find the rhythm for your breath. Inhale, lift the chest up. Exhale down. Inhale, chest up. Exhale down. Inhale, chest up. Exhale down. One last time. Inhale, chest up. We're going to stay here. Now try to keep the belly pulled in. Breathe into your chest and your collarbone. One, so there's no wobbling here. The belly is not expanding. Two, three, four, five. Exhale and slowly come back down. Make a pillow out of your palms. Rest your chin. Continue, toes out. Relax in Makarasana for a few seconds.

So throughout your back-bending practice, keep the lower abdomen drawn in and start to work with your chest and your collarbone to breathe. This will help you to stabilize the lower back and reduce the pressure or any kind of pinching sensation in the lower back. For the second set of Bhujangasana, the first one we did five repetitions; the next one we'll do three, but we're going to change the arm position. So bring your feet parallel to each other. Take your arms behind your back, interlock your fingers. Roll the shoulders back. You don't have to press the palms together. The palms can be separated, just interlock. Forehead down. Inhale, lift the chest up. Exhale, down. Inhale, lift the chest up. Exhale, down. Last one. Inhale, lift the chest up. Stay. One, two, three, four, five. Exhale, down. Release your arms. Relax in Makarasana again. Take a moment to observe the sensations around the back.

Bring the palms on either side of the chest again. Legs together. Now you have two options here. This also we're going to do only three reps. You can go back to the first variation if you like, or the second variation, interlock the fingers. If both of that was comfortable for you, there's no strain in the back, around your neck, or shoulders, we'll try the third one. Interlock your fingers behind the head. Lift the elbows up. As you inhale, lift the chest up. Exhale, down. Inhale, chest up. Exhale, down. Inhale, chest up. Stay here for one, two. Don't collapse. Lift up, three. Four, five. Exhale and down.

This time you're going to release the hands. Push the hips back. Sit into child's pose. Extend the hands forward. Completely relax the breath. Two movements happening here: I'm trying to push my hips down into my heels; at the same time, I'm trying to reach forward with my palms. One, two, three, four, five. Roll your spine up, vertebra by vertebra. And we're going to come on to our knees.

Now that we've prepared a little bit with Bhujangasana, we're going to attempt Ustrasana here. So for Ustrasana, if you have a pair of blocks, it'll help you to progress gradually into the posture. If you don't have the blocks, you can use a book or any kind of height to support your palms. We're going to set up the blocks on either side of the ankle, and we start with the highest height here. Okay, now first for Ustrasana, we're going to warm up with a few back bends here and then try to get the palm on the block.

So take your palms, thumbs towards the spine, and place them on your lower back. Now squeeze the elbows towards each other. Inhale and lift the chest up. Think about the center of your chest: there's a thread attached at the center of your chest, and this thread is lifting you upwards towards the ceiling. So you're expanding through the chest here. Keep the lower abdomen pulled in. Inhale and arch your back, push the hips forward, arch back. Exhale and come back, one. When I'm doing this practice, I feel no pressure in the back because I'm lifting more through my ribs and the chest, and I'm not dumping into my lower back. So let's keep that in mind. Inhale, lift through the chest, push the hips forward, arch the back. Exhale and come back. When you're arching back, don't allow the hips to go back, hips stay pushed forward. One last time, I'm going to hold this for three counts. Inhale, lift through the chest, push the hips forward, arch your back. Stay there for three, two, one. Exhale and come back. Sit down in Vajrasana. Watch the breath. Slowly open your eyes.

Come back up onto your knees. If you feel like you need a little support for the knees, you can always fold up your mat or use cushions. Now the second level, what we're going to do is arch back and try to reach the palms to the blocks. So here, just use the blocks if you need to. Palms on the lower back. As you inhale, lift from the chest, move the hips forward, let the hips remain forward. We're not going to do that; we're going to keep the hips pushed forward. Arch your back. Right palm to the block, left palm to the block, my palms are facing back, so fingertips pointing back. Once you get the palms on the block, try to lift the chest, push the hips forward more, then drop the chin back. One, two, three, four, five. Support the back. Slowly come back up. Sit back on your heels, Vajrasana. Close your eyes. Pace your breath. Please don't talk like me during the practice, focus on your breath and breathe. Slowly open your eyes.

We're going to go to the next level. If you feel like this itself was too challenging for you and your heart rate is going up, there's a little bit of pressure, I would recommend you practice more of your Vajrasana, Ustrasana first level, and then try this again. If this was comfortable, what we're going to do is we're going to keep the blocks away, and this round we're going to keep the toes tucked on the mat. Okay, place the palms on the lower back. We'll do three breaths here, I'm not going to count this time so that you can also listen to my breathing. Lift the chest up, hips forward, keep inhaling, arching back. Open the chest. Right palm to the right heel, left palm to the left heel. Open up more. Drop the head. Support. Slowly come up and sit in Vajrasana. Pace your breath. Gently open your eyes.

Beautiful. We have one last level of Ustrasana, only if you're absolutely comfortable with the heels lifted up, I want you to try this. Please don't force your practice. The more you practice these back bends, the more you open up through the front body, these will become easier, more natural. So there is no force at all over here. Okay, let's come up. This time we're not going to tuck the toes, we're going to point, so one level lower. Palms on the lower back. Lift the chest up, hips forward. Draw the lower belly in. Arch your back. Palms to the heels. Slowly come back.

This time, hips down, extend the hands forward, getting into Child's Pose. If you're very comfortable, you can also try Shashankasana, where your knees are together. Go forehead down and palms holding your feet. Very gently roll your spine up. We're going to now sit down on the mat. A great way to counter your back bends, apart from forward fold, is to also work on your abdominals, because we've been stretching the front body, now we want to compress a bit to counterbalance. So we're going to play with Navasana here.

Place your feet hip-width apart on the mat. Extend your arms forward. Draw the navel in. Lean back slightly, I'm not getting my lower back to the floor or tailbone to the floor, I'm very much still on my sit bones. So lean back. Lift your right leg up. Stay here. One, two, three, four, five, down. Left leg up. One, two, three, four, five, down.

Now, before we try to lift both feet off, I want you to place your hands behind you slightly, fingertips pointing the same direction as your toes. Roll the shoulders back. Lean back. See if with support you can lift both legs up. One, still on your sit bones, two, three, four, five, slowly come back down. If this was comfortable, we're going to go ahead. Extend the hands forward and lift the feet off. Lean back. Lift up. Stay. One, two, three, four, five, slowly come back down. Release. Relax.

We'll try one last variation where we're trying to extend the legs up. But when you're trying to extend the legs, the tendency is to lean back to counter the weight, we don't want that to happen. So we're going to try to use the lower belly and the hip flexor to kind of create a stance which keeps you staying close to your legs. Again, try this only if the previous one was comfortable; otherwise give yourself time to build that strength. Let's try. Arms forward. Lean back. First lift your feet off. Now start extending the legs. One, two, three, four, five. Bend the knees. Slowly come back down. A good way for you to also find more engagement and balance in Navasana is to use a block. We can do the halfway lift with a block squeezed in between the thighs. This will help you create that engagement in your inner thighs as well and give you a little bit more stability.

From Navasana now, we're going to lie down on the back. We worked with Navasana, it really helps with engaging the lower belly, and it also activates your abdominal organs. To counter this, and also stabilize the lower back, we're going to practice Setu Bandhasana, or Bridge Pose. Your feet are going to be hip-width apart, palms on either side of the hips. You don't want to take your feet too far away, neither are you holding your hips, in between, where your fingertips are just about touching your hips. Ensure your knees are not collapsing inwards, neither are they falling out, so you're in a very neutral position here.

Even when you lift the hips up, you're not overarching the spine, keep the pelvis neutral and lift the hips up. Press your feet, your palms. Inhale and lift the hips up. Exhale down. Inhale, lift the hips up. Exhale down. This is a great preparation for your inversions when we're going to move into Sarvangasana. Inhale and lift the hips up. Exhale and down. Inhale, hips up. Exhale down. Last two. Inhale and hips up. Exhale down.

One last time, this time I want you to use a block or some kind of support. We're going to do Setu Bandhasana with the block support, so we get a little bit more opening, but it's more passive. Inhale, lift the hips up. Now take this block, slide it under the band of your lower back, okay, just about supporting the lower back, it's not pressing into your tailbone. You can stay here very comfortably. If your block is wobbling a bit, adjust. Close your eyes. Breathe. Fantastic, press into the feet, lift your hips up, remove the block. Now try to maintain the same height, interlock your fingers underneath your back. One, two, three, four, five. Gently bring your hips down.

Hug the knees into the chest, forehead up towards the knee, tight hug. Inhale, release the head, extend both your arms forward, keep your feet apart. Palms facing the ceiling, your eyes closed. To finish off, you can also practice a gentle spinal twist, which we've practiced in our previous episode as well, so definitely check that out. Once you're done, you can completely relax in your Shavasana.

So that was day four of our seven-day series and I really hope you enjoyed it. This is Yoga & You, from India with love and light. Thank you.