• Bend your right leg behind you and take hold of the right foot with your right hand. Bring your knees in line

with one another, keeping the heel in line with your sit bone. If your outer hip is very tight it won’t be easy to

keep the knees in line.

• Pull the right leg behind you gently. Keep the pelvis and shoulders facing forward and upright the whole time.

• Keep the pelvic floor and the low belly strong as you try to pull the leg behind you through the balanced

action of the inner and outer thigh.  

• If you have tight hips, it will be difficult to keep the legs aligned as you draw the right leg back. The knee will

pull sideways, and it is imperative that you keep the legs in line.

• Cross your right ankle of the left ankle while standing. Try to line up the

pinky toes as close as possible.

• Bend forward and pay attention to keeping the hyperextension out of the left

knee.

• Reach your hands towards the floor or towards a block or blocks.

• Pull the right hip back if possible to go deeper.

• Repeat on the other side.

• Stand at the wall. The distance between your feet and the wall depends on how deeply

you sit down. The knees should never go past the ankle.

• Place a block between the thighs and apply equal pressure through both legs. You can

squeeze hard or not, but equal pressure on both legs is key.

• Try to put your back and head against the wall (the head might not happen.

• The lower back and neck should be curved as slightly as possible away from the wall.

• Hold for 30 seconds building up to a minute or longer.

• Roll up a mat or blanket.

• Stand with your feet parallel, your heels on the floor and the balls of your feet as high up the roll as possible.

• Bend your knees softly and lift all ten toes. Keeping your knees aligned over your ankles, bow forward. Have

support for your hands if necessary. (A block, or even a chair).

• Stay in this position for a minute or longer.

• Keeping the knees over the ankles, try to bring weight to the inner foot. Lifting your toes will help keep your

arches from collapsing.

•Starting on your hands and knees step one foot forward and place your hands on the front knee bending your elbows out to the side.

•Orient your trunk so that both the hips and shoulders are facing forward.

•Pay close attention to the inner thigh of the back leg trying to set it back while rotating it internally. This stretches both iliacus and psoas

major.

•As the front knee comes forward it is very easy to lead with the front hip so do your best to move both sides of the pelvis together at the

same pace.

•Tone the transverse abdominis of the lower belly which will free the iliacus to stretch more.

•To go deeper into the pose play with straightening the arms, extending the trunk from the back of the body as much as the front.

•You can also play with the alignment of the pelvis turning the hip of the back leg more forward than the hip of the front leg to turn up the

volume a bit.

•Finally you can rotate the trunk to accentuate the pose in a number of ways.

Step your right foot forward and keep the left leg straight with the knee off the ground. Your fingertips should be

on the floor or on a block.

Square your hips as best you can and lift your fingers just one inch off of the floor. Feel what happens to your hips

when the hands no longer provide support.

If that goes well and you feel stable extend the arms forward alongside the ears.

Ideally the trunk doesn’t elevate or sit on the front thigh.

You can increase the difficulty by raising the arms higher without lifting the front of the ribcage and also by

drawing the wrists closer together, bringing the arms towards parallel.

6. If you want to move on from here, straighten the front leg about halfway. This should engage the hamstrings,

gluteus maximus, and assorted spinal muscles depending on where you need

the work.

∙ Standing in Tadasana, bring your right knee toward your chest.

∙ Take the big toe in the first two fingers of your right hand. If your hamstrings are tight, hold a strap looped around the left sole.

∙ Extend the right leg. Straighten the knee as much as possible. Keep the leg in line with the trunk if possible.

∙ Steadying your trunk open the right leg out to the side.

∙ Hold for 5 breaths, then bring the leg back to center. Engage your quardiceps and let go of the foot trying to keep the right leg aloft.

∙ Do both sides.

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Lie on your back with the knees bent and the feet flat on the floor.

Ground yourself through the whole foot with extra attention to the inner foot and lift the hips up off the

floor.

Extend your right shin keeping the thighs in line.

Replace the right foot and extend the left shin.

Do it again without lowering down in between.

Build up to a set of five

Set up a blanket on the floor in front of your mat so that it can slide along the floor.

Lie on your back with your butt as close to the front of the mat as possible with your knees bent and feet on

the blanket. Put a block between the inner thighs.

Make sure that your feet are parallel and you are particularly grounded into the inner foot.

Lift your hips into a bridge.

Work your feet isometrically so the gluteus maximus and hamstrings engage correctly in the direction of the

heels.

Hold this position for one minute to start, working up to 3 or even 5 minutes,focusing on using the muscles

correctly (i.e. not overusing gluteus maximus which leads to an unwanted external rotation).

• Stand with your hips and shoulders facing forward and maintain that alignment as long as you are in the pose.

• Bend the right knee and place the right foot as high up the leg as possible. If the pelvis turns backwards to help

your foot lift up, turn it back to face forward equally on both sides.

• Tree pose is both a hip opener and standing balance. But it only opens the hips if the pelvis is facing forward as

the leg opens to the side.

• Don’t worry how high your foot gets on the leg but if it can’t get above the knee keep it slightly below. You can

press the foot into the leg pretty hard as long as you aren’t pressing on the knee joint.

• Stand up straight with feet shoulder’s-width apart or slightly wider.

• It is okay to turn the feet out keeping the knees in line with the ankle. Make sure that the feet are

turned out equally and not too much. Feel free to hold onto a chair as you begin to explore this exercise

• Slowly and steadily bend your knees and flex your hips to lower your butt toward the floor. Don’t let

your knees move forward of the toes. You are trying to squat down backwards.

• Don’t worry about how far down you can go at first. Work on maintained alignment and a pain free

descent.

• Lower down to the best of your ability and hold for five breaths. Try to increase this over time to 25

breaths.

• An advanced variation is to isolate and engage your pelvic floor muscles while squatting. In this

version you try to tone the levator ani (a thick muscle at the top of the pelvic floor.

• Stand with your feet shoulder-width apart.

• Bend the left leg behind you bringing the left shin parallel to the floor and keeping the left ankle aligned with the knee.

• Slowly lower your body forward reaching for the floor with the right hand.

• Keep your back straight, and your standing knee pointed in the same direction as your foot.

• Descend as far as you can.

• Pause.

• Slowly push up from your inner foot, extending your leg.

• Straighten your leg.

• Repeat on the other leg.

Standing bird dogs

• Start by lying on your left side, with your knees bent and the right leg on top of the left

with the feet together.

• Maintain a neutral spine, engaging your abdominals if you need to.

• Stack the hips and don’t let the top hip move backwards. You can even cheat the top hip

forward. It is important to differentiate between the leg and the pelvis and not let them

move in the same direction.

• From this position, raise your knee slowly engaging gluteus medius. Keep the pelvis and

trunk stable. Hold the top position for 5 seconds.

• Lower slowly for five seconds.

• Another option is to raise the top knee slowly, hold for five seconds and then lower slowly

only about half way maintaining an active muscle.

• You want to activate gluteus medius and any way that happens for you is the best way.

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• Start on your back with your arms reaching up the palms facing each other.

• Do you best to roll up to a sitting forward bend with as little effort as possible.

• Do backwards in slow motion with the same control you were trying to display coming up.

• The feet may have to lift up a little when you first begin.

This exercise also works to stabilize the trunk. Engage your core and move the spine as little as

possible when lifting the knees up.

• Start on your hands and knees.

• Soften your upper spine gently between the shoulder blades allowing them to

soften onto the back. 

• Tone the pelvic floor and low belly. Keeping the trunk stable lift your knees one

inch off of the floor.

• Lay flat on your back with your hands by your sides.

• Lift the legs straight up in the air or curl your knees into your chest.

• Take the hips off the floor on an exhale. You can use your hands to help. 

• If this seems easy enough, bring your arms over head so you hands can’t help.

• Lie down on your mat on your back. Bring your arms out to the side with the wrists at the height of the shoulders, like the

letter T. Turn your palms up towards the ceiling.

• Draw your knees up into your chest.

• Attempting to move the knees up, bring your knees over towards the right inner elbow.

• Looking straight up the whole time, keep the legs together and slowly come back up to the center.

• In slow motion, move the knees to the left, again drawing them up towards the elbow.

• Coming back up to the center, keep squeezing the legs together and bring the knees up towards the nose.

• To go deeper in this exercise, you're going to come over to the right again and stop about two-thirds of the way down. Stop,

hold, and squeeze the legs together and release the left side of the rib cage down towards the floor. Come back up to center

slowly. Move to the left on an angle as slowly as you can, stop two-thirds of the way, hover and at the same time reach the

right side of the rib cage down towards the floor.

• To go deeper still, the full pose is done with straight legs. The difficulty in this advanced version is keeping the legs straight,

together, and moving up on an angle towards the finger tips. If the legs can’t move on an angle towards the fingers you

should only do this with the knees bent.

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In all three of these variations the legs stay down as the trunk lifts up.

-Lie on your stomach.  Interlace your fingers behind your back. Lengthen the back of your neck looking straight down.

- Draw the belly in and lift your trunk up off the floor, keeping your chin soft. The head, neck, and chest want to move in

one piece.

-Lie on your stomach.  Interlace your fingers behind your head. Lengthen the back of your neck looking straight down.

- Draw the belly in and lift your trunk up off the floor, keeping your chin soft. The head, neck, and chest want to move in

one piece.

-Lie on your stomach.  Bring your arms into a cactus position. Lengthen the back of your neck looking straight down.

- Draw the belly in and lift your trunk up off the floor, keeping your chin soft. The head, neck, and chest want to move in one

piece.

• Stand with your back to a wall. Place your feet about six inches away

from the wall. Relax your knees.

• Bring your arms out to the side and press everything to the wall

(except for the neck and low back), focusing on the middle of your

back.

• Slowly bend the elbows bringing your hands up to a right angle with

your arms. Make sure everything remains on the wall. Move very

slowly.

• If the arms come to a right angle, move the elbows up the wall,

keeping everything connected.

• Lie down on your belly with your elbows under your shoulders and your palms flat to the

floor in front of you.

• Lift the hips up off of the floor bringing the ankles, hips, shoulders and ears into one straight

line.

• If this is difficult begin by lifting the hips with the knees still on the floor and then try to lift

the pelvis up.

• Be aware of the upper back. We have a tendency to round or push up the upper back and

use the tightness of our chest muscles to hold us up. Try to broaden the upper chest and let

the upper spine soften gently towards the floor.

• Come onto your forearms while on your stomach.

• The elbows should be under the shoulders and the forearms should be parallel.

• Engage the lower belly so that you feel supported in the lumbar spine..  

• Relax that engagement to feel what type of muscle tone you have at rest.

• This is a key exercise for understanding the core tone you have and what you need.

Start on your hand and knees. Align the knees directly under the hips with the thighs relatively

parallel. The wrists should be under the shoulders and the creases in the wrists should be

parallel to the front of the mat.

Extend your right arm alongside your right ear with the right palm facing left.

Extend your left leg back keeping the pelvis and trunk as solid as possible.

Lift the left leg up behind you keeping the left hip turned towards the floor. The heel

wants to go only as high as the sit bones.

Do both sides.

• Start on your hands and knees with the hips aligned over the knees and not too close to the wall.

• Pick your hand variation and choose the distance away from the wall based on how hard you want to work.

• Take the knees up off the floor and step one foot up the wall to the height of your hips or higher.

• Try to put the other foot on the wall coming into the full pose.  

• Do both sides.

• The closer your hands are to the wall the harder the pose gets.

• Lie down on your belly with your elbows under your shoulders and your palms flat to the

floor in front of you.

• Lift the hips up off of the floor bringing the ankles, hips, shoulders and ears into one straight

line.

• If this is difficult begin by lifting the hips with the knees still on the floor and then try to lift

the pelvis up.

• Be aware of the upper back. We have a tendency to round or push up the upper back and

use the tightness of our chest muscles to hold us up. Try to broaden the upper chest and let

the upper spine soften gently towards the floor.

• Starting on your hands knees try to straighten the legs. Ideally the shoulder are fractionally

behind the wrists and the foot and shins are close to a right angle.

• Make the arms and legs as straight as possible.

• Don’t let the hips sink down.

• Soften the upper spine if you can.