The Pose of Week is Bear Pose! This pose is excellent for building deep core strength and stability. Our core is exactly how it sounds, the core of our ability to do all of our main movements that we do daily. The stronger our core, the stronger our ability to keep ourselves from injury in the back and spine.
Benefits:
Strengthens the wrists, arms, shoulders, core, back and legs. Develops core strength and stability. Useful for spine stabilization.
How to:
- Begin kneeling down on all fours, in tabletop position.
- Align your knees to be hip distance apart.
- Place your toes directly behind the knees.
- Tuck the toes.
- Find the best hand placement, with your hands either shoulder width apart or just wider than the shoulders.
- Spread the fingers wide.
- Spin the biceps forward.
- Ground down through all four corners of the palms.
- Press down into all ten fingers.
- Lift at the base of the wrist and middle of the palm.
- Reach your hip bones towards the ribcage.
- Lengthen through the arms and lift the knees up to hover, just above the ground.
- Lengthen the sternum forward.
- Hug the arms in towards each other, as if there were a block that you were hugging into.
- Remember to breathe!
- When ready, gently release down and feel free to press back into child’s pose.
Modify it:
Keep your knees on the ground and practice the engagements. Press down through all four corners of the palms and press through all 10 fingertips. Lift the base of the wrist and the middle of the palms. Hug the arms inward towards each other as if they were hugging into a block. Press down through the tucked toes. Reach the hip bones towards the ribcage and lengthen the sternum forward. Another option is to hold a kneeling plank pose, to release pressure on the knees.