Understanding Backbend | Beginner Iyengar Yoga

Level: Beginner You'll need: two straps, a blanket, two blocks, a chair, a bolster, a wall Includes: Bhujangasana, Salabhasana with straps, a backbend over a chair and Setu Bandha Sarvangasana on a block. If you are on your cycle, leave out the strenuous backbends. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ In this class I go through some deeper understanding as you begin backbends. They can be frightening, and they can give you pain if you're not doing them correctly, so we go through some basic principles and a few poses. We're always bending forward, so we're not used to bending back, and every part of you is involved: the shoulders, the spine, the hips, the legs, the hands and the feet. We don't want compression in the lower back. Like in twisting, we lengthen first, and then we lift. The adrenal glands become activated, creating a beautiful energy throughout this practice. Energizing as backbends are, take your time, understand what's happening in your body and make adjustments where you need to. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ IN THIS CLASS YOU'LL LEARN TO • Move the tailbone in and down while the thighs move back • Roll the shoulders back and bring the shoulder blades in to lift the chest • Lengthen the front body first, then curve the upper back with the elbows bent in Bhujangasana • Take the feet wider if you feel any compression in the lower back ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ SELF-PACED PROGRAMS 👇 New to Iyengar yoga? Start with the Foundational course: 18 classes over six weeks. ► 30 Days of Iyengar Yoga for Posture & Alignment https://desayogi.com/yt/30days ► Foundational I & II Bundle https://desayogi.com/yt/foundations-b... ► Browse all programs https://desayogi.com/yt/shop ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ CHAPTERS 0:00 Welcome 0:54 Pelvis to the wall: the backbend action 2:55 Tadasana with a strap on the arms 6:00 Gomukhasana arms 8:20 Baddha Hastasana and Paschima Namaskarasana 10:35 Lying on the front: lengthening first 13:55 Bhujangasana 15:35 Lifting the chest with straps on the ankles 17:45 Salabhasana with straps 19:15 Salabhasana, strap on the arms 20:45 Salabhasana, hands on blocks 21:35 Adho Mukha Svanasana 22:58 Backbend over a chair, feet at the wall 28:15 Bharadvajasana on the chair 30:50 Chatushpadasana with a strap 33:10 Setu Bandha Sarvangasana on a block 36:00 Viparita Karani on the block 37:25 Reclining twist 39:50 Savasana with a bolster under the knees 41:55 Closing ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ QUESTIONS? Leave them in the comments below or find me on social: Website: https://desayogi.com/yt/site Instagram: www.instagram.com/desa_yogi_bali Facebook:   / desayogi   #iyengaryoga #backbends #yogaforbeginners #bhujangasana #kathycook #desayogi