3. Rabbit Pose
Come to the middle of the towel. Sit down on your heels, feet and knees together.
Put the towel on your heels, grab the heels over the towel, fingers inside, thumbs outside.Grip tight.
Pull on your heels as hard as possible. Stretch your spine up to the ceiling.
Tuck you chin to your chest, look at your stomach.
Exhale breathing: slowly round down the front of your spine, as close to the front of the body as possible,
until your forehead touches the knees. At the same time, touch the top of the head to the floor.
Exhale breathing, suck your stomach in and lift your hips up as high as possible. Roll hips forward until
your elbows are straight, eventually thighs perpendicular to the floor.
4. Rabbit Pose
If there is a gap between your knees and forehead, walk your knees forward, until your knees touch your
forehead. No gap between knees and forehead. Heels together, feet flat on the floor, no gap under the
tops of your feet.
Eyes open, throat compressed, normal breathing. Don’t move or turn your head. Make sure your total
spine is stretching from top to bottom.
Exhale breathing, suck your stomach in, to help stretch your lower spine more.
Very little weight in your head, keep strength in your arms. Lift your shoulders up towards the ceiling away
from your ears. Pull harder on your heels, hips up toward the ceiling more.
Continuously keep pulling. Reverse out opposite way you came in. Head up last. Come up, turn around,
relax on your back.
5. Rabbit Pose
Additional Instruction:
- First you stretch your neck and upper spine. When your spine opens more you will learn how to
stretch your total spine from coccyx to neck.
- If you feel too much weight in your head, you need to pull more with the arms and lift your shoulders
toward the ceiling,
- Feet stay on the floor throughout the entire posture.
Benefits:
The Rabbit produces the opposite effect of the Camel, giving maximum longitudinal extension of the
spine. As a result, it stretches the spine to permit the nervous system to receive proper nutrition. It also
maintains the mobility and elasticity of the spine and back muscles. The Rabbit improves digestion and
helps cure colds, sinus problems, and chronic tonsillitis. And it has a wonderful effect on thyroid and
parathyroid glands. The pose improves the flexibility of the scapula and the trapezius and helps children
reach their full growth potential.
6. Head to Knee with
Stretching Pose
Yoga with Meridian for Self Healing
8. Head to Knee with Stretching Pose
Turn around and sit facing the mirror. Bring your right leg out to the right corner of your mat. Bend your left
leg and put your left foot against your right leg inner thigh.
Create pressure with the sole of your left foot against your right inner thigh muscle. You two legs should
create a 90 degree angle. Both hps on the floor comfortably.
Arms over your head, turn to the right. Interlock your fingers, grab the foot two inches below your toes.
Pull your toes back toward your shin.Flex your foot. Stretch your spine up to the ceiling. Exhale breathing,
bring your chin to your chest, suck your stomach in, look at your stomach and touch your forehead on the
knee. If you cannot touch your forehead yet, bend the knee up.
9. Head to Knee with Stretching Pose
Bring your elbows down, next to your calf. Both elbows touch the calf. Use the forehead against the knee
to straighten through the knee. Left elbow down more, left shoulder down more. Left knee touching the
floor. Suck your stomach in. Bring your forehead closer to your stomach. This is a compression pose.
Change, left side. Grab your big toes with your middle and index fingers. Wrist straight, palms facing each
other.
Walk your hips back right and left, until both of your legs are straight and your pelvis starts to tilt more
forward. Flex your feet, thighs contracted. Straight spine.
As a beginner, of your legs are still bent, keep working on straightening your legs more. Look forward,
head up, chin up.
Inhale breathing, stretch your body forward from the lower spine. Chest sown on the legs, spine straight.
Exhale and pull. Touch your forehead to the toes.
Come up, turn around, completely relax on your back.
10. Head to Knee with Stretching Pose
Additional Instructions:
-Compression of the pancreas, extension of the kidneys, very good for your thyroid and pituitary glands.
-Try to get your upper body centered over your straight leg.
-If you leg is straight, thigh contracted, heel will lift off the floor. Not pulling the heel, heel lifts with the
contraction of the thigh.
-Suck the stomach in, creating hydraulic pressure, protecting the back.
-Make sure all ten toes are flexing toward your face. Pay attention to the pinky toes and the outside of the
feet. They should be flexing back just as much as the big toes and insides of the feet. Spine straight, even
if that means legs are bent and you cannot come forward with head to the feet.
11. Head to Knee with Stretching Pose
Benefits:
The Head to Knee Pose helps to balance the blood sugar level. It improves the flexibility of the sciatic
nerves, ankles, knees, and hip joints; improves digestion;enhances the proper functioning of the kidneys;
and expands the solar plexus.
The Stretching Pose relieves chronic diarrhea by improving the circulation of the bowels. It also increases
circulation to the liver and spleen and improves digestion. It increases the flexibility of the trapezius,
deltoid, rectus femoris, tendons, hip joints, and the last five vertebrae of the spine.
14. Spine Twisting Pose
Turn around and sit facing the left side of the room.
Bend your left keen on the floor, left knee facing the wall that you face. Put your right foot over the left
knee. You heel should be touching the knee.
Foot flat on the floor. Both hips should touch the floor, to keep your spine perfectly straight.
Touch your left heel to your right hip. Point your left toes.
Bring your left arm over the right knee, elbow against the knee. Push you knee back with the help of your
left elbow.
15. Spine Twisting Pose
Turn your wrist and grab the left knee with your left hand. Make sure your knee, hand and heel are all
touching each other. Keep your knee on the floor, foot flat. Stretch your spine up towards the ceiling.
Bring your right arm on your back, palm facing out. Try to grab your left thigh with your fingertips.(As a
beginner, put your hand on the floor behind you and push against the floor to get your spine straight)
Inhale, chest up, spine up, open your rib cage. Exhale, turn your head,look over your right shoulder, chin
over the shoulder. Turn and twist your body all the way, from top to bottom. Coccyx to neck. Chest up and
shoulders down. Stretch up and twist. Keep twisting. Use your arms to twist. Your whole spine is twisting
from top to other side.
16. Spine Twisting Pose
Additional Instructions:
- As a beginner, if you cannot grab your knee yet, grab the mat or towel in front of you.
- Sit up as tall as you can. Stomach in.
- Don’t lean to one side. Keep toth hips down.
- Keep your chin parallel to the floor.
Benefits:
The Spine Twisting Pose is the only exercise that twists the spine from top to bottom at the same time. As
a result, it increases circulation and nutrition to spinal nerves, veins, and tissues, and improves spinal
elasticity and flexibility and the flexibility of the hip joints. It helps cure lumbago and rheumatism of the
spine, improves digestion, removes flatulence from the intestines,and firms the abdomen, thighs, and
buttocks.
19. Blowing in Firm Pose
Sit down on your heels, feet together, or sit cross legged in easy pose if the knees have had enough.
We started with the Pranayama deep breathing exercise and we end with another breathing exercise.
Exhale through your open mouth, very strong, by pulling your stomach in. After you snap the belly in,
completely relax it.
The inhale will happen automatically as long as you totally relax your belly after every time you snap it in.
You should feel this in your abdominal muscles.
Bring your hands on the knees , arms straight, no bend in the elbows( arms behind you if your legs are
crossed.)
20. Blowing in Firm Pose
Keep your spine straight, shoulders relaxed. Abdominal relaxed. Swallow a couple of times moisten and
clear your throat. Cleansing breath together, normal inhale/exhale.
Inhale to prepare, start, as you exhale, belly pulls in. Release the belly, Inhale happens on its own. Focus
on the exhale. (Teacher clap quietly or breathe to set the pace, count soen the last few).
Turn around, lay down of your back for final SAVASANA.
Benefits:
This last breathing exercise strengthens all the abdominal organs and increases the circulation. It also
makes the abdominal wall strong and trims the waistline.
