Yoga for Posture: How to Improve Your Posture

Hey guys what’s up it’s Dean. Today we’re going to go through a quick flow to help with before you sit down for extended periods of time…so this is great for the mornings before you want to work you don’t have a lot of time or if you’re at the airport and you don’t have a you have a few minutes before you board. This would be a great idea.

So we’re to start off in a chair pose feet about six inches apart you don’t need any equipment for this workout…so feet six inches apart, bring your butt straight back bring your arms out. Now work on getting the weight into your hips so you’re trying to squeeze your butt cheeks together, squeezing your inner thighs particularly the upper part of your inner thighs together and really squeezing your glutes so just getting those muscles active because they’re going to be pretty dormant for a while and then I want you to lift your arms overhead as much as you can. Remember we’re not going for that long we’re only going for a few minutes so really push it while we’re here…so the legs are squeezing toward one another the knees are pulling back behind the toes glutes are engaged arms are reaching overhead…so stretching the shoulders and make sure you’re turning the palms to face up or slightly back…give this two more breaths, maybe sink a little bit deeper into it, and we’re really focusing on the muscle engagement here because again we’re not going to be using your muscles a lot in the next few hours, or in a couple hours, whatever you’re sitting for so you want to make sure those muscles get active, get turned on. A little lower one more breath…alright stand back up and we’re going to go into a high lunge, right foot forward left one back squeeze your legs toward one another so squeeze your back thigh squeeze your right heel toward the back try to get your right hip below the left hip so you’re pushing your right butt toward the ground, keeping your left thigh squeezed and engage and squeezing the legs toward one another. Make sure that your hips are centered and bring your arms up into a goal post arms now so now we’re going to work on opening up the chest and you want to lift your ribs up away from your hips while reaching your tailbone down, so making sure that you’re not in your back so you’re bringing length to your lower back you’re keeping the weight particularly in the abs and in the hip area right so not near the knees but all right around the middle of your body and give this a few breaths to…every exhale maybe sinking a little bit deeper, try to push your elbows out wide and squeeze your arms back make sure your arms are a little bit externally rotated so not facing down like this but opening up through the chest…see if you can sink a little bit deeper still squeezing the back thigh and one more breath we’re going to move up into a standing one leg balance..I want you to press down to your right foot bring your left knee up the hip level squeeze your right glute keep your shoulder stacked on top of your ankles and push your left hand into your left thigh so abs are tight and balances are great because they activate so much muscle so as you’re balancing on your right leg focus on pushing down to the heel squeezing your hip tightening the muscles in your right leg but also working your hip flexor in your left leg keep pushing your head up, keep your abs tight go ahead and bring your arm up to because your arm probably isn’t going to be overhead for a while…all right and then one more we’re going to bring your left heel back grab the inside of your left foot bring your right arm straight up inhale and then press into a standing bow, so try to keep your hips above your ankle make sure that your hips aren’t coming out in front, make sure your tailbone is reaching down to protect your spine, even squeeze your hips toward one another, really reach the right arm up and press hard into your back hand so really pushing the left foot hard into your left hand….two breaths here try and lengthen from your left knee to your left ribcage and then go ahead and release and switch sides immediately stepping your right leg back into a high lunge now we want to get the left glute toward the ground so try to sink that left hip make sure you’re squeezing the toes toward your heels so trying to lift that arch on your front foot now squeeze your right thigh to help open up to the right hip sink your hips down just a little bit reaching your tailbone down to get extra stretch through your right hip also protect your spine and again we want to focus the weight in the hip area right so right in the core kind of from the the thigh through the ribs…no tension in your spine because the core is engaged and even squeeze your legs toward one another so the right foot squeezes forward and slightly into it the middle same thing with the left leg squeezing back and then toward the middle and then again arms up into goal post arms slight external rotation and again that’s because our arms are going to be down along our side stopping that overhead so we want to get the shoulders open and get those muscles active in the back, so even pinch your shoulder blades towards one another and use the muscles in your back to stretch the muscles in your chest in the front of your body…use your exhale to sink deeper try to straighten the right leg as much as you can don’t do so at the expense of your lower back though…if you feel like it’s it’s too tight and you’re feeling a little pinching a little discomfort and your lower back ease up and soften the knee. Two more breaths here and you’re just opening up that right hip…all right and then into a standing March hold or standing one leg balance…bring your right knee up to hip level press your right foot sorry right thigh into your right hand make sure the shoulders are above the hips right so we aren’t leaning back or pushing the knee forward and falling over like I just did but standing straight up right…go ahead and bring the left arm up…breathing in and out of the nose keeping it slow and controlled and again focusing on muscle activation so we’ve got the core active we’ve got the right hip active got the left leg active…one more breath here and into the next balance pose so bring your right leg back try to do this seamlessly grab the inside of your right foot make sure your bicep faces out to the side, left arm goes up breathe in….exhale push back press hard into your right hand with your right foot, lift your left arm up reach your tailbone down so try to make the front side of your body longer actually try to lengthen the back side of your body as well so keeping both sides long so keeping height, and then really pushing hard into that right hand so almost treating this like a leg exercise right so pressing hard into that hand almost like you’re trying to move a weight…left arm goes up high…two more breaths here try to keep the hips squared forward opening up to the ribs but at the same time keeping the abs tight to protect your spine…one more breath…and then go ahead and release. All right we’re going to take it down to the ground just a couple more exercises here into a plank…pull your body forward, tighten the ABS lift your bellybutton squeeze your thighs squeeze your hands toward your feet and so I would you can just 10 seconds squeeze your hands toward your feet squeeze your biceps tighten your arms push your head forward press your heels back…five seconds…and then lower down halfway into a half push-up over the low plank and then from here push up into an up dog or take it down to a Cobra so flip your feet press down through your hands pull your body forward turn your biceps to face forward push the top of your head toward the ceiling squeeze your shoulder blades together arch your back but squeeze the legs toward one another to protect your core, lift up and then flip your feet and take it into a Down Dog..so hands are a little wider than shoulder width, bend the knees work on stretching the hamstrings, push your thighs back as much as you can, squeeze your legs toward one another, work on slightly pulling your chest forward so kind of opening up your sternum toward the front of the room…hug your arms toward one another hug the legs toward one another and try to work on your core engagement here so we’re opening up the calves, stretching the hamstrings, getting the shoulders active, and let’s do three breaths here try to squeeze your quadriceps and if your legs aren’t locked out don’t worry about it it’s fine…one more breath here, try to wrap the thighs in push your hips back a little bit more alright then a quick pigeon on both sides…so right knee toward the right wrist crawl the left leg back squeeze the legs toward one another pull the chest up, and really arch the back here so again we want to get the body into positions that were won’t be doing while we’re sitting, so chest pulling up, legs squeezing towards one another so the right knee squeezes toward the left knee and allowing the hips to sink down with the exhale…just one more breath here and then go ahead and switch sides so take it back into a Down Dog, left knee toward the left hand left foot across the body crawl the right leg back keep the chest upright, squeeze the left knee toward the right leg, pull the chest forward and up remember arching the back breathing in and out of the nose and allowing the left hip to open up, you shouldn’t feel any pressure in your knee, if you are feeling pressure than the you can bring the left heel a little closer to the hip, back toward the hips, or you can also put some on the weight into the hands and as that as you start to sink into the stretch as your hip opens up then you can put more weight into the legs again…just one more deep breath here…all right and then from here tuck the toes come back to a down dog just a couple breaths here opening up the hamstrings a little bit more pushing down through your hands squeezing the shoulders toward one another keeping the shoulders firm and strong tighten abs a little more one more breath all right and then take it back up.

And that’s it, all right guys so a quick little flow 11 12 minutes this is great for to do before you sit down for a long time, so you have a few minutes and you’re at the office or maybe you don’t have time for a full workout and you’re about to head into work or maybe you’re going to go for a drive, this is a great little flow for you to do to help negate the negative effects of sitting, so helping you get your chest open, getting your hips open stretching your hamstrings, getting your glutes active getting your arms overhead instead of at your sides that’s going to help with your mobility and help with how you feel throughout the day.

All right guys thanks for joining me today…if you’re watching this in the members area thank you so much for being part of the man flow yoga community…if you’re watching this somewhere else if you’re looking for more work up like this and easily easily to navigate and very convenient location everything in one place with workout programs and very organized the members area is just $1 to check out so you can sign up for a seven day trial for $1 at manflowyoga.com/7-days…thanks again for watching and if you found this useful share it, like it, make sure you’re following on YouTube and Facebook and I’ll see you on the next video take care