Yoga For Hips & Lower Back Release | Yoga With Adriene

– What's up party people? And welcome to
Yoga With Adriene. I'm Adriene and this is Benji
and today we have an awesome practice for the hips
and the lower back body. So hop into something
comfy and let's get started. (upbeat music) Alrighty my friends, let's
begin seated in your yoga mat with the legs
out in front of ya. You're gonna lift your knees,
place your feet on the ground, try to aim your
toes pointing forward. Just to start to send some
awareness towards your feet. And then you're
gonna take your hands and you're gonna
touch your booty. So we're gonna move fleshy part
of the buttocks to the side so that you can feel this grounding
down through your sits bones. And if you don't feel it,
that's okay. Just would be to each his own.

Moving the buttocks
just so you feel grounded. So we have our feet grounded and then we have
the sits bones grounded. And then just notice if the
knees are coming in or out. See if you can
align knees with ankles, so you have two
slides going down. Awesome, so we have
a swift practice today. Swift is and not long so we're gonna jump
right in with the breath.

Bring your hands
to your hamstrings. Just behind the
back to the thighs here. You're gonna
keep your feet rooted, loop your shoulders,
start to lift your heart up. Now, there is the likely chance
that you've picked this video because you're experiencing some
tension or some tightness in the lower back or hips so see if you
can send awareness and breath, whatever that means to you,
right down to that lower back right away here
as you breathe in. And breathe out. Then in your next breath in,
sit up a little taller, breathe in and then breathe out
you're gonna slowly send your heart forward, chest forward. You're gonna drape over
the tops of your thighs. Now you might clasp
opposite elbow here. Notice if the knees are
wanting to come in or out. See if you can keep these two
nice straight lines from the knees to the ankles,
toes pointing forward and then yep, you guessed it.

Some of you are
probably already there, you're gonna relax
the weight of the head over and still continue
with the breath. Ah, should feel really good. Notice where you might be
holding or clenching in the neck, the traps,
the shoulder area. The skin on
the forehead, the jaw, keep awareness in the toes. So keep that connection of the
sits bones and your feet just kind of grounding
you into the moment. Take a moment to
close your eyes here. Just feel the power of
your breath, that wave. Notice how it can
stretch as you breathe in and soften as you breathe out. And again,
if you haven't already, go ahead and close your
eyes just for moment here, go inward. I love this shape. Doesn't always have
to be a fancy yoga pose. Just uniting breath and body.

Sweet, take one more deep breath in your own private
little love cave here. Nice, now release the hands, press the palms
firmly into the earth. Stay connected to everything that is touching
the ground here, your foundation as
you tuck the chin, start to lean back, way back,
and slowly roll it up. Awesome, take a
deep breath in here. Head over heart,
heart over pelvis. And then as you exhale, hands are gonna
come to behind the thighs. You're gonna lift the toes up,
dig into the heels and if you're experiencing any pain or
discomfort in lower back, you're just gonna stay here. If you're here for more of the
release and preventative care then you're gonna lean back
and lift the shins and toes up parallel to the ceiling. Just connecting to
little core stability here.

So we're here or we're
here and we're breathing deep. Jumping right in. Thank you so much for sharing
your time and energy with me and with the Yoga
With Adriene community. You made a great choice. Take one more breath,
you got it. Awesome, then we're
gonna slowly release, feet back to the ground. Then you're gonna
send the left leg out long. You're gonna hug
the right knee in, squeeze as you send your sternum up
towards the sky. Flex your left toes, take a deep
breath in and then on an exhale, you're gonna slowly bring
your right hand behind you and you're not
gonna twist to look back. You're just gonna
twist to look to the right. So the right side of your mat,
not all the way back. Just gentle and easy here. Big breath, squeeze and lift. Great, then you're
gonna come back to center. We're gonna bring the
right knee out this time. And then we're gonna
lift the right fingertips all the way up towards the sky.

Left fingertips
brace behind you. Then you're gonna think up
and over as you reach the left fingertips to either
grab the outer, sorry, right fingertips to grab
the outer edge of your left foot or your left shin
or your left thigh. So you could be here,
here or here. Now actively draw the
top of the right thigh, that meaty quad muscle,
and your thigh bone, the femur, down towards
the earth as you inhale, lift your chest. Lots of awareness. 100% full body awareness. Take a deep breath in. And then exhale,
you're gonna release your hand and then we're just gonna take
the hands to the earth, the shin or the foot and you're
gonna come all the way flat, belly towards the thigh. Just intention not you
have to come all the way flat. Head to knee pose,
take one more breath here.

Big cycle of breath in and out. Breathing into that lower back
body and then slowly release. Don't push anything. Just let it kind of be
where it's at today. And you're gonna guide
the right knee all the way up. And we'll just do a switcheroo. Send the right leg down,
I'm not gonna lie guys, I'm on a little bit of
a cold medicine. Okay? Just got to keep it real. Right leg goes out,
left leg comes in. Nothing better than a little
at-home yoga to tend to the body so I'm all good, don't worry. Not that you were worried.
(laughs) Squeeze and lift so
find this foundation first.

Nice and tall,
hug that left knee in. And then again, we're
not going all the way back. Today, we're just
going to the left. So you'll bring the
left fingertips behind. This is to help us resist the urge of cranking
all the way back, creating stability
and finding length today. Big breath here,
breathe into your belly. Nice, and then slowly
we'll come back to center. We're gonna open
the left knee out. Beautiful, then
left fingertips reach up. Got it right this time. Right fingertips come back to
anchor you and then you're gonna think up and over as you reach
towards the outer edge of the right thigh,
outer edge of the right shin, or all the way over to
outer edge of that right foot. And you're of course
gonna feel that great, long lengthy release
in the lower back body.

And you know what
makes it even better? You bringing
conscious breath to the par-tay. So soften your gaze. Breathe deep. Let your left thigh bone,
left quad get really heavy here. So we're actively
drawing down as we lift and lengthen over the right leg. Awesome, then slowly release. Frame your right leg with your
hands and then you'll decide what feels best here.
Maybe grabbing the shin. Maybe one day the foot,
maybe you're just here. Baby steps and we'll slowly
fall into our version of head to knee pose,
Janu Sirsasan. Hey buddy. Breathing deep. Then slowly press
into your foundation to roll up and look what Benji did.
(laughs) He loves to sit on top
of people or on top of things.

You think you're a lap dog. Okay, from here, from here we're
gonna pull the right foot in to meet the left, Baddha Konasana but we're gonna give
ourself a lot of space today. So if you're used to kind of
zipping up to the center line, awesome for you, my loves but we're gonna give
ourself a little space. You're gonna create a diamond
shape by bringing the heels out. Then hands are gonna hold
on to the shins or the ankles so shins if you seem to
be rounding forward. If you have that length already
here then you can go ahead and go for the ankle and find a
little rotation in the pelvis. Okay, inhale,
sit up nice and tall. Exhale, bend the elbows. You're just gonna slowly shift
forward so that you're looking just beyond the toes. Maybe looking into a pond,
seeing your reflection. And then we'll come
all the way back up. And then back again,
navel draws in and up, create space, coming forward,
bend the elbows.

And then come back up and
then this is the last time we're gonna hold there, and you
might find that the option is available to allow the elbows to
press the tops of the thighs out a little bit and
maybe open the toes. So we're breathing deep. Tops of the thighs
actively anchoring down. Ooh, yeah. This is a good one, tuck
the chin a little bit here. Find length. Nice, and then release. Bring the hands
to the outer edges of the thighs or the knees. You're gonna bring the knees
together and then we're gonna send the legs out long. If the legs are a bit tight,
lower back, hamstrings a bit tight, just go ahead
and keep a nice generous bend in the knees by
digging into the heels.

If you're able to straighten the
legs let's go ahead and send the toes up towards the sky and keep
nice and active in the toes. Check it out, left fingertips
are gonna go back. You're gonna slowly
reach all the way up and over, touch your right toes. Then come all the way back up. Left fingertips, I did it again. Right fingertips
are gonna go back, think up and over,
touch your left toes. Again, you can bend the
knees here for this flow.

Inhale to reach up and over. It's like you're
swimming here, big stroke. And then come back and
then all the way up and over. And you're gonna keep doing this
and see if you can find a nice breath to sync up with. And this is definitely one where
I like to remind you to not worry about what it
looks like but how it feels. Explore the sensations as you move with your breath. We'll go ahead and even it out.

And then the next time you're in
your Forward Fold with the knees bent or with the legs straight,
with a micro-bend, you're gonna go
ahead and hang out there, Paschimottanasana. I love to bend my
knees in Paschimottanasana. When I was younger, I really
tried to get that peanut butter and jelly sandwich but I think
I was straining my muscles a bit more then now I know that
I would have wanted. (laughs) Whoever's doing
the captions on this video, good luck with that one.
No, just kidding. Basically, bend your knees. Because we're not just
trying to get loose hamstrings. It's all connected, right? It's all tied in
to one moving part. So we want to integrate.

I'll stop talking for a second
and I'll allow you to listen to the sound of your breath as you allow the weight
of the head to relax. And then take one more
breath in your private, beautiful,
therapeutic love cave. And then slowly grounding
through your foundation to tuck the chin and roll
it all the way up. Okay, so how you get here will
be a little bit different for everyone but I'm gonna
guide you to bend both knees and bring the feet
flat to the earth. Okay, so we're in this bit of an
awkward pose to start but we're gonna use our fingertips,
we're gonna turn the toes out. This is very important.

Turn your toes out, bring
your fingertips behind you, then here we go, lift
up from your pelvic floor, connect to your core and
you're gonna slowly come forward into a Froggy Pose. Knees are gonna trace the toes. A big hip opener here. Find soft, easy movement here. Notice if you got a little bit
frustrated there, that's okay. That's why we're
here to create space one lovely at-home
yoga practice at a time. It's all good. So create a
little movement here. You can stay in the Froggy Pose
or you might widen your feet just a bit more,
drop your heels back and come into
this low yogi squat. A little Malasana variation. So you know your body best,
you are the expert. So you can stay in
the Froggy or come here. Big full, deep breaths no matter
what variation you're choosing. Again, try to think of
the body as one moving part.

It's kind of why I've selected
this little dance today so that we're not just going
isolating hip stretch. Isolating back stretch. Even though this is
really great for the lower body. All of it, take one more breath. Maybe lean back
wherever you are. Sit up nice and tall. Yes, and then release
we're gonna lift the heels if you're in the squat. You're gonna
walk the toes back in. Knees are gonna
go forward, toes forward. Come to the center of your mat. And again, if you're
feeling sluggish today, just remember this
time is so awesome.

You get to kick your
shoes off and do yoga, right? You're not at work, yet. Okay, then from here
toes pointing forward, fingertips on the
earth to support us, we're gonna slowly
drop the head down, drop the heels and
send the hips up high so you're in a
Standing Forward Fold. Allow the blood
to flush to the head. You can claps the elbows,
rock a little side to side. Now you have gravity
working for you here. So you might be able to straighten the
legs just a bit more. But careful not to lock them. And then really, oh,
take this time to release. Have you been holding on to or
carrying around something heavy that needs to be shed? No matter how big or how small,
can you take a really conscious moment here to let go? Choose to release something that maybe is
just no longer needed.

Maybe that's just tension
in the neck and shoulders or tightness in the hips. That's where we
store it all anyway. Oh yeah. If the arms are clasped, go ahead and
release the hands down. Now you're gonna walk your
feet as wide as your yoga mat. Once again, turn the toes out. Inhale, use your
fingertips on the ground and exhale to support you. Exhale, slowly drop your center
back down into your Froggy or into your yogi squat. Take a deep breath in here,
smile, life is good. Then exhale, you're gonna
bring the fingertips behind you. We're gonna come all
the way back sitting, seated.

Awesome, send the legs out long. Sit up nice and tall. Beautiful Dandasana. Toes up towards the sky,
breathing deep. Close your eyes, center. Nice and then
press into your hands, dig into your heels. You're gonna lift your hips up. Send 'em towards
the front of your mat and come all
the way to your back. When you get there,
take a deep breath in. The deepest breath you've
taken all day and as you exhale, hug your navel into your spine and hug the knees
up towards the chest. That's right, find
what feels good here. Give yourself a big hug. Roll around one
way and then the other. Let any sounds of gestures that
want to come out of the body, (laughs) let them come out. Sigh of relief or release. Great, then you're gonna lower
your left foot to the ground. And you're gonna cross your
right leg over your left leg.

Now check it out, use the
hands to press into the earth, you're gonna shift your hips
over towards your right side of your mat, and then slowly just
allow your legs to fall towards the left side of your mat. Now, if you're
experiencing any stress or tension in the lower back, you're gonna skip this and
you're gonna come into maybe a more gentler twist. Make it an easy reclined twist.

Knees just stacked
on top of each other. Otherwise we're in
the Garudasana legs-ish, Eagle Legs, breathing deep. Soft fingertips. Send your breath downward. And then anchor
through your foundation to come all the way back up. Right foot comes to the earth as
you re-center the spine and then left leg's gonna cross over. We're gonna use our
foundation to lift the hips up. Press down through the earth,
lift the hips up, send the hips to the
left side of the mat. And then let this just
fall easy to the right. No pushing or forcing. Mmmm. And we're
breathing into the belly. You can close
your eyes on this one. And then slowly press
into your foundation to come all the way back up to center. Take your hands,
bring them to your kneecaps. You might have to
peek at me for this one. We're gonna
stabilize a little bit, neutralize the spine by
bringing the palms to the knees. You're gonna scoop
the tailbone up first so that it's nice and
flush with the mat. This should feel yummy and
it requires you to be active. So you're gonna
scoop the tailbone up, draw the navel down.

So there's no space between. Breathe deep here,
try to soften through your feet. And then if this
just feels amazing, you're just gonna stay here. Otherwise, we're gonna release and now slowly
allow the pelvis to tilt, the lower back to lift up. Just the opposite
of what we were doing. And again, you'll know if it's
right for you to stay with your lower back flush with the mat.

And if you do take the tilt,
you might come right on to that SI joint,
right on to the sacrum. Nice and easy. Soft in the feet,
soft in the jaw. Great, and then nice and slow,
scoop the tailbone up. Hug the knees into the chest. Nice work, you're
gonna reach around. We're gonna end
with a Happy Baby. So you're gonna grab
the outer edges of the feet or the inner arches. I'll let yogi's
choice rule here. And then you're gonna
kick one leg then the other, soles of the feet actively
kicking towards the sky. And now actively
reach your tailbone towards the front edge of your mat.

Try to lift up
the lower back here. Breathe deep. If you want to some
soft easy movement here, please do. (sighs) One more big breath in and out. And then we'll release. Awesome. Feet come
to the ground. You're gonna windshield wiper
the legs one way and then the other to extend the
legs all the way out. Great, bring you
left hand to your heart and your right
hand to your belly. We'll take a final breath here
to just allow the nutrients of our practice to settle in.

Go ahead and close your
eyes when you land here. Feel the warmth of your hands. Inhale, lots of love in. And exhale, lots of love out. Nice work today. Go ahead and
leave behind anything that's not working for you,
not serving you. You can just leave it
on the yoga mat. It'll evaporate and transform
into something new for someone. So just a little opportunity
to release and leave behind whatever wasn't working so
that you can plant new seeds, find new joy and
rock your best self.

I want to rock
with you all night. (hums) Go ahead and
bring your palms together. Tap into a little inner smile. Take a deep breath in and we
finish by quietly whispering Namaste. (upbeat music).

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