Happy Hips: An Advanced Yoga Sequence

Do you experience tight hips or back pain?  You may simply need to stretch out your hips more.  Add some Pigeon Pose to your life.  This 13 minute sequence is designed to progressively stretch out the legs while opening up the hips and low back.  I created this sequence for people who already have good flexibility in the legs and are familiar with pose terminology.   I will do a sequence for beginners at a later date.

In this sequence, we move from Downward Dog to a split-leg Downward Dog to a high lunge, arms upraisedto a low lunge, to Lizard Pose (Utthan Pristhasana), to Pigeon Pose (Eka Pada Rajkapotasana), to the variation of Pigeon that I call Mermaid Pose to Intense Side Stretch (Parsvottanasana), back to Downward Dog.

I don't do a very good job of explaining the transition between Pigeon and Intense Side Stretch in the audio so let me attempt to rectify that here.  From Pigeon, take the front leg into a low lunge by rolling onto the foot and lifting the knee, tuck the back toes under and push up into a low lunge, lining up the feet, then slowly straighten the legs and square the hips.  You may need to stand up to reposition yourself before folding back over the legs.  In this version the arms are dangling, but if you're feeling adventurous you can try Eagle arms, Yoga Mudra, or reverse-Anjali Mudra.

PLEASE be warmed up before attempting this sequence.  I suggest my 14 Sun Salutations audio or some more yoga before doing this.  Or just do 50 jumping jacks and 20 squats first.  Seriously.  These are pretty intense stretches.  What are we stretching?  Mostly the hamstrings and hip flexors.  Tight hip flexors are extremely common due to a high prevalence of desk jobs and long commutes, and can lead to lumbar compression, resulting in low back pain.  Keeping the hip flexors long and supple can potentially improve your run times, so this sequence is perfect for runners, especially if you have tight hamstrings.  Follow with a few twists and you'll have stretched out the whole core from every angle.

Here is the audio.

LINK

Let me know in the comments what you think, and what my next yoga sequence should be!