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| I was just thinking about body proportions and poses. I am short, but have longer legs in comparison to my torso. I've noticed that this makes all of the "foot grabbing" poses harder for me, and I guess I will need a lot of patience with those. On the other hand, the "head to knee" poses are a snap.
Any advice for long legs/short torso? Will I ever touch my head to my feet in hands to feet? Will I ever touch my head to the floor and be able to reach my feet at the same time in standing separate leg stretching?
I also wonder if anyone has had the experience of coming home from yoga and being completely overwhelmed with exhaustion, sleeping 12 hours or so, and waking up fine the next day. This has happened to me a couple of times and I wonder if it's some kind of marker of progress, maybe? Like maybe something "big" happened inside and my body needs rest in order to "get the benefits," like a super savasana?
Ferret |
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| hey ferret. im 5"8, female here. initially i thought it was impossible to improve with those stretch pose. but soon, i realised its possible! my right leg flexibility has gotten way better that when im doing the last stretching pose, i actually had to stretch IN FRONT and flex my feet really hard to feel the stretching. the first set i round my spine, the second set i go forward onto my sheen bone so that i get more stretch.
but i guess for the full paschimotthansana, its harder for tall people to get their head to their toes.
you should be fine, if you find those foot grabbing poses hard, it probably means your muscles are not flexible enough. but you are going to be there one day! |
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| The real question for you (and for lots of us, including myself), is will you ever truly come to believe that depth doesn't matter as long as you are doing the pose the right way?
Yes, I've come how wiped out. Then, after a night's sleep, I feel better than ever. Sometimes I reward myself with an early morning practice. The wipe out feeling might mean progress. Sometimes its just literally being drained, and needing water and electrolytes. And sometimes, who knows? |
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| I think Duffy raises a good point!
Also, I have found that whenever I have reached a milestone, a new one comes up. For example, if you can't grab the back of your heels in hands to feet, that will be your goal for now. But once you can do it, you'll be working on locking your knees. And then on bringing your head down to touch the tops of your feet. And touching your elbows behind your calf muscles. So even when you can "finally" do something, there is something new for you to work towards. This is why we keep going. 
I used to get exhausted like that when I first started practicing, and I occasionally have days like that now, too. I think it is often just when life needs us to slow down - due to stress, maybe fighting off an illness, or adding in extra exercise (like if I do a hike on a weekend, I might feel exhausted after a Tuesday practice - I didn't rest enough right afterwards, so by Tues my body forces me into it). Make sure you are keeping your electrolytes up, too! |
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| Just to clarify, I am not actually tall. I am only 5'2", but my legs are proportionately long compared to the rest of me--so I find the feet weirdly farther away when I bend over! I think this may be the reason I've had an aversion to hamstring stretches in the past--it always seemed unreasonably hard to get at the toes! I'm glad to be getting to know my body better.
Duffy, you have a good point. Honestly, I do not ever expect to get the kind of super depth that some of the very flexi yogis have, but at the same time I think it is healthy and appropriate to have a concept of "progress" in yoga and to feel you are looking forward to certain milestones. :-) At this point, I'd like to be able to lock my knees in all of those poses where they say "lock the knees." I don't think I'll really be able to touch my toes with my head. I think that's physically impossible for me, and I'm okay with that. But there's something a bit frustrating about hearing an instruction given with so much emphasis "Lock your knees, lock your knees," and being unable to follow it. I got to class about three times a week. Will it help if I do some hamstring stretches each day outside of class?
I guess I've been to maybe 80 classes by now, and at this point I've actually backed off the depth in some postures as I work on getting things lined up just right.
Ferret |
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| One of my teachers likes to say that the poses are "bottomless". There's always more to explore.
I have nothing against milestones. I am as happy as anyone when I get one of those breakthroughs -- happier now, since they seem to come much more sporadically. I also would not, after 80 classes, or even a couple of hundred, begin to assess what is or is not physically impossible for you. Maybe one day you will get your head to your toes, and maybe not. Maybe the relative length of your bones makes it very unlikely. None of that really matters if you are doing the poses with the right form and intention.
As for doing hamstring stretches outside of class: it might help you with the depth of your poses. If you do them carefully, and don't overstretch, I don't see any harm to it. But a part of me rebels: the Bikram class is supposed to serve your life, not the other way around. Doing stuff outside of Bikram class for the purpose of getting better at stuff inside class just seems backwards to me. Of course, if you are doing hamstring stretches because you really need them, and it will help you in other areas of your life, that's a totally different idea.
Finally, what is it with people and hamstring flexibility. My hamstrings are really tight. But for some reason, we tend to judge flexibility by hamstring flexibility and there's much more emphasis put on it than on any other kind of stretching. Thus, touching the toes or the floor or whatever, is to stretching what the bench press is to weight lifting. |
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| well, i'm a bi believer in daily practice myself,and with bikram, that often means practicingg with less heat or no heat at home. so, sun salutations help warm the body.
aside from this, not only are a'll thins possible'--which i truly believe--it's really a matter of whether or not acheivin somethin is reasonable.
and besides, i have always seen a lot of instruction like "head to toes" as bein metaphorical. |
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Expert Yogi
Posts: 8442
    
| BKS Iyengar's head does not touch his toes in pascimottsanasana. Body proportions are what they are. I am 5'2" with a long torso and my head does get quite close to my toes. I don't lie flat on my thighs and my sit bones come up off the floor. Soooooooo much to work on! If we had all the asanas right we could move on to meditation and maybe teleporting and cool stuff like that. Which reminds me - I need to get back to my Harry Potter book! He is in a real fix this time, folks...  |
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| Sometimes anatomy is destiny, baby!! If you have proportionally longer legs, then nope, you're not gonna touch your head on your toes unless you sprout a couple extra vertebrae. But that's just a benchmark, anyways. You can still get your spine perfectly long and flat, and your hamstrings nice and stretched out, and achieve the totally "full expression". That's what's cool about this yoga: any body can do it perfectly well!
And head to the floor in standing separate leg stretching? Sure, you can TOTALLY do that. You're just gonna have a slightly wider step in your final expression than you would if you had a longer spine.
"Super savasana" is a great term for that crazy post-yoga class coma that happens occasionally.
tourist, you're a little bit behind the times on this one, aren't you?! No worries, carry on... I LOVE those books. The last 100 pages have me on the edge of my seat every time.... |
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| Duffy you humble me. You are right, of course.
the dancingj--yes, that is what it was. A yoga coma! I think that's the second time it happened.
If I someday accomplish the head-toe-touching, I will be sure to have my doctor check for new vertebrae. Wouldn't that be a testimonial for Bikram's site? As cool as it would be to touch my head to my toes, I am sure the extra leg length is good for something, too. Maybe I will want to take up running hurdles someday...
Ferret |
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Expert Yogi
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| j - yeah, I'm too cheap to rush out and buy the newest book. I bought it finally this summer and it had to go through both of my kids before I got my turn.  I have a suspicion I haven't read the 6th one and the movie of course, leaves out a lot of important stuff. |
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| I also have a relatively short torso and pretty long femur bones so getting to the second part of camel will be a long road. Not only do I have long legs but I also have archer's bow shoulders so getting my arms extended down to my feet is another hurdle. |
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Veteran
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| I love that MY pose will never look like so and so's...... I go for myself to be with myself and learn about who I am and what I can do. I don't go to se what the person next to me is capable off !!!! |
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different bodies?
