Adho Mukha Svanasana
aka: downward dog
(AH-doh MOO-kah shvah-NAHS-anna)
adho = downward
mukha = face
svana = dog
Exercise: Press your thigh bones back into your hamstrings. Keep your arms straight in front of your head putting your body in a 90 degree position stemming from your hips. You can keep your eyes open or closed, focus on third eye gaze breathing slowly.
Physical Benefit: Strengthens the arms, legs and torso.
Mental Benefit: Stimulates the mind.
The Downward Facing Dog Pose
The Downward Facing Dog Pose, or Adho Mukha Svanasana, stretches the entire body.
Advantages
If your hamstrings are tight, gradually lower your foot with each practice. If you have troubled shoulders, try this pose with your hands stretched on a chair.
Step Into the Pose
1. Start on your hands and knees, legs hip-width apart, hands flat, fingers spread.
2. Inhale deeply, and on the exhale, lift your knees, pressing your toes into the floor.
3. Move your legs back while at the same time raising your buttocks toward the ceiling. Don't lock the knees.
4. Pull the tailbone in, straighten the arms, and extend forward through your fingertips.
5. Straighten your legs by resting your heels on the floor.
6. Lower your head between the upper arms with purpose.
7. Hold this pose for a minute or longer, and on an exhale, and release into Child's Pose.
If you have trouble with carpal tunnel, do not practice this pose.
Beginner Tips
Many people find it easier to sit on a cushion or f
Advanced Tips
Once your form is perfected, raise your right leg even to the torso, and hold for 30 seconds. Repeat with the other leg.
Anatomical Focus
* Upper back
* Upper back
* Sinusitis
* Calms the brain and helps relieve stress and mild depression
* Energizes the body
* Stretches the shoulders, hamstrings, calves, arches, and hands
* Strengthens the arms and legs
* Helps relieve the symptoms of menopause
* Relieves menstrual discomfort when done with head supported
* Helps prevent osteoporosis
* Improves digestion
* Relieves headache, insomnia, back pain, and fatigue
* Therapeutic for high blood pressure, asthma, flat feet, sciatica, sinusitis
* Carpal tunnel syndrome
* Diarrhea
* Pregnancy: Do not do this pose late-term.
* High blood pressure or headache: Support your head on a bolster or block, ears level between the arms.
If you have difficulty releasing and opening your shoulders in this pose, raise your hands off the floor on a pair of blocks or the seat of a metal folding chair.
To challenge yourself in this pose, inhale and raise your right leg parallel to the line of your torso, and hold for 30 seconds, keeping the hips level and pressing through the heel. Release with an exhalation and repeat on the left for the same length of time.
To get a feel for the work of the outer arms, loop and secure a strap around your arms just above your elbows. Imagine that the strap is tightening inward, pressing the outer arms in against the bones. Against this resistance, push the inner shoulder blades outward.
A partner can help you learn how to work the top thighs in this pose. First perform Adho Mukha Svanasana. Have your partner stand behind and loop a strap around your front groins, snuggling the strap into the crease between your top thighs and front pelvis. Your partner can pull on the strap parallel to the line of your spine (remind him/her to extend the arms fully, and keep the knees bent and chest lifted). Release the heads of your thigh bones deeper into your pelvis and lengthen your front torso away from the strap.
* Plank Pose
* Uttanasana
* Standing poses
* Uttanasana
* Headstand
To increase the stretch in the backs of your legs, lift slightly up onto the balls of your feet, pulling your heels a half-inch or so away from the floor. Then draw your inner groins deep into the pelvis, lifting actively from the inner heels. Finally, from the height of the groins, lengthen the heels back onto the floor, moving the outer heels faster than the inner.
