Why Backbends Are SO Good for You!

THE BENEFITS OF PRACTISING BACKBENDS!

Backbending increases the natural range of motion for the spine, which in modern day society has become quite limited to just forward bending, owing to sedentary office jobs and too much smartphone use!

Our bodies are naturally designed to bend backwards amongst other directions, and increasing your ability to backbend can boost your overall happiness and wellbeing due for a number of reasons:

1. Backbending can help reverse physical effects from sedentary/technological lifestyle

Excessive forward bending, e.g. from constantly hunching over a computer or a smartphone, can lead to back and neck pain, restrict blood flow to vital organs and have negative psychological effects on self-confidence and mood.

When you bend backwards, the front of the spinal vertebrae decompress, helping to reverse the impact of excessive forward bending. This includes pain relief from too much forward bending, as the parts of the spine that are compressed experience lessened pressure.

2. Backbending increases spinal flexibility and mobility

Backbending restores the natural range of motion and flexibility of your spine that you were meant to have. Keeping the spine supple and flexible maintains overall body health, youth and longevity. It protects and nourishes your central nervous system which is housed within your spinal column.

3. Backbends improve posture

Backbends realign the spinal vertebrae whilst lengthening the spine, opening the shoulders and the chest and strengthening your upper back, all of which contribute to a tall beautiful posture. Practicing regular backbends encourages us to subconsciously remember our better spinal alignment in daily life.

4. Opens the shoulders and chest for better breathing

Backbends open the shoulders and chest, creating space in the thoracic cavity where our heart and lungs are. This increased space allows a greater capacity of air to enter the lungs, allowing us to breathe deeper and more effectively oxygenate our cells.

4. Improves mood, relieves depression and opens the heart

When you do a backbend, you are physically opening your heart which releases any physical tension stored in the muscles, stimulates the sympathetic nervous system to positively energize and invigorate you, and it also releases the body´s natural pain-killers!!

Through the physical act of opening your heart, psychological effects are also triggered. Backbending opens the heart chakra which during heartbreak or a challenging time, can become blocked or closed. Through bending backwards we open the shoulders and chest, allowing our hearts to be vulnerable but also open and receptive to positive emotions and love once more. No matter how flexible you are, when you first start backbending, you may experience a release of emotions you didn’t even know you had!

5. Boosts self-confidence and breaks through fears

Backbends can seem daunting at first, but through expanding out of our comfort zone and facing our fears, we gain a massive confidence boost as we learn we can do more than we ever thought possible and achieve more than we ever dreamed. As we expand past our physical and psychological limits on the mat, we expand in confidence and self-belief in our every day lives.

3. Opens the hips

Most backbends are also great hip openers, as they stretch the hip flexors when you open the front body, releasing any physical and emotional tension stored in the hips. The hip flexors can cause discomfort for many people, e.g. cyclists or runners, due to repetitive contractive movements of the muscles. Backbending and hip opening counteract these movements in the same way that backbending opens the shoulders and chest to counteract excessive forward bending.

Tips for going further in your backbends:

Work on your core to build strength in the abs, as having strong abdominal muscles naturally protects the lower back and spine. You will likely find that conscious strengthening of the core enables you to bend further in backbends, as the body subconsciously feels safer and supported and therefore allows itself to ´let go.´

Warming up is very important prior to performing a backbend.

As a rule of thumb, do about forty minutes of flow prior to working on a backbend such as Wheel Pose. Incorporate ab work, chest openers and hip openers in your warm up poses prior to moving into your backbends. For example you could do sun salutations, Cat-Cow, the Warrior poses, planks, Pigeon Pose and Baddokonasana. It´s better to sequence your backbends so that they fall at the end of your practice.

After a deep backbend, go into a neutral spinal position rather than into a deep forward fold. Counter poses are important but it´s far safer and better for the longevity of your practice overall if you bring your body into neutral spinal alignment first. After the spine is neutralized, then you can enter a forward fold.

Stabilize the lumbar and cervical curves of the spine whilst letting the movement come through the thoracic spine. The thoracic spine is actually the least mobile of the different sections of the spine, but yields the most benefit in terms of backbending.

Avoid throwing your head back in backbends. We are aiming for the bend to come from the thoracic spine, and throwing the head and neck back doesn´t actually make the backbend any deeper. Instead of throwing the head back, lift up through the sternum.

So as you can see, there are numerous benefits of enjoying backbends as part of your regular yoga practice!! Remember to consult a doctor if you have any back or neck issues, anxiety or are pregnant before embarking on your backbend journey!!