Home Blogs Hands to Feet Pose – Improves Digestion And Helps Blood Circulation

Hands to Feet Pose – Improves Digestion And Helps Blood Circulation

The Hands to Feet Pose (Pada Hastasana) is the seated variation of the standing forward bend. Strictly speaking, Extended Hands and Feet Pose (Utthita Hasta Padasana) and Side Hands and Feet Pose (Parshva Hasta Padasana), are the poses that normally follow. This is an intermediary stage the practitioner has to pass through on the way to another pose. Very often mistakes in a posture can be traced back to an intermediary stage and can be corrected more easily here than in the full pose.

This pose helps improves flexibility of the spine, strengthens the legs, improves digestion and helps blood circulation in the head. However, this pose is not for people who suffering from spinal problems.

Steps Of Hands to Feet Pose (Pada Hastasana)

1. To begin, do Tadasana (Mountain Pose). With a deep inhalation, raise your arms above your head.
2. Now, bend forward till your hands touch your feet. Keep breathing normally and with every exhalation feel you going down further and further.
3. Keep bending further until your belly touches your thighs. Get a hold of your toes and keep breathing deeply.
4. Once you got hold of your toes, or ankles, use a slight force to stretch your body. The stretch from your hands will help move your belly to your thighs and prevent your chest from sinking. You will, thus, not lose the supportive power of your lower back during the pose.

Beware! You should do this forward bend relaxed and not with brute force. Resist the urge to tug at your feet with too much force. If you pull too hard, your will body stiffen, your thinking and breathing will be affected and, worst of all, you stand a chance of injuring yourself.

Benefits

• Standing Forward Fold pose stretches your spinal column and the backs of your legs and back muscles.
• It helps stimulate the uro-genital, digestive, nervous and endocrine systems.
• It also improves flexibility of the spine, strengthens the legs, improves digestion, and aids in blood circulation to the head

Contradictions:

• Standing Forward Fold is best avoided by those who’ve had a recent or are nursing a chronic injury to the hips, legs, shoulders or back.
• This pose is also not advisable for people with spinal problems.

Modifications: For those who find it difficult you can place yoga blocks under the hands.

Variations: There are quite a few variations on the placement of the hands:

• Hold on to the backs of your ankles
• Scoop your fingers under your feet till your toes reach your wrists
• Cross your arms behind your legs and hold onto the front of your ankles with opposite hands
• Clasp your elbows behind your legs.

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