Featured Stretch

This exercise will massage your lower back and sacrum and help you increase the mobility of your hips.

Lie on your back and draw your knees towards your belly. Hold your right knee with your right hand and your left knee with your left hand. Don’t pull with your hands. If your chin is popping up towards the ceiling, place a folded blanket under your head to help relax your neck and upper back.

Take a few breaths and begin to relax the hips by focusing on the crease where the leg meets the hip socket. See if you can direct your breath to this area and “feel” the crease becoming deeper. This sense of the crease deepening is a sign of increased relaxation of the hips.

Now begin to circle your knees in opposite directions. The right knee circles to the right and the left knee circles to the left.

Inhale as the legs move away from you and exhale as the legs move toward you.

Complete 5 to 10 rotations and then stop and rotate the knees in the opposite direction.

This exercise is safe for everyone. After completing the movement, extend your legs out on the floor with your arms at your sides and feel the effects of the movement.

Theresa Evans, RN, RYT500, Certified Critical Alignment Therapist, is the owner of Stone Path Yoga Studio, located on Highway 57 in Sister Bay. For more information call 920.421.1607, email [email protected] or visit http://www.stonepathyoga.com.