TheHotYogaDoctor

Hi, I’ve been practising Bikram for 7 months now. average about 3/4 times a week with the occasional holiday breaks. I love it but just as I thought my practice is improving, for the past 2 months I noticed that I am being hindered by clicks and strains.

My shoulders click and hurt as I lift my arms up on half moon and get more uncomfortable as I try to keep them up. I now have to put my arms down between right moon, left moon and backbend. and upon noticing the stiffness I have been doing a lot of warm up before the class but the first set always get me, the second set does improve but the subsequent arm lifting postures (Half Tortoise, Balancing stick)get me as well. I have always have neck and shoulders pain which yoga has been helping a lot until now, for the first 5 months I thought it has completely solved my problem.

After Awkward pose and Eagle pose, my toes got so strain that I have to stop and click my toes before I could continue. Now my elbows start to click too with standing bow. and I have to click my neck between each set during the floor series as my neck gets too stiff from looking up and back.

All these stiffness are affecting my practice, my professor notices that I am lagging behind on timing, I told her about them and she reckons it is all in my head.

But my shoulders/shoulder blades/black does feel very good after the class (but clicky still), just not during it.

I do have bad joints and have always been taking Glucosamine (prescribed strength) so I don’t know what else I could do.

I am wondering if it is a phase of Bikram yoga or has anybody else experience this too.

I am thinking of doing the 30 day challenge in Jan but if this continues…

Any advise/thoughts will be most appreciated.

thank you
binny

Hi binny

It is possible that in order to protect yourself from experiencing your neck and shoulder problem that you are tensing your neck a little. This is involving your neck (shortening it) and your head (yes there are related muscles in your head!) and your shoulders.

It is also possible that that strain is causing you to not surrender your arm properly in Standing Bow. The issue in your toes could also be related because of the tension in your upper body. If it’s not alleviated by my suggestion below then we’ll go to the next step.

And it is possible that the relief you feel after class is because you are now more relaxed (and warm) in those areas and your body is thankful that you are not punishing it anymore!

My first thought is to microbend your arms for your Half Moon, Tortoise and Stick poses. When you do that perhaps you will notice that you can lift your chin to a regular position and you can easily drop your shoulders again. One of the problems with trying to squeeze the head with the arms WHEN YOU HAVE NECK AND SHOULDER PROBLEMS is reflected throughout your practice in more poses than you imagine it would. So let that tension go for a while, bend the arms a tiny bit, enough to release and decompress (lengthen) the neck. Focus on shoulders down and back rather than arms to head.

Before we go into anything else I would really love to hear what effect that has on your practice, if any. We can see if we are moving in the right direction! Let’s see if we can get that strain - which I imagine is etched on your face - to dissolve.

Namaste
Gabrielle

Thank you Gabrielle for the prompt reply.

I will try it out at the next class and report back.

Namaste.

binny

hi Gabrielle,

sorry for the late reply. as you know pre-christmas and post new year periods are always a bit hectic.

you were right that my problem was my neck and shoulders, and yes they were tensed only because after my summer holiday I’ve forgotten to drop my shoulders in the class! And i had watched the ‘elbows in the back pocket’ vid before.

please allow me go back a bit -

I first tried your suggestion on microbending my arms in half moon, but only after a few classes did I realise that (with the help of microbending arms) I have been tensing my shoulders, not scrunched up but lifted/tensed. not at the start of the pose either but only when I started to bend, somehow my shoulders lifted up to compensate the inadequacy of my core (working on it).

with this discovery, I decide to I downloaded your 90minutes yoga class and went through it and It proved to be a relevation -

I was scrunching up my shoulders right from the beginning of the class, yes at Pranayama breathing, not at the inhale but the exhale. After that discovery, i just keep dropping my shoulders, even at Savasana which is new to me - ‘shimmy your shoulders in’ as per your instruction on the digital yoga class and it made a real difference - not only can i breath deeper during savasana but it also prepares me to keep my shoulders down in the next poses.

as I said I watched your ‘elbows in the back pocket’ vid but I only remember it for the standing savasana.

so after that, my shoulder blades have stopped hurting and clicking, my toes stopped straining in awkward and eagle poses (yes, I was scrunching up my shoulders here, thus my balance was off and my toes did extra work to make up for it, hence the strain).

generally after which all my poses improved, I am even able to arch my back now at standing separate leg stretching pose. like you say in you vid, it transformed my practice.

and my back now feels great both during and after the classes.

so from now on, I hope not to forget to drop my shoulders but sadly my yoga teachers here don’t emphasis much on dropping the shoulders apart from the occasional poses. (you will be appalled to see how many scrunching up their shoulders here), I will be lucky if they mentioned it once a while in the class. i think because of that i gradually forgot to drop my shoulders and eventually getting all these strains and clicks.

they say yoga is a personal journey and it is definitely very true for Bikram yoga, and thankfully this website has been the guiding light for mine.

Thank you very much Gabrielle.

a happy 2010 to you!

Namaste!

binny

Hi Binny

I am so grateful that you have worked through ALL your problems and I so happy that I could guide you there. Thank you so much for coming to report your transformation. I love being able to share in your joy.

Namaste
Gabrielle