The Hot Yoga Doctor – Free Bikram and Hot Yoga Resources › Hot Yoga Doctor Forum › The Hot Yoga Poses › Ardha Chandrasana › Half moon, arm issues!
The Hot Yoga Doctor – Free Bikram and Hot Yoga Resources › Hot Yoga Doctor Forum › The Hot Yoga Poses › Ardha Chandrasana › Half moon, arm issues!
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Hello!
I am struggling with this pose in so many ways. Where to begin… The intensity stems from tight shoulders and keeping palms together, elbows locked. I have great side extension, strength, hip alignment ok, can tighten glutes, weight even in heels, chin up and breathe, but unfortunately become exhausted in milliseconds due to arm issues.Could hyperextension in my elbows be causing this? I can’t find the sweet spot to hold my arms up for the whole or even seconds of the pose. It seems if I keep the arms with ears, my hyperextension doesn’t allow for this, I’m literally squeezing my brain in with my elbows, so then I am forced to position my arms almost behind my head which my tight shoulders don’t allow. My arms are long, and shoulders super tight, so it seems nothing is adding up here. I’m ok with losing my side extension for now, but still can’t figure it all out. Some days I am only standing up straight and trying to work on arms only, which seems insurmountable. Are my forearms too weak to press my palms together? Or being long, they don’t have the rotation yet to deal with the compensation for my hyperextended elbows? Where should the “push palm together” strength come from, fingers on knuckles, or forearms? So many questions…
fyi: I have slight scoliosis in my cervical spine, causing entire right side to be tighter, stiffer, pelvis higher…in half moon I’m even cheating by not alternating arm clasp sides, one side is so much easier to do than the other…Any thoughts? I could go on and on. Could you recommend some shoulder stretches to work at the internal and lateral rotator cuffs? I am so lopsided, it’s daunting to work on my weak side…
ps: How is this pose related to my weakness in evil Half tortoise? My forehead is nowhere NEar the floor….
Thank you thank you! 🙂
Hi Eileen
Welcome to the forum. It appears you have some rather painful and unresolved tension and pain in your head, neck and shoulder region. Luckily, the problem you have has nothing to do with hyperextension. It has to do with the erroneous instruction to squeeze your head with your arms and lock your elbows and glue your palms together – no matter what and without question. This can only be the correct instruction for people who have no neck or shoulder tension.
Your problems will start to dissolve the moment you stop listening to the instruction and listen to your body. THOUSANDS upon thousands of people have this issue. They slam their arms to their heads and straighten them because the dialog tells them to.
This is an instruction that is by no means ‘one size fits all’. ANY yoga movement that causes pain and strain and tension in the body needs to be assessed. This is your body telling you that something is not right. Yoga is about listening to your body, right?
There are actually many, many posts on this forum with the exact same problem (that are either posted under “Injuries”, “Neck, Shoulders, Arms and Upper Back” or under specific poses. Take a look around!
The signs are clear. When you do this beyond where you should then you will find pain in your neck and shoulders and you will also notice that your chin will drop even just a little in response to the tension. You may also notice that your face looks stressed and pained rather than neutral.
Try a micro-bend in the arm and make your utmost priority to keep the shoulders down and back. Take a look on the FREE VIDEOS page at my first video called A Transformational Technique For Your Practice, For Your Life (by scrolling to the video at the bottom of the page!
Let me know how you go
Namaste
Gabrielle 🙂Thank you for the reply! I must have sounded more stressed in my post than I realized. Type A yogi just wanting to improve too quickly I suppose:) I have backed off in my arm locking and this is helping for sure, thank you for this advice. I read another post online about learning to become aware of the serratus anterior. I noticed amazing improvement after only a few classes of consciously engaging/acknowledging this muscle…this has helped me become much more aware of how to release the tension I hold in my neck area. I hope this can help someone…my after class headaches have disappeared after this change also! What I thought was a hydration issue was really muscle tension. I definitely look forward to improving my poses with your site!
Yippee Eileen
That’s great news. Thanks for letting us know of your progress.
After a quick glance at your initial post I realised I had said nothing about the scoliosis issue. A strong focus on alignment is crucial. There are lots of specifics I have shared on other posts around the forum. Pop the word “scoliosis” in the search facility and you’ll literally dozens of threads in which scoliosis is mentioned.
Namaste
Gabrielle 🙂 -
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