Critical Elements of Ustrasana

How to get in and out of Ustrasana:

1. First, kneel on the floor, keeping your knees hip width apart and thighs at a 90-degree angle to the floor. Turn your thighs in slightly and keep buttocks firm. Keep the outside of your hips soft and press your shins and the tops of your feet solidly into the floor.
2. Next, place your hands on the back of your pelvis, with the palms on top of the buttocks and fingers pointing downward. Use your hands to spread the back pelvis and stretch it down to your tailbone. Gently bring the tail slightly forward toward the pubis. Prevent your front groins to "puff" forward by pressing your front thighs back, counteracting the forward action of your tail. Breathe and lift the heart by pressing your shoulder blades against your back ribs.
3. Keeping your head up, chin near the sternum, and hands on the pelvis, begin to lean back, keeping the tailbone and shoulder blades firm. Place your right hand on your right foot and left hand on your left foot without scrunching your lower back, but keeping thighs perpendicular to the floor, If you find it difficult at first to place hands, tilt your thighs slightly from being perpendicular, lightly twist body to place one hand first. Then position your body back into perpendicular orientation and place the other hand.
4. Make sure your lower front ribs aren't bulging toward the ceiling because that causes you to harden the belly and compress the lower back. Ease the front ribs and lift the front pelvis toward the ribs. Raise the lower back away from the pelvis to elongate the spine. Press your palms firmly against your heels, having the base of the palms on the heels and the fingers pointing toward the toes. Without squeezing the shoulder blades together, turn you arms outward so the elbow creases are forward. You can either keep your neck in a relatively neutral position, neither flexed or extended, or just simply drop your head back as long as you don't strain your neck or harden the throat.
5. Stay in the pose for relatively 30 seconds to a minute. To leave the pose, bring your hands to the front of your pelvis at the hip points. Inhale and lift your head and torso by pushing down on the hip points. If your head is back, rather than leading with the brain, lead with your heart to come up.  

Alignment - Actions of muscles involved: 

• In Ustrasana, many different muscles are involved, especially our back. It helps strengthen the adductor muscles of the hip and opens our lower back. In this pose, we resist the pull of gravity as we arc backwards. When we do so, the Psoas, Abdominal, and deep cervical flexor muscles contract, while our middle and lower trapezius also contract and lifts us against gravity. It ultimately helps align our spine and strengthen many frontal body muscles