The True Depth of Your Core and How Yoga Can Help Develop Core Strength

I hear it all the time “I really need to work on my core strength”. People say this for many reasons: back pain, a few extra pounds, balance, poor posture, a general sense of dissatisfaction. Most of the time when saying this they’re referring to the front side of the abdomen. And let’s face it, it’s the part we can see so it’s the part we pay attention to the most! But what if I told you that your actual core was not just your abs AND, maybe even more importantly, your core was actually something to think about in 2 different depths in your body? Here’s a simple introduction to two possible ways to think about the true depth of your core and how yoga can help develop core strength.

Let me preface everything I say here with the following: your body is an incredibly complex system and no one system can be separated out entirely from the rest in practical application. This is also true for your muscles. We can take individual muscles or groups of muscles into consideration as a model to start to understand our bodies better, but just know that the interrelationships between individuals and groups within the whole is complex and beyond the scope of a single blog post. What I give you below is a model for how to think about and work with this one system within the body that we know as our core.

Deep Core

As I mentioned above, I really think about the core in two different ways. The first way is what I would refer to as the Deep Core. In anatomical language, what is superficial is closer to the surface (in other words, just under your skin) and what is deep is, well, DEEP! So this first way to think about core involves some things that you can’t necessarily touch with your hands.

The first of those is your SPINE. In discussions of Core, this is often overlooked, but if we consider the core to be at the center of our body, we have to first consider the bony structure that is not only at center, but is an attachment point for many muscles that we might think of as Deep Core muscles. It’s also worth noting that most of us, because you can feel your spine through the back side of the body (just put your hand on the back of the base of your neck. That bony bump that sticks out is actually your C7 vertebra), don’t have a good understanding of just how deep the spine goes into the abdomen. I can’t give you definite measurements, but trust me, it’s pretty deep!

Now we get to the muscles of core and here is where, in my mind, I start to make some distinctions. Generally speaking, the muscles that run along and attach to the spine are muscles that mostly create spinal (or deep core) stability. Key among these is the psoas. This large muscle is often thought of as a hip flexor, but in reality, it’s PRIMARY function is to create stability and absorb shock in the spine. While it does serve a small part in hip flexion (remember, complex system) we can see that the bulk of the muscle is much more focused on the spine, simply by looking at how many more muscle fibers are near or attaching to the spine versus the hip joint.

There are many other deep muscles that stabilize the spine include the amazing network of interspinal muscles and the erectors. Rather than getting bogged down with names and details, simply understand that there is the deep level to core that is centered near and surrounds the spine.

Superficial Core

There is this second level of core as I think of it. This is the one that most of us think of that includes the abs. However, a key concept here is, just as in the deep core, it’s not just the front! Generally speaking, the Superficial core is a full circumference network of muscles around the abdomen that mostly create movement. This includes your abs on the front but also includes your obliques (the sides of the cylinder), your lats (the back) and other layers of muscle. These muscles are fairly large and while they do contribute to stability, they can mostly be thought of as being responsible for movement such as flexing your spine, extending your spine, twisting and side bending. Therefore, to focus on only one set of these muscles is to loose sight of the full picture of what constitutes core.

So we have a Deep Core network of muscles that is close to the spine and generally creates stability, we have a Superficial Core network of muscles that is closer to the surface and generally creates movement. This basically describes a cylinder that has a center within it. Something like this:

So what about the top and bottom?

In my mind, the top and bottom are shared between these two levels (Deep and Superficial) because they cover both. The bottom is the network of muscles that make up the pelvic floor. The top is your breathing diaphragm. If you’ve never seen it before, it looks something like this:

The umbrella like shape of this muscle puts a lid on our cylinder, connects to the spine but also connects in close proximity to those Superficial Core muscles around the outside. The pelvic floor works similarly. These structures create stability but are also key in movement throughout this complex system.

What It All Means

With this understanding that there are two main layers to our core as well as a top and bottom, we now see that the things we might always think of when it comes to core work, namely sit ups, really are addressing only one thing - the superficial muscles on the front side of the abdomen. Now also try to imagine that this was the ONLY thing you focused on when trying to strengthen your core. It becomes obvious right away that this would create an unhealthy and unhelpful imbalance. We need to work all these structures to bring a balance of strength and flexibility to the entire system in order to be well, similar to any other point of focus in the body.

How Yoga Can Help

While a vinyasa yoga practice can’t necessarily address the full picture of core strength, there’s a lot that we CAN do to holistically address the deep and superficial core in our sequencing as teachers and in our practice as students. Here are some ideas:

• Rooting down through the feet in standing postures - this kind of engagement, especially before transitioning from close to the earth into a standing posture (think moving from low lunge to Warrior 2) can activate those stabilizing muscles of the deep core including the psoas. There is a complex network of muscular connections between the psoas and your feet (see the work of Tom Myers if you’re interested in learning more). When you engage in this way you’re helping to support the spine through transitional movements and creating that deep core stability those deep core structures are there to do. (For more about the benefits of rooting down in standing postures, see this blog post.)

• Lifting high enough in Ardha Uttanasana (half way lift) - it’s a posture most people hardly give a second thought to in their practice, but actually lifting up in this posture can help to work the back body muscles and create more strength. Even better, think about that support coming from the front and the back. More on that here.

• Create twisting actions without leverage - many yoga practitioners use their arms to help create leverage for deeper twists. This isn’t wrong. However, if you want to build core strength, especially in the muscles of the core that create rotation, consider doing your twist WITHOUT the arms involved. You won’t go as deep, but you’ll certainly create more strength in these important side body muscles.

• Incorporate more locust poses into your vinyasa - resisting gravity is a key way to build strength in a yoga practice and there’s almost no better pose to embody that than locust. When working with this posture, be sure to do your best to not just bend the knees when you lift the legs. See that the lift is actually coming from the use of your back body muscles like glutes (they’re part of your core!) and hamstrings.

• Use the breath in coordination with movement - This is especially useful in movements that create a lot of force or load in the body. One of my personal favorites as a person with back injuries is to EXHALE on the way up to standing from a standing forward fold.

Want to experience this and more for yourself with some guidance? Then join my Livestream or On Demand classes all this month where we’ll incorporate many of these movements into a vinyasa flow to help strengthen ALL parts of your core together!

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How a Modern Interpretation of Foot Placement May Help Your Standing Yoga Postures

When I began my teaching career I noticed right away that many students had stability problems in standing yoga postures like Warrior 1, Warrior 2 and even Tadasana. As I continued to observe my students and experimented in my own practice, I found time and time again that a wider base of support seemed to eliminate these issues almost instantly. Depending on the lineage of teaching that a student and teacher may have come through, confusion may still remain as to appropriate foot placement for individual bodies in these postures. In this post you’ll find an anatomical explanation for this modern interpretation of foot placement and how it might help you feel more steady and at ease in these commonly practiced standing yoga postures.

Traditional versus Modern Interpretation

I often make the joke to private students when we start to work with these kinds of details in their postures that “this practice was created by skinny little Indian men, and honey, I’m an American woman and I have hips! I need space!” (If you’ve never met me in person I’m nearly 6 feet tall and weigh about 185, so I am neither small nor skinny!) All joking aside, what I’m pointing out is something very important to this understanding of foot placement - the traditional interpretation of the postures revolved around the narrow pelvis of the people that “created” the postures and the people that were being taught. Students of yoga in those days were of typically of Indian decent, young and male. They therefore had a naturally more narrow pelvis and were taught a more narrow placement of the feet in standing postures.

Anatomically speaking, our knowledge of an individual’s unique differences in their anatomy and how they might affect their practice has improved in the last century. We now know that the female pelvis is wider than the male pelvis, primarily to accommodate childbirth. This google search will give you some images and articles to make this more clear. But the important part for our asana practice is that, generally speaking, our unique anatomical make up, our general range of flexibility and the shape of our frame will have a great deal of affect on the stance we take in our standing postures. The majority of yoga practitioners in the US are female and with our more recent anatomical understanding many teachers, myself included, have begun to teach foot placement in standing postures in a more anatomically informed way.

Let’s give you some examples so you can start to put this into practice. And please bear with my rather rudimentary illustrations! And also bear in mind, the use of traditional vs. modern is NOT a value judgement, but a way of making a distinction.

Let’s take Tadasana (Mountain Pose) for instance:

In the traditional interpretation of the posture, the big toes would come together to touch as you stood at the top of your mat. Some people would even bring their inner heels together. Let me be very clear here: THIS IS NOT WRONG. For many bodies this won’t be a problem. For many other bodies this may feel like a very narrow base of support that isn’t at all grounded. In my body, this additionally creates a tension in my outer hips that doesn’t feel beneficial.

Also, when I look at the center line of my foot, it is offset compared to my pelvis. I can tell because when I feel my hip points (the two bones you might be able to feel if you palpate the front of the pelvis), if I were to draw a straight line down to the center of my foot, that line hits more towards my outer ankles. So instead, I take my feet “sit bones distance apart” (I often have people measure this by bending forward and taking two fists together between the arches of the feet. It seems to work well.) which gives me a broader base and more appropriately aligns my body. So it would look more like this:

With this broader base I’m more able to hold my ground, or be more firmly grounded in this pose that is supposed to embody stability.

This wider foot placement in Tadasana also translates into other common standing poses. Tadasana, is after all, the foundation for every other yoga posture. Take Warrior 2 for example. Here’s what the traditional foot placement would look like:

You can see from the lines on this mat (thank you Liforme!) that the heel of the front foot would have bisected the arch of the back foot. (I have also heard it described slightly wider, so that the heel of the front foot would have lined up with the heel of the back foot in traditional teaching.) This might give a practitioner with wider hips a feeling of, what I often call “walking the tightrope”; the base of support is too narrow to be stable. This often shows itself not while the practitioner is in the pose, but when they are making the transition up into the pose from a lunge, for example. There’s a wobble that happens in that transition and I’ll often see students reflexively step the back foot wider to catch themselves! What they’re instinctively doing is creating a stance more like this:

This comes into play again when we look at Warrior 1. Again, the more traditional placement would look like this:

But for many bodies, this foot placement becomes problematic when the practitioner attempts to make the transition into the pose from a lunge and/or places unnecessary forces into the knee joints in particular as the pose is held. With Warrior 1, as the pelvis rotates toward the top of the mat, the narrow stance may not allow for much rotation. With the pelvis unable to rotate and force still being applied (a discussion for another day), that torque has no where to go but to the next available joint, which is the knee. Unfortunately for our poor yoga student who is fighting to do what is asked, the knee is a hinge joint and does not lend itself to rotation. Chances are, they feel this as something happening IN the joint, a thing we typically want to avoid in a vinyasa yoga practice. This can all be avoided by stepping the feet wider like so:

With the broader stance pictured above, there’s greater freedom for the rotation of the pelvis, the integrity of the knee is no longer questionable and there will be a greater sense of stability in the pose overall.

What Does This All Mean for You?

To apply what you’ve learned here you might take the time to experiment with these different foot placements outside of a class. Start with Tadasana and see how your body feels with the two different foot placements. Depending on your specific body type and shape, you may find one that feels more stable and easeful than another. Then do the same experiment with Warrior 2 and Warrior 1. Take the time to really notice the effect on the joints of the legs in particular and your sense of stability. Do you feel like your “walking the tightrope” or if a strong breeze came by would you be steady? As with anything in yoga, the proof is in the experiment within the laboratory of your own body, life and practice!

I’m considering offering a workshop on this topic in the near future. If you’d be interested in such an offering, let me know in the comments below or send me an email!

If you’d like to experience a group class with me where I teach this more modern interpretation, check out my schedule for an upcoming vinyasa yoga class.

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Get to Know Your Shoulder Joint

Part of the study of yoga is getting to know our bodies better. With all our focus on the shoulders lately in my classes, I thought it might be helpful for you to get to know your shoulder joint a bit more from an anatomical standpoint. If your eyes glaze over when anyone says anatomy I understand! That was me for a very long time. But when you see how the knowledge of anatomy can inform healthy movement patterns and inform the choices you make in your practice, it all becomes a little more palatable. I'm going to give you a very basic overview here which I hope will enable to you to make good choices for your own body as you move through your life and practice.

What is a joint in the human body?

First - a basic definition. A joint is where two or more bones come together in the human body. You probably already knew that. We typically think about the knees, hips and shoulders when we think of joints but did you know there are also joints in your spine, your fingers and toes and other places? This simple definition helps us be clear as we move forward.

Bones of the Shoulder

There are three important bones that create your shoulder joint as you can see labeled above. I’ve given you both the common and the technical name for each of these. I highly recommend that you palpate your own body with your hands as you look at the image to really find these things in your own body. If you have a willing and consenting other human nearby that can be helpful too! The combination of read information and sensory input will help you learn.

The first and probably most obvious is your Humorous or upper arm bone. It’s probably the bone that we think about the most when we think about the shoulder. It may even be the ONLY bone we think about when thinking of the shoulder. But there are two more important players.

The second is the Clavicle or collar bone. It’s that bone on the front side of the body that extends from the front of your neck (just slightly offset to the right or left) out to your shoulder. You’ll find it at the top of your rib cage and it forms the part of the top edge of what we often think of as our shoulder. If I asked you to take your left hand and put it on your right shoulder the heel of your hand would likely be resting on this bone.

While you’ve got your hand on your shoulder [you did do that didn’t you?! ;-)], your fingers are probably curling over the back of your shoulder and that’s where you’ll find the third bone, your shoulder blade or Scapula. You may never have thought of this before, but your shoulder blade is called your shoulder blade because it’s an essential part of your shoulder joint! And what you’re likely feeling under your fingers is what’s often referred to as the “spine” of the shoulderblade. The tip of that spine (closer to the outside of your body) is called the Acromium.

So where’s the actual shoulder joint?

The actual shoulder joint (or glenohumeral joint if you want to get technical) is where the humorous and the scapula fit together. There’s a shallow cup on the shoulder blade where the upper arm bone fits in. They are connected together first by connective tissue (labrum, cartilage, ligaments, etc.) and then by a series of complex muscles known as the rotator cuff. So unless you have an injury or something else going on, the big thing to know here is that your upper arm bone (humorous) is attached to your shoulder blade (scapula). While the collarbone is not directly connected here it does play an important role in movement, but that’s a bit beyond the scope of the current exploration.

Why should you care?

Any time you move your upper arm bone your shoulder blade MUST move. This becomes really important when you set up for postures like bridge or wheel because how you position that upper arm bone will influence the movement of the scapula and therefore the whole shoulder joint. Any time you take the arms overhead like in Warrior 1 or Down dog, the shoulder blades must also move upward (that’s an over simplification but for the purposes of this discussion it’s sufficient). Not allowing the shoulder blades to move properly may cause trouble over time for the healthy functioning of the shoulder joint.

Knowing how these two bones are connected also gives us a better understanding of what “stability” in the shoulder joint really means. There are three very stable positions for the shoulder joint: 0 degrees of flexion (when the arms are resting alongside your torso in a standing position), 90 degrees of flexion (plank pose) or 180 degrees of flexion (arms directly overhead like in handstand). This is helpful if you DO have an injury or strain in this area because you can pay attention to how your bones are aligning to create stable positions and avoid unstable ones. You can also offload weight from the shoulders if they are moving between any of these angles if you do have an injury or you know that you still need to build strength in this area (chaturanga anyone?!).

Questions? Leave me a comment below!

If you want to get to know your shoulders more through movement, sign up for one of my livestream classes this month or join me on Patreon to practice on demand!

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