The Big Toe Pose in Yoga
- Focus: Hamstrings
- Level: Intermediate
- Total Time: 60 seconds
- Indications: stimulates liver and kidney, relieves headaches, insomnia menopausal symptoms
- Contraindications: lower back injury, neck injury
Big Toe Pose (Padangusthasana)
The big toe pose focuses on your hamstrings but offers many additional amazing benefits. It stretches your calves and thighs while energizing your liver and kidneys. It can also help improve your digestion. For women, the big toe can help relieve menopause symptoms and can help any headache sufferer or insomniac.
Note: you can perform this yoga pose seated or standing. These instructions are for the standing pose, which requires less balance and is a little easier to complete.
- Stand with your feet six inches apart. Raise your kneecaps by tensing your front thigh muscles . Without bending your knees, breathe out and fold your body forward at your hips, reaching your arms down until you can reach your feet. Keep your shoulders low, away from your ears.
- Place your index and middle finger on each side of your big toe and grip your toe by wrapping your fingers together with your thumb while pressing your toes into the ground.
- Breathe in, expanding your rib cage and keeping your back straight. Without rounding your back, straighten your arms. Extend the front of your body and breathe out.
- Relax your forehead and let your neck extend in a straight line from your spine as you breathe out.
- Breathe in, continuing to hold your big toes. On each breath out, relax your hamstring muscles further.
- To exit this pose, release your toes and raise your torso until you are standing upright, with arms at your sides.
The Leg Stretch Pose in Yoga
- Starting on all fours with a neutral spine, point your right toes, straighten your right leg behind you, and raise it toward the sky and hold this position for a few seconds.
- With your leg in the air, slowly flex your foot and hold the position for a few seconds.
- Relax your foot and return your leg to the starting position.
- Repeat this stretch with the left leg.
Now, stand up and end your warm-up session with the goddess pose stretch.
Warming Up For Yoga
- Everybody knows the importance of stretching before running or working out, but what kind of warm-up does yoga require? While traditional stretching is helpful before performing yoga, since most yoga poses are advanced stretches in and of themselves, there are a number of yoga positions you can use to warm up before you delve into the more involved practice.
- The unique aspect of warming up for yoga is the process of centering oneself, at the same time you wake up your muscles. A yoga physical warm-up is also a mental warm-up that allows you to move away from your other preoccupations and reach a calm mental stance that will assist you in further yoga work.
- An ideal yoga warm-up will include poses that involve both your upper and lower body. It should incorporate stretches that attend to your wrists, your neck, and your spine, key parts of your body that receive the most work when you’re doing yoga. In this chapter, you will discover some great poses you can use as part of your personal warm-up routine.
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TOP YOGA MCQs Questions and Answers
1 Who is believed to be the father of Yoga?
A Krishnamacharya
B Gautam Buddha
C Maharshi PatanjaliAdi
D Shankaracharya
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2 Yoga has eight components, also known as the eight fold path of life — Niyama, Asana, Pranayama, Dhyana, Samadhi are five of them. Which are the other three?
A Savichar, Santosa, Tapas
B Asteya, Aparigraha, Brahmacharya
C Ananda, Asmita, Aachaar
D Yama, Dharana, Pratyahara
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3 The word “Yoga” comes for Sanskrit. What is the literal meaning of this word?
A Hindu system of philosophy & meditation
B Inner peace & tranquility
C Joining together
D Controlled breathing
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4 Over time, many new postures have been added to the original compendium of Asanas that yoga started with to incorporate modern day fitness requirements. How many classic Asanas were enlisted in the initial texts?
A 84
B 108
C 33
D 195
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5 Surya Namaskar is considered to be a complete exercise for the body and has often been cited as a combination of Asanas that helps in stretching almost all the major muscles. How many different Asanas does Surya Namaskar comprise of?
A 12
B 7
C 10
D 8
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6 Yoga has many practitioners in the West and several Hollywood celebrities such as Adam Levine and Julia Roberts have endorsed it. Indra Devi is credited with introducing Yoga to the West. Which country did she belong to?
A Nepal
B Russian
C India
D USA
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7 An Indian youth organisation entered the Limca Book of Records for simultaneously performing Yoga for the longest duration. Which organisation was this?
A NSS
B Girl Scouts
C LTS
D NCC
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8 Bharat Thakur is an internationally renowned name in the field of yoga instructors and a celebrity in his own right. Which new field of yoga did he lay the foundation for?
A Ashtang Yoga
B Hatha Yoga
C Sahaja Yoga
D Artistic Yoga
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9 Now to some yoga-related fun questions! Recently, a photo of the very hot, very happening Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau doing Mayurasana went viral. Around 40 years back another world leader struck a similar pose, alas there was no social media he could go viral on. Who was he?
A Richard Nixon
B Pierre Trudeau
B Harold Wilson
B Georges Pompidou
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10 In the popular TV series Friends, one of the main characters is seen talking to Mr. Treeger, the superintendent of Monica’s building, about attending Yoga classes. Which character is this?
A Ross
B Phoebe
C Monica
D Mike
Answer ⇒ ????