Source

• Alexander Yanai Vol1 Lesson #4
• Reel 1, Track 2, Lesson 3
• Duration 38 min.
• For German see AYnmal täglich: Sitzen auf orientalische Art

Synopsis

• Organize your hips. Sitting in a half lotus, use your whole body to move your knees to the floor and then your knees and head to the floor.

Lesson Outline

1. Sit with legs lng. Place right foot on left thigh and bring it towards your body. Lean on your right hand. Roll your pelvis and arch your back bringing the knee to the floor. Do many times. Repeat on other side.
2. Repeat lying. That is, lying on your back, place right foot on left thigh and bring it towards your body. Roll your pelvis and arch your back bringing the knee to the floor. Do many times. Repeat on other side.
3. Sitting, place the right foot touching the inside of your left thigh (right knee on the floor bent to the side). Lean on left hand on the floor behind you. Put your right hand on your right knee and press it toward the floor. Arch your back to bring knee to the floor. Round your back and contract your abdomen to raise the knee. Do many times. Repeat on other side.
4. Sitting half lotus, i.e. place the right foot touching the inside of your left thigh and place left foot is in the fold between your right thigh and right lower leg. Place both hands behind you. Leaning on your hands, arch your back to bring the knees downward and round your back to lift them. You can lift your pelvis off the floor to bring the knees to the floor. Switch which leg is on top and repeat.
5. Sitting half lotus as before with arms behind you, lower your head to the floor. First with both hands behind. Then with right hand in front. Then with left hand in front. Then with both hands in front. Your forehead will touch the floor if you lift your pelvis. Switch which leg is on top and repeat.
6. Repeat step 2 and notice difference from the start of lesson
7. Sit with legs crossed in Indian fashion. Lean on your hands behind you. Lift pelvis off the floor and put forehead on the floor. Switch which leg is on top and repeat

Focus of Moshe’s Teaching

Related ATMs

• Knees outward to the floor AY174
• Tag Sitting-cross-legged
• Tag Hip/Pelvis Freedom
• Tag Abdominal-muscles
• Tag Lower-back-and-pelvis

Resources

• • Sharon Starika recording: http://sharonstarika.com/workshops/online-workshops/weekly-classes/hamstrings-glutes-hips-feet/
  • This is Charlie Murdach teaching the “reminder” movement for this ATM:

Share Your Insights (ideas, principles, strategies, experiences, …)

• Proximal/Distal: This ATM constrains the movement of the legs and moves the pelvis around the head of the femur.
• Spiral of the femur into the hip joint: Though there is not much movement of the legs, it is worth noting that as the back arches and the knee(s) moves toward the floor, there is a small but important external rotation of the femur. As Jeff Haller teaches, this rotation of the femur into the hip joint is important for power (see What is Good Posture?).
• Image of the global endpoint > refinement and differentiation. You start by “cheating” to get the image of where you’re going (touching the floor with the knee – 1 & 2 above); then through various constraints you focus how you accomplish this primarily in the arch of the lower back – not recruiting extension of the entire spine (3 & 4 above); then through differentiating the hip joint in folding and lengthening forward over half-lotus legs (5 above), you find the actual ability to extend the hip joint while in the extreme externally rotated position (6 above), so you can take your knee to the floor using even less of the extension in the back. – LynetteReid Feb 27, 2011
• Challenges the tendency to hold the hip joint in flexion–an anxiety pattern, shortening of the iliopsoas. By opening the hip joint, enabling the pelvis to sit better as the base of the spine in sitting and walking (he cautions to take it slowly when starting to walk again at the end).
• If the students are having trouble with the first step, you can bring their attention how they can use their whole self:
  • Left hip: The right knee goes toward the floor as the left hip opens.
  • Left heel: The arch in the back can go from the left heel to the head.
  • Right hand: placement of the right hand and of the direction of the fingers of the right hand effect holding in the chest.
• In step 3 and 4, it is important to emphasize both extension to bring the knee downward and flexion to raise the knee. Its the combination of both arching and rounding the back that balances the antagonistic muscles and allows for more movement in the lower back.

• One transition through this lesson is from a movement in which the knee is fixed open to the side, and you roll your whole self to the side to take the knee to the floor (which you do, as he says in comments on 3, if you have “knees that are frozen”), in which case you will do a big extension/shortening of your opposite side, maybe pushing on the heel–to a diagonal extension (extension particularly in the low back, as he says in 14) that takes the knee towards the floor closer to the midline, the pelvis rolling more towards 6 o’clock and less towards 3/9 o’clock. This naturally brings your foot resting on your thigh closer to your groin. I’ve long seen the lesson that way, but reading your comments and looking again at the transcript, I see the emphasis also on the idea (as he says in 14b too) that the more flexible you are in your hip joints, the less you need to use your back. – LynetteReid Feb 25, 2011 My experience was once I learnt to have my whole spine support the movement, the holding in my hip joints reduced and I gained more flexibility in my hip joints. – yedwab Feb 26, 2011
• The variation (5 above) of taking your head towards the floor while one hand or the other or (especially) both are on the floor behind you is amazing for the reorganization of the neck and shoulders relative to one another. It’s just one variation on the way to other things, but I find it highly illuminating. – LynetteReid Feb 25, 2011

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