Among the iconic yoga poses that everyone aspires to master, the Splits Pose, known in Sanskrit as Hanumanasana, stands out. It's a challenging pose, but one that’s within your reach to practice through a step-by-step and consistent practice.
In this blog, we’ll explore three practical steps to learning how to do the splits.
You can also practice along with my guided YouTube video on how to do the Splits Pose, Hanumanasana.
(1) Understand the Alignment and Technique of the Splits Pose, Hanumanasana
It might not surprise you to learn that the splits require a lot of flexibility in your hamstrings. Therefore, before attempting the Splits Pose, it's helpful to practice forward bending poses to help lengthen your hamstrings.
But what makes Hanumanasana challenging isn’t just the need for long hamstrings. The pose also requires opening your hip flexors.
The splits are an uneven pose in which both legs perform different actions simultaneously. You’re stretching your front leg's hamstrings and your back leg's hip flexors.
In addition to flexibility, it’s supportive and beneficial to find some stability and engagement of your muscles while in the pose. You can do this by actively stretching, lengthening, and engaging your hamstrings and hip flexors.
Learning how to engage your quadriceps in the front of your thighs will help relieve some tension from your hamstrings and hip flexors. In the end, as with all yoga poses, we want to actively stretch to cultivate strength and flexibility together.
(2) Take Time to Warm Up With Preparation Poses
Before you start practicing Hanumanasana, it’s crucial to warm up with some preparation yoga poses. Like all advanced poses, preparing the body for the pose is really key to preventing overstretching or injury.
First, warm up the body with dynamic movements like Sun Salutations. Then, work with a carefully designed yoga sequence focusing on forward bending and hip openers. These targeted preparation poses should engage and lengthen your hamstrings, hip flexors, and quadriceps—precisely the areas you will need to use for the Splits.
Depending on where you are with your yoga practice, you might choose for a period of time to work only on preparation poses like the Seated Forward Fold (Paschimottanasana), Anjaneyasana (Low Lunge) and Ardha Hanumanasana (Half Splits). This will allow you to focus on getting your body comfortable in yoga poses that engage and lengthen your hamstrings, hip flexors, and quadriceps required for the splits.
Once you feel ready to approach the Splits, take your time to approach the pose slowly. A great first step is to practice Ardha Hanumanasana (Half Splits). This allows you to slowly towards the pose at your own pace.
If you feel comfortable in the Half Splits, you can experiment with bringing your front leg a little further forward and your back leg a little more back. Then, as you start to feel more familiar with these actions, you can start to slowly work your way towards the splits.
(3) Practice Consistently to Make Progress in Your Splits
As with most things in life, consistency is key! The more often you practice, the more comfortable your body will become with the preparation poses and the Hanumanasana.
Even if you don’t practice the Splits every day, it can be very helpful to focus on regularly practicing the family of yoga poses of forward bends and hip openers. These poses support lengthening and engaging your hamstrings, hip flexors, and quadriceps.
When approaching the preparation postures and Hanumanasana, work with your breath as a guide, as well as the sensations and feedback that you feel in your body. This will help you determine when it’s the right moment for you to transition from the Half Splits to the Full Splits and how far to go into your splits.
Tune into how your body feels before, during, and after practice for more direct feedback. Then, notice how you feel in the posture over a period of time as you keep practicing consistently.
Remember to have fun in your journey of learning the Splits, and keep practicing consistently to see the best results.
Happy practicing!
💛 Irene
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