This blog will explore five key yoga backbend poses that are suitable for beginners. To practice backbends safely, it's important to warm up first and use your breath to judge how deep you can go into each backbend.
Sun salutations are usually the simplest way to warm up your body and find a connection with your breath. Alternatively, if you’re short on time, you can use the first two yoga poses below (Cat/Cow Pose and Puppy Dog Pose) as a warm-up.
In my beginner backbend YouTube video, you’ll be guided through a flowing sequence that includes all of the postures below.
(1) Cat / Cow Pose | Bitilasana / Marjaryasana
The Cat/Cow Pose is one of the best spinal warm-ups. It allows you to dynamically move your spine into flexion (rounded back) and extension (arched back).
Come to your hands and knees. Inhale, arch your spine, and look a little forward. Exhale, round your spine, and drop your head down. Continuing a few rounds at your own pace, see if you can link the flow of your movement with the length of each breath.
Try and use a full inhale to open through the chest and a full exhale to round your spine and firm your belly. You want to keep a little bit of heaviness through your hands and allow your arms to be long and active.
Balance out the pace of each inhale and each exhale. Possibly starting to explore a gentle pause at the end of each breath and movement. So you're inhaling and arching your spine; at the end of the inhale, pause in an arched position with your spine. And then exhale and round your spine; at the end of the exhale, find a slight pause with a deep rounded spine.
(2) Puppy Dog Pose | Uttana Shishosana
The Puppy Dog Pose is a great passive backbend to open your shoulders and chest.
Start again on your hands and knees. From here you can drop down onto your elbows. If this already feels enough you can stay here. But if you feel relatively comfortable and can keep your breathing slow, start to walk your arms a little further forward and drop your chest down.
If the posture feels quite intense, feel free to bring your arms a little closer to your torso and lift your shoulders a bit more away from the ground. If you feel you have more space, you can keep your hips above your knees and walk your arms forward to open the front of your chest.
Staying here for 5 - 10 slow and steady breaths.
(3) Cobra Pose | Bhujangasana
If I had to pick just one backbend to practice, it would be the Cobra Pose. It strengthens the lower back and creates more space in the upper back. This is perfect for a healthy spine, where we want to encourage stability in the lower back and more flexibility in the upper back.
Come to lie down on your belly. Place your hands under your shoulders and actively draw your elbows in. To begin with you can move in and out the posture with your breath.
Inhale, as you lengthen your spine and lift your chest up. Exhale, as you come back down. Repeat a few rounds coming up on an inhale and back down on an exhale. On your next inhale, come all the way up with your chest and pause in the Cobra Pose for around five slow breaths.
While you’re in the pose see if you can keep your belly firm. Resist the tendency for your shoulders to lift up towards your ears and instead allow them to drop down and back. And finally, see if you can keep pressing the top of your feet—especially your little toes—down to the ground.
If you want to focus more on strengthening your lower back, you could try lifting your hands up so that they’re hovering above the ground.
(4) Locust Pose | Salabhasana
Now, we're going to progress from the Cobra Pose to the Locust Pose that requires a bit more strength and stability due to the positioning of the arms and option to lift the feet. Therefore, the Locust Pose is a good one to practice once you’ve already had the chance to warm up with several rounds of the Cobra Pose.
Lie down on your belly and reach your arms out in front. Inhale as you lift up your right arm and left leg, and exhale as you lower them back down. Inhale as you lift up your left arm and right leg, and exhale to lower back down.
Repeat this several times on each side, focusing on lengthening your arms forward and reaching your legs back. Coordinate each movement with your breath.
Then, on your next inhale, reach both arms forward and up while at the same time grounding through the top of your feet. Pausing here for five breaths.
(5) Bridge Pose | Setu Bandha Sarvangasana
Finally we’re going to do the Bridge Pose as the peak backbend posture in this practice. We’ll use this pose to actively lift the hips and open up through your entire spine.
Lie down on your back. Place your feet about hip distance apart or a little wider and arms alongside your body. Slowly inhale as you lift up through the hips and bring your arms up and over the head. Exhale as you drop your hips and arms down alongside your body.
Inhaling as you lift up even higher with your hips and bring your chest to your chin. Exhale as you press your feet and shoulders down. Fingers could be interlaced to help the shoulder blades draw down and towards each other. Staying here for around five breaths.
Every time we lift up, we also keep our belly firm. That's important for all of these backbends. Although we arch the spine for a backbend, we also want to balance that with stability by firming the belly.
Practice tips for yoga backbends
These are the five yoga backbends that I find most supportive and effective. As I mentioned, the first two poses—Cat/Cow and Puppy Dog Pose—are great for warming up your spine. The other three poses—Cobra, Locust, and Bridge Pose—are useful progressions to practice one after the other.
If you find it difficult to firm your belly in any of these backbends, I suggest starting with a few core warm-ups to help you connect better and engage your belly. Core warm-ups can also be useful preparation for backbends if you have any lower back tension.
If you’re finding that it's tightness in your hip flexors (at the front of your hip), you could try doing the Low Lunge (Anjaneyasana) as a warm-up before your backbends.
If shoulder tightness is holding you back in the backbends, you could try practicing a few simple shoulder stretches before doing these postures.
Happy practicing!
💛 Irene
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