The challenges that you face in this posture generally depend on which camp you fall into.  If you are a beginner and are challenged with tight hamstrings, stiff shoulders and a tendency to round your back when you bend forward you’ll need to approach Flank Pose quite differently than someone who is very flexible.  In the second camp, we have those who may have overly flexible and weak hamstring muscles, open shoulders and a tendency to hyperextend the spine.  I’m going to call these two tribes the ‘Too Tight’ and the ‘Too Loose’ tribes.  If you are a teacher, it’s important that you offer individualized instructions depending on what you see, rather than going into autopilot and repeating the same instructions. More often than not, the instructions you give a beginning level student substantially differ from those offered to more advanced students.

Too Tight Tribe

If you have very tight hamstrings, tight shoulders and a tendency to round the back as you bend forward, try these three adjustments:

1. Arm Position:  Instead of bringing the palms together behind the back in Prayer Position (Namaste), take hold of your outer elbows (Fig. 13).  Press firmly against the elbows to broaden the shoulders.  Or, simply place your hands on your hips.  Easy!

2. Stance:  Keep your front leg bent throughout the practice of the posture.  Bending the front knee will make it much easier for you to bend forward, and safer for you to go into and come out of the posture without strain on your back (Fig. 15).

Once you have reached your final position, experiment with attempting to straighten the leg while keeping the head-to-tail connection through the spine. 

3.  Props:  If you are very tight and only able to come forward about 30 degrees off the vertical, rest your hands on a chair in front of you.  If you are able to form a tabletop position, place your hands on a yoga block. Working without these props will undoubtedly lead to a rounded back.

Too Loose Tribe

Increasingly, I see students with weak and overly flexible hamstrings, often combined with incompetent core muscles.  The hamstring muscles attach to the base of the pelvis at the sitting bones.  When these muscles are weak, they will fail to anchor the back of the pelvis and there will be a tendency for the pelvis to tilt anteriorly.  If you are in the ‘Too Loose’ tribe, you need to learn how to engage your hamstrings and the deepest abdominal muscles that lie on either side of your lumbar spine: psoas major (Fig. 16).

The primary function of your psoas muscles is to stabilize your lumbar spine.  When strong and long, these muscles act like industrial strength pillars supporting the span between the lumbar vertebrae and disks.  Engaging both the hamstrings and the psoas muscles will give you the ability to have a controlled descent into the posture, maintaining the energetic connection of the pelvis to the legs throughout the entire movement. 

1. Bending Forward with Control: Assume the preparatory stance position (right leg forward, left leg back) with your arms behind your back and the hands in Prayer Position.  Come forward 20° off the vertical and pause. Imagine that you are sending an anchor downwards from the back of the right hip all the way down to the right heel (Fig. 17).  Feel the left and right psoas muscles like strong yet pliant pillars supporting your lumbar spine.  Some students like to imagine the psoas muscles as hands lifting and supporting the front of the spine.  Now come forward another 20°, pausing to check that you are not breaking at the juncture between the pelvis and lumbar spine (S1/L5) or between the lumbar spine and the ribcage (L5/T12).  Each time you move incrementally, re-establish the anchors from the psoas to the ground. 

If your core muscles are weak you may only be able to come forward about 45°, without compensating or losing your anchor.  Eventually, you may be able to come to a tabletop position.  Maintain this position for 5 breaths.  To come out of the posture bend your right knee and slowly push down into the floor to bring your torso back to the starting position. 

Visualize the psoas muscles supporting and lifting your spine back to the upright position.  When practiced correctly, you will feel that you are elongating through your spine while simultaneously creating a slight braking action to that very same elongation.  

2.  Building Spinal Integrity and Strength: In your descent into Flank Pose, the spinal muscles work against gravity from the moment you move forward from your standing position, up to and while you are in the tabletop position. Once you move past the tabletop position and begin to fold over the front leg, the spinal muscles primarily lengthen and the emphasis shifts to the hips and legs.  Like many members of the ‘Too Loose’ tribe, you need to have the discipline to spend most of your time strengthening your back by staying longer in the positions from vertical to tabletop.  Move 10° forward and pause for a few breaths, move another 10° forward and pause.  This will build your core muscles and spinal strength.  At the very end of your stay in the posture, bring your head onto your shin just for a few breaths as a reward and to give yourself a sense of completion.  Well done!