Legs Up the Wall Pose (Viparita Karani)? Hmm… It sounds pretty straight forward, doesn’t it? Well, luckily for all of us, it is! Yes, I said “luckily” because this pose is pretty easy to do, doesn’t require much time, and on top of all that, it brings you incredible benefits that will affect every aspect of your life.
Did I get your attention? Excellent! Let’s proceed.
How to do the Viparita Karani Yoga Pose – Legs Up the Wall Pose
Whenever you feel stressed, tired, anxious, or whenever your legs feel like giving up and your entire body just won’t accept a good workout, you can do this pose to relax and feel better.
The fun thing is that you can do this pose literally anywhere! Going from your home to hotel rooms, to outdoors, everything can be your playground. All that you need is something vertical, like a wall, door, tree, etc.
This pose basically looks like this:
You lay down on your back, put a folded blanket or a firm pillow under your pelvis, and raise your legs straight on the wall. By doing that, fluids like lymph and others will easily flow to your lower stomach. You see, the fluids that will start running through your body naturally during this exercise are the ones that make your knees hurt, tired, your ankles swollen and generally put your legs in a lot of pain.
By doing the Viparita Karani yoga pose, you will be literally refreshing your legs and your reproductive area. You see, this pose makes your blood flow better as well, which often leads to better blood circulation in your entire body.
As you can see, this pose is not only pretty easy to learn but pretty beneficial as well. If you are a rookie when it comes to yoga, you should pick the easier ones first. This, of course, doesn’t mean that yoga veterans avoid doing this pose because it is easy. No way! This pose is beneficial to every single one of us and its easy-to-be-learned nature is just a plus.
Small Tips Regarding the Pose
Make sure your support is placed on a good distance from the wall so that you can comfortably lay down. After you have made sure that your support is on the right spot, the next thing you need to take into consideration is that your sitting bones should not be right against the wall. The front side of your torso should only slightly be arching from the pubis.
It’s a good routine to bend your knees first, lift your back a bit and set your support a little bit higher, right under your pelvis. It is hard to find the correct position on the first try, so feel free to adjust.
The final tip for this pose would be to keep your legs firm, but not firm to the point that it hurts. Make them as firm as they need to be in order to stay vertically on the wall.
You should be in this pose anywhere from five to 15 minutes. Enjoy!