notes from yoga lesson.

When you exhale, you naturally engage your pelvic floor.  If you aren't sure if you are engaging mula bandha - exhale and check into your breath.

Plank isn't supposed to be a straight line, necessarily. by engaging core and pulling up a bit so the back is parallel to floor, then pulling heart forward (not melting!) you get so much more strength and ease in the pose... and less shoulder strain.

Lowering down - let elbows go out to sides a little bit and use lower belly core strength instead. Don't tuck in close to the body, that hunches shoulders forward.

To come out, tuck tailbone & retrace steps.

Practice good form and core engagement with modified chaturanga first - then move toward full chaturanga, hover, lower gently to belly.  Then add pushing back up - but build this strength/process in modified form.

Hip flexor / psoas stretch with tennis ball in iliachus, then bend opposite leg into 90 degrees on floor and lift leg on tennis ball side (or just come up to toes curled under if lifting leg is too much.)

Theraband stretches:
hold theraband at waist height, should width, wrapped around hands, thumbs out. pull out. 5-10 times both hands, 5-10 times each side isolated.

Hold theraband at waist, pull wide/out lift overhead, bend elbows, pull down behind head, thinking of engaging lower traps.

Camel - you're pushing hips too far forward - it is the cue in core 26 - but that's for beginners and actually locking up lower back pushing too far.  Think of pushing straight down into knees and inhaling into the middle back to create space and then exhaling heart directly to the sky for a vertical direction, rather than a forward force.

Practice camel dropbacks with toes together, knees hipwidth or wider.  Hands down backs of legs or sides of legs... exhale back, inhale up.

Then practice hands to heart, come back 1/2way, lift/breathe - let breath originate movement. once breathing, then reaching hands out, touch fingertips. exhale lift heart, walk finger tips back toward the feet with each exhale, then place hands on top of head and gently drop back or lower down just the extra bit to reach the feet.

Breathe, breathe, breathe.  Stay one breath once you feel panic to train your brain to relax for next time. Find your breath as an anchor *then* move to come out.