Pavanamuktāsana - Wind Liberating Pose

Wind liberating pose. Generally practiced to get rid of abdominal & gastric problems and improve digestion.

1. Lay on your back with a neatly folded blanket underneath your head

2. Lift your feet of the floor with your knees bent so that the heels are close to your buttocks

3. Lift your head and upper back to reach your legs and embrace your forearms around your shins, interlinking your fingers together or holding one wrist in the other hand.

4. Keep hold of your legs but roll your upper back back down to the floor, and head back to your support, uncurling your vertebrae like a fern leaf.

5. Breathe into any stiff areas and imagine that tension can escape from between the major joints like stale air and let the joints become increasingly refreshed by the breath.

6. Stay for as long as the body feels like it is able to settle. Then release and lay on your back with the soles of your feet on the floor and arms stretched out to your sides.

7. Then roll over onto your side.

Contraindications: where difficult to reach your shins, use a belt to bridge the gap between your hands or embrace the back of the thighs between the calf and the thigh.