Video

Transcript

i’m going to show you the best the

absolute best stretch for your psoas

muscle

what is the psoas muscle well it’s the

only muscle that connects the upper part

of your body with the lower part and if

you have a tight psoas chances are

you’re going to have low back pain

chances are you’re going to have poor

posture

chances are your hips are not going to

work correctly without a psoas you’re

going to have a heck of a time

getting out of bed it’s virtually almost

impossible to get out of bed in the

morning

standing up from a seated position will

be difficult

uh walking running will be impossible

now if the psoas is tight

keeping your posture

erect keeping your upper body over your

lower body without going forward is

going to be an issue because

the muscle i’m going to show you what

this looks like right here the psoas

attaches from the lumbar spine as well

as the last thoracic vertebra it comes

through your pelvis

to your your upper leg okay so what it

does is it causes the lower leg to come

up towards the chest okay

so let’s see if you can see this right

here so this is what it does right here

it’s a hip

flexor

now your thigh muscles are also hip

flexors but the psoas is the most

powerful it’s a very large muscle

and without this motion i mean think

about it you can’t can’t walk can’t run

you can’t climb up the stairs so it’s a

it could be a major major problem if

it’s not working correctly personally i

had a tight solus without really even

knowing it was tight

but it manifest as low back pain because

i used to run my bike for miles and

miles and miles up hills and that was

really the only exercise i was doing for

about 10 years and so you can imagine

i really built up my hip flexors

but i didn’t

work on the opposite muscles the other

thing i did at the same time

was a lot of sitting i mean i would

basically sit all day long unless i was

at my office and

that’s just a killer for the psoas

because it keeps it in that contracted

state

i’m just curious how many hours do you

sit per day go ahead and put that in the

comments because with myself i think i

was sitting for at least 10 hours a day

i mean that’s just way too long to sit

so what happens when the psoas becomes

too tight it it really throws off a lot

of other muscles including your glute

muscles

and everything starts compensating and

you can watch people who have a tight

psoas they usually are tilted forward so

usually a person will have a tight psoas

on one side more than the other side

and it’s really important to

fix that and keep them both symmetrical

it’ll give you so much relief with your

low back and i’m going to walk you

through a real simple exercise that i

figured out

after trying a lot of things that didn’t

work

and there’s just three simple steps

and not only am i going to show you how

to stretch it out but also to strengthen

it

and also to stabilize it okay so it also

involves

several other muscles and also your

upper body

so let’s just dive right in and show you

exactly how to do this

all right this is basically what you’re

going to do you’re going to

hyperextend okay one side at a time

we’ll start with my left side

and take that psoas muscle and not just

stretch it but we’re gonna stabilize it

and strengthen it all at the same time

so grab a chair at first you know you’re

going to have to probably go at your own

pace but you’re going to scissors your

legs and come right down

and keep your upper body

as straight as possible

and then

take your left leg

and straighten out your knee if possible

okay so now

i’m squatting down with my right leg

which is not easy when you first start

out so of course go at your own pace

okay

so we’re holding on to a chair and we’re

just stretching this and you’re just

gonna count for ten okay you’re going to

just do this for 10 seconds

and then you’re going to do the opposite

side

now

when you do this

you’re going to notice which leg

or which muscle is tighter left or right

and obviously you’re going to spend a

little more time on the area that’s

tight right and so what we’re trying to

do is we’re trying to get symmetry

between the left and right side as well

as

strengthening the whole dynamic because

these muscles do not work

in isolation okay they work together

so if we’re doing this side and you do

this for a period of time where you’re

comfortable

then what you do is do step two which is

simply you’re raising your arm

okay now what we’re going to do is we’re

going to stretch

all the muscles and ligaments that are

in the fascia that’s connected

to the opposite side okay

so you’ll do that for 10 seconds okay

and then do the opposite side

over a period of time when that becomes

easier you add one more layer to this

which is you just bring both arms up

without any type of assistance from the

chair

and you just focus on your form and your

stabilization and you hold that for 10

to 20 seconds and you’re really just

trying to do this until you can do this

comfortably now

over a course of like two or three weeks

you’re going to find that when you walk

your pelvis your hips

your gait

is now free and open you’re going to

find that your low back pain is

completely gone it frees up a lot of

tightness in your hips

and at the same time you’re going to

find that your low back curve

is now in a good position where you

actually have a nice cushion in your

lower back so it’s going to be overall

very very stabilized now if you haven’t

seen my first video on the psoas muscle

you should check that out because i go

through a series of things to test to

see if you need to stretch it so i put

it up right here check it out