I remember watching Shakira’s “Hips Don’t Lie” video and being mesmerized. Of course, I had to get up and try to move like this Goddess. How is she moving her body like this?! Upon trying her moves, I, just like most women, felt like a complete failure. Belly dancing, Hula dancing, Twerking, all require an immense amount of core strength, core control, breathwork, and the ability to let go.
For most of us, the ability to move like Shakira feels impossible because our hips feel “stuck.” When muscles on our body are stuck they’re also weak. The area from the bottom of your ribs to the pelvis is a hard area for a lot of people to activate and move. Why? Two main reasons are: 1) we’ve never asked muscles in that area to move in a particular way, and 2) because we haven’t asked, we don’t have control of those muscles. We’re unable to consciously decide if we want that area to stay still, or if we want it to move. It just does what it does almost similar to me on a much-needed night out with my girls and we’ve had our fair share of champagne.
Have you ever picked up your child and felt low back–pain or tightness in your low back? Or maybe at the end of a long workday, your hips and low back felt stiff? These feelings are directly tied to that area of our body. The ability to control or stabilize that area is one of the top things we need to learn to feel good as we age. So… what do we do, and how do we start?
Lumbo Pelvic Mobility:
Pelvic Rocking:
- Lay on your back, legs bent and feet flat on the floor.
- Place heels of your hands on low abdominals and fingertips on your pubic bone.
- Rock back towards your waistband so that your pubic bone tilts towards you. Your fingertips will tilt in the direction of the ceiling.
- Reverse that motion and come back into the center
- Tilt your pelvis forward creating an arch into the low back. Your fingertips will tilt in the direction away from you.
- Continue this motion seeing if you can move from your abdominals and low back vs. your legs and butt.
Lumbo Pelvic Stability:
Marching:
- Lay on your back, legs bent and feet flat on the floor.
- Engage your lower abdominals and lift one foot an inch or two off of the floor. Keep the weight evenly distributed between your right and left sides as you do this.
- Set your foot down.
- Re-engage your lower abdominals and lift your other foot an inch or two off of the floor.
- Continue slowly marching your legs while stabilizing your hips by using your lower abdominals
Add these exercises to your workout and we promise that you’ll be able to move and stabilize better. Once you’re able to activate the muscles, control the movements, and link your breath to the movement–just let go. Have fun and dance like no one is watching. What we cannot promise is that you’ll be able to dance like Shakira.
