If you’ve heard it once, you’ve heard it a hundred times: cultivating a strong foundation is a fundamental part of feeling supported in your yoga practice. And while your core muscles are often cited as responsible for your stability, there’s another essential area that plays a key role in your daily routine, whether you’re on or off the mat. Enter the pelvic floor.
“The pelvic floor is the foundation of almost every movement we make. It stabilizes the spine and hips, supports breathing and posture, and even influences circulation and hormonal health,” says Ed Gemjin, physical therapist and CEO of The Venice gym. “If it’s weak or overactive, you may see problems ranging from back or hip pain to digestive problems and poor balance.”
Julianne Collazo, yoga instructor and founder of Yoga Islandsa yoga and Ayurvedic exercise program, explains that the pelvic floor is a group of muscles that act like a hammock, supporting your reproductive organs, bladder and lower digestive tract. A healthy relationship between your abdominal and pelvic floor muscles can create a powerful foundation from which all your movements, including yoga poses, are centered.
“Although the anatomy differs slightly between men and women, both rely on the pelvic floor muscles for posture, continence and sexual function,” says Gemjin. Furthermore, any discomfort in the pelvic area has the potential to create not only tightness, but also limitations in flexibility and stability.
The good news: yoga can help rebuild the connection between the core and the pelvic floor. Read on to learn more about incorporating pelvic floor strengthening stretches into your routine.
Strengthening, stretching and stabilizing the pelvic floor
“When we talk about involving the pelvic floor in yoga or movement exercises, we often focus on technique How to activate these deep, supportive muscles,” says Collazo. She notices that along with the Howthe Why is just as essential. “It’s not just about strength, it’s about vitality, hormonal harmony and emotional balance.”
A strong core is integral to optimizing overall well-being. Activation of the core muscles helps stabilize the spine, providing support against gravity while maintaining vertical alignment. Yet a stable core is also the result of a partnership that includes pelvic floor exercises.
When you learn how to strengthen the pelvic floor, your muscle memory retains that information, creating a solid foundation for balance, engagement, and strength. By stretching, strengthening and stabilizing these areas, the pelvic floor muscles and their coexisting connective tissues provide support to the adjacent abdominal muscles and vital organs.
Here, experts share insights on how to effectively exercise the pelvic floor during yoga and otherwise, so you can cultivate a stable, supportive baseline for optimal balance, stability and strength.
10 pelvic floor signals for strength
The functionality of the pelvic floor is relevant for both men and women. The following pelvic floor exercises are intended for everyone.
1. Think about stopping the flow of urine
A simple anatomical clue like this, which relates the action to everyday life, can be useful for anyone, especially novice yoga practitioners.
2. Imagine that you have to sneeze
“I avoid rigid cues like ‘squeeze’ and instead encourage subtle, breath-based awareness,” says Gemjin. “‘Exhale and gently lift from the base of your pelvis,’ or ‘Imagine you are holding a sneeze.'”
The goal here is to create connection instead of tension in the muscles, and stability instead of tension.
3. Imagine you are picking up marble
“To help students feel it, I sometimes say it like, ‘Imagine a marble resting on the pelvic floor and try to lift the marble as you exhale, and then release it as you inhale,’” says Joe Miller, yoga anatomy teacher and Feldenkrais practitioner.
4. Engage in your mula bandha
“In yoga we use the expression mula bandhain which the anus and genitals are tightened or contracted with a sensation of being pulled up and inward. Many poses, even long, deep breaths, can be done while engaging mula bandha and creating a more stable, stronger pelvic floor,” says yoga instructor and Giving Power Yoga for Sports author Gwen Laurens.
“The old adage, use it or lose it, couldn’t be more true here,” says Lawrence, explaining that it’s imperative to engage the pelvic floor regularly. She notes that it is especially relevant for people who suffer from weakening muscles due to aging.
5. Lift the pelvic floor towards your navel
By relying on anatomical landmarks, this cue not only activates the correct muscles, but also creates awareness of the relationship between the pelvic floor and the core muscles.
6. Feel how the muscles between your sit bones gently move in and up
This stimulates lateral and vertical activation. Think of mirroring the contraction and release actions practiced during bridge lifts and Kegel exercises, strengthening the pelvic floor and deep core muscles, rather than relying on the strength of the glutes and quadriceps.
7. Exhale as you go
There is a relationship between the diaphragm and the movement of the pelvic floor. Miller explains that during relaxed breathing, the pelvic floor lengthens to allow for the descent of the diaphragm as you inhale. It contracts and rises slightly as you exhale. “It can also help with active exhalation, allowing you to push out a little more air,” says Miller.
“But if it is chronically contracted (hypertonic), it can make relaxing breathing more difficult,” he says. Hence the need for awareness whether you are constantly working on it or not. Collazo adds that people tend to lose connection with the pelvic floor when they hold their breath, so don’t forget to exhale as you go.
8. Imagine drinking a smoothie through a straw from your perineum
This visual helps activate lifting and pulling in motion subtly and without force. Collazzo explains that this visualization can help students practice the action of activating the mula bandha area.
9. Practice pelvic thrusts
According to Lawrence, a pelvic thrust is an exercise that stimulates the root chakra, increasing your sense of stability and making you feel more secure in your body and in life.
How:
- Sit in a comfortable cross-legged position.
- Extend your arms down, palms flat on the floor next to your hips.
- Inhale and push the floor away, lift your buttocks and hips and exhale, drop down.
- Repeat this for 1-3 minutes.
- Sit and breathe in the resulting sensations.
10. Indicate the pose instead of the muscle
Miller specifically avoids engaging the pelvic floor in his asana exercises. “It’s not that I never say anything about it, but I generally focus on the bigger, more global actions of the pose that should help him get involved when he needs to,” he explains. Think of shapes such as chair pose, bridge pose and even child’s pose. “Ideally, it contracts reflexively when we need that extra support, so I don’t tend to micromanage it.”
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