Yoga Sequence

Ten Minutes for a Stiff Lower Back

The short practice for the days between

This is the practice for the days you would otherwise skip. Ten minutes, all of it on the floor, and no decision to make once you have started. It is not a smaller version of a real session. It has its own job: keeping the gap between two proper practices short enough that the body does not go back to its old setting. A back changes because you asked often, not because you asked hard.

10 min · Level 1

When it helps

Your back is stiff in the morning, or you have been sitting since breakfast, or it is a day when the longer practice is not going to happen. Ten minutes. No props needed, though a cushion under the head is welcome.

Physical effect

Flexion, extension and rotation of the lumbar spine in their smallest useful doses, plus one strengthening pose so the practice is not only stretching.

Nervous system

Ten minutes lying down with a long exhale does something to the background tension around the spine that no single stretch does.

Mental effect

The days you practise when you did not feel like it are the ones that build the habit. Short is what makes that possible.

Ten minutes

One pass through the four movements a lower back needs, and then a rest.

Apanasana

1 min

Knees to Chest Pose

On your back, knees drawn in one at a time, hands behind the thighs.

Knees to Chest is the least demanding way into flexion and a good place to notice what today feels like.

Learn more about Apanasana

Marjaryasana

45 sec

Cat Pose

On all fours, rounding towards the ceiling at the speed of the breath.

Cat is controlled flexion. Control is what a guarded back is missing more than range.

Learn more about Marjaryasana

Bitilasana

45 sec

Cow Pose

Belly drops, chest and tailbone lift, and you stop before anything pinches.

Cow gives the other direction. Together they cover most of what the lumbar spine does in a day.

Learn more about Bitilasana

Balasana

1 min

Child's Pose

Knees wide, forehead down, arms forward or alongside the body.

Child's Pose holds the rounded shape long enough for the muscles beside the spine to let go rather than just move.

Learn more about Balasana

Ardha Bhujangasana

45 sec

Baby Cobra

Forearms down, elbows under the shoulders, shoulders away from the ears.

Baby Cobra keeps extension in the routine. A back that only ever rounds loses the other half.

Learn more about Ardha Bhujangasana

Setu Bandha Sarvangasana

5 lifts, 5 breaths each

Bridge Pose

Feet hip width, lift only as far as it is comfortable, come down slowly.

Bridge is the strength in this short practice. Ten minutes without anything active would be a stretching routine, and stretching alone is not what the research is describing.

Learn more about Setu Bandha Sarvangasana

Jathara Parivartanasana

1 min 30 sec per side

Reclining Belly Twist

Knees to one side, a cushion under the top knee if you want it.

The supine twist reaches rotation, which is the movement most people lose first and miss least until it is gone.

Learn more about Jathara Parivartanasana

Savasana

2 min

Corpse Pose

Knees bent or over a cushion, palms up.

Two minutes is enough for the spine to register that the practice is over and it is allowed to stop holding.

Learn more about Savasana

Integration

Use this on two or three of the days between your core practices. If it is the only thing you manage in a week, that is still a week in which your back moved. Nothing here is medical advice, and the safety notes in the practice guide apply to this practice as much as to the long one.

The teacher behind this sequence

Manish Rana

Founder & Author

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Go deeper into the poses

Every asana in this practice has a page of its own. You will find alignment cues, what the shape actually works on, and the energetics behind it.

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