Standing Tall in Tadasana
Good posture versus bad alignment.

by Katy Santiago, M.S.

Tadasana (mountain posture) is fundamental to any yoga practice as both a stand alone pose and a preparatory positioning tool for future asana (posture). It is also the stance most likely to come off the mat into your daily practice of life. With both feet on or off the mat, standing up straight, you may or may not be truly aligned and thus supporting health biomechanically and energetically.

Most yogis are startled to see that although their tadasana may be aesthetically excellent, the alignment of the skeleton beneath is not. Because posture is subjective, guidelines are usually passed teacher to student or mother to child. We know the basics: hunching over is bad and keeping the abdomen in is good, but there are many other things that your mother didn’t know, particularly when considering chronic physical issues.
Alignment, on the other hand, is objective and quantifiable. It is possible to teach people where their body should be in space, and more importantly, why. Rather than being subjective, the best alignment places the bony levers of the body in a position to provide the best control to the muscular system. This control means less of many things: less excessive or inappropriate force in joints, less usage of cartilage, tendons and ligaments, and less neurological confusion. It can also lead to more oxygen flow, more support for the organs and more fine and gross motor skill, which is essential for healthy cognitive function.
While biomechanical concepts are often linked to the movements of the arms and legs, the same universal laws apply to circulation, blood flow, lung inflation and bone density.  Important physiological functions such as cardiovascular and organ health are also subject to the mechanical environment created by skeletal position. Misalignment may reveal issues hidden deep within the musculature of the body.

Two misalignments I see most often in tadasana are an overly tucked pelvis and a rib cage thrust too far forward. Both of these actions are compensatory mechanisms to enhance posture when muscular strength or motor skill is missing. These habits then create further imbalances and/or muscular weaknesses: a tucked pelvis can change the position of the pelvic floor muscles making them inefficient at holding the organs with strength equal to their weight. This can further increase pressure on the prostate in men and can lead to genito-urinary organ prolapse in women. This backward tilt can also result in weak posterior muscles and excessive tension through the lower back. These situations can decrease circulation to the hips as well as muscular load on the bones of the pelvis, which are both a necessity for bone and cartilage generation.
Rib thrusting is a common mechanism to disguise kyphosis, a forward curvature of the middle and upper back. Due to the excessive sitting our modern life requires, the ability to mobilize the vertebrae individually is decreased. Standing up straight has simply become adjusting the upper back as a whole unit, not the individual articulation of which the spine is capable. The result is shoulders that are further back in the body than where they should be with ribs that are displaced forward. Because the placement and mobility of the rib cage is essential for optimal lung inflation, this skeletal repositioning can have an instant effect on the ability to take a full deep breath and fully oxygenate the lungs and bloodstream. The abdominal muscles also attach to the lower ribs, so thrusting the ribs forward can contribute to weak abdominal muscles, poor spinal stabilization and excess compression of the discs between the vertebrae.

While the feet may seem far removed from the alignment of the shoulders, spine and pelvis, misalignment in the body can have a direct impact on foot problems, including: hammer toes, plantar fasciitis, collapsed arches and balance. Keeping the weight in the heels means keeping the weight over the heels, which is difficult to do when the body is shifting forward via your pelvis and spine.

Correct alignment in Tadasana by asking: Where does your tadasana stand?
Stand against a wall with your heels three to four inches from it. Press your thigh bones toward the wall, letting your tailbone relax. Next, bring your shoulders, arms, and back of the head against the wall. You should have a small space underneath your waist where your low back naturally curves in, but your middle back should be touching the wall. If your middle back is not touching the wall, peel your head and shoulders away until your mid-back touches. This aligns the natural curvature of the upper spine.
If your waist is completely on the wall, you are a tucker and are overly tucking your pelvis in. Adjust this by tilting your tailbone out toward the wall until the space reappears, and follow the above directions to notice the curvature in your upper spine.
Making these basic changes in skeletal position can change your yoga practice at the cellular level – from existing to thriving.

Katy Santiago, M.S. is an expert teacher of biomechanics (the physics of human movement and tissue) and a life-long student of yoga. She is the President of Restorative Exercise Institute in Ventura, CA. www.restorativeexercise.com

 Alignment is objective and quantifiable. It is possible to teach people where their body should be in space, and more importantly, why.