What's a good stretch for that?

I've had many students come up to me after a class saying, "My [fill in body part] is really tight! What is a good pose or stretch that I can do to loosen it up?" This or some variation of this question will inevitably come up at some point in a yoga teaching career. A general understanding of the mechanics of a stretch will help you find a quick answer and keep your yogic composure!

Know your anatomy!

For now, we'll assume that it is a muscle that you're trying to stretch. Sometimes the yogis asking the questions don't know what muscles they are trying to stretch or they could name muscles that the tightness is not coming from, so you might need to use your yoga anatomy expertise to help figure out what they're trying to stretch to begin with. After figuring out the muscle, figuring out how to stretch it is fairly simple!

The Basics of a Stretch

Keep the big picture in mind and visualize generally where the muscles connect to the bones and what joint(s) the muscles cross. Pulling the two attachment points of a muscle further away from each other will create a stretch. For example, the pec (pectoralis major) starts on the breastbone, collar bone and ribs on your chest, crosses the shoulder and attaches to the upper arm. Pulling the upper arm out to the side (horizontally abducting the shoulder) will lengthen out the pec creating a stretch. Now, all you need to do is think of a yoga pose that uses horizontal abduction in the shoulders! Virabhadrasana II (warrior 2) or utthita trikonasana (triangle pose) sound like good possibilities!

Also, a good rule of thumb to keep in mind is that the opposite action of the muscle is usually the action that will stretch it, meaning if the muscle flexes a joint, then extending the joint will stretch it. If a muscle internally rotates a joint, then externally rotating the joint will stretch it, etc. For our pec example, the pectoralis major functions as a horizontal adductor, so horizontal abduction will stretch it. If you need to brush up on your basic movements check out my articles, Anatomy Language: Part II and Part III. 

Is that all there is to it?

That's it for the basics, but like most things in life, it can definitely get more complex. Sometimes muscles cross multiple joints. Some muscles have different divisions and multiple movements. Some muscles change movements depending on their position. All these things affect figuring out how to stretch a muscle. We can also talk about stretching fascia and ligaments, how long to hold stretches and reciprocal inhibition, but we can save these topics for future articles. To sum it up:

1. Know where the muscle generally connects to the body
2. Figure out how to pull those two points further away from each other
3. Find a yoga pose that does that (or create one!)

Yoga is not all about stretching even though this is what many people think of when they think about yoga. Although yoga has many more benefits, stretching is definitely a major one. Also, the "How do I stretch...?" question is a common one to yoga teachers, so knowing how to stretch a muscle is a great skill to work on!

Namasté

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Pectoralis major graphic from Thieme Atlas of Anatomy: General Anatomy and Musculoskeletal System, and Warrior 2 photo from yogajournal.com.