Who sings bend over touch your toes?
I know that Ludacris says that in a song. That's not what the song's called though.
I can't touch my toes. Is something wrong with me?
It’s okay if you can’t touch your toes. Do not force it. I can touch my toes if I want, but I choose not to do so most of the time. When I do, it is usually with my knees bent slightly.Listen to and honor your body and appreciate what it can do.Something we did in a recent yoga seminar, that you might want to explore is this: Gently do your forward fold until you reach the place that is comfortable for you, such as below your knee. Observe carefully how you feel throughout your body. Return to standing.Next put a tennis ball under the ball of your feet and roll the ball around on the floor with just a little bit of pressure. Move the tennis ball to other places under your foot and do the same, but avoid the arches. This will help to loosen some of your connective tissue, which runs throughout your entire body. Put the ball aside. Now try your forward fold again and see if you feel any difference.You may also want to experiment with different ways of doing your forward fold. Which parts of your back do you engage? (We typically want to avoid engaging our lower back to perform a pose). How do you hold your pelvis prior to the bend? Can you feel your core muscles engaging? How are you positioning your feet and where in your feet are you holding your weight? There is so much involved with this pose beyond simply touching your toes! Be careful that you are not straining your back or locking your knees.
Why you can't touch your toes, if you are standing with your heels against a wall?
why you can't touch your toes, if you are standing with your heels against a wall? (from physics view As you lean forward, your center of mass will move forward. When you are standing with your heels against a wall, the perpendicular distance from the wall to your center of mass is greater than the perpendicular distance from the wall to your toes. The product of the perpendicular distance from the wall to your center of mass times your weight equals the torque which will cause your body to rotate toward the floor. The product of the perpendicular distance from the wall to your toes times the maximum force which your toes can exert equals the torque which will cause your body to rotate away the floor. Your weight * large perpendicular distance from the wall to your center of mass is greater than the maximum force which your toes can exert * perpendicular distance from the wall to your toes. So, your body rotates forward toward the floor. You better tuck your head and do forward roll, cause you are going down!!
How do I learn to touch my toes?
I would practice a combination of the following depending on a number of factors.1. If you haven't stretched for a long time, I would start again in the pool. It's low impact and often relieves a lot of built up muscle stiffness just from moving through the water a bit. If you can relax in a jacuzzi before and after, that's a big help too2. Practice the Standing Forward Bend: Uttanasana. BEND your knees and DO NOT reach for the ground. Just let your body kind of hang there in that position while doing Pranayama: Yogic Breathing. As you relax and breath out, the weight of your body will naturally push you down, little by little.3. If balance is a concern or it is too uncomfortable to bend down while standing (usually from lack of core muscle strength), you should try the Seated Forward Bend: Paschimottanasana. Same as standing - BEND your knees and use a strap to slowly pull yourself toward your legs. Make sure not to hunch - keep a straight back (engage your stomach muscles) and lean forward. Instead of gravity pushing you down, the tension of your arms pulling on the strap should SLOWLY pull you toward the floor. 4. If you are too stiff for both of those,Knees-to-Chest Pose works well for loosening up the lower back before or after the more intense stretching exercises.If your hamstrings are really tight, try this:Bend your knees so you can stretch a little further. Then alternate one leg at a time making it straight to the point you feel stretch, but not pain. Maybe two or three deep breaths on each side 10 times. You will not be able to touch your toes today. But after a month or so, you should be on your way there. You can also do the sitting pose since it will stretch them out using the gravity of your body pushing down - make sure knees are bent and alternate putting one at a time toward the floor to feel stretch but not pain. Hamstrings are always the worst (for me) when I haven't exercised in a while. Sitting a lot really makes them tighten up since they're never extended for very long.It will NOT happen overnight, but I've seen people do things they've never dreamed they could do with a little practice - myself included!
If you bend down and touch your toes and your lower back cracks is that bad?
Not necessarily. Usually, back cracking is a normal body function. Your back cracks when gas bubbles form and pop between your facet joints. As you go about your day, moving this way and that, the air pressure in the joints changes. This causes bubbles to form inside the synovial fluid. Eventually, those bubbles pop. When that happens, it makes a cracking (or popping) sound.You can read more on this here.
Can you be physically fit but unable to bend over and touch your toes?
Although this exercise is a Hamstring stretch, the depth you can reach depends on mobility in your lower back and hip flexors.Individuals with anterior pelvic tilt (APT) have shortened lower back and hip flexor muscles, so presumably someone with APT won’t be able to reach their toes regardless of their physical fitness.
Why can you not successfully bend over and touch your toes when you stand with your heels against a wall?
because when you bend over you move weight back to stop from falling over, and if there is a wall in the way you cant transfer weight backwards so you will fall over forward.
What does it mean if you can't touch your toes?
In my experience as a postural alignment specialist, many people believe it’s due to tight hamstrings. But that is only part of the picture and usually not the main reason. In my opinion it is mostly due to not enough mobility in the pelvis, the pelvis not being able to go anterior or posterior relative to the position it is in (“stuck pelvis”).When you bend forward to touch your toes, ideally the first and foremost part of the movement should come from your pelvis tipping forward. Only the last part of the movement is back/spine flexibility. As I said, most people don’t have the pelvic mobility to perform this movement. One of the reasons for this is that we don’t move enough, and sit too much.We sometimes do a short experiment with someone who cannot touch their toes and thinks it is due to “tight hamstrings”. We have them do 3 or 4 short exercises, none of which stretch the hamstrings but that address the pelvis. Afterward almost all of them are able to touch the floor.A good video on this, in which the father of modern postural therapy, Pete Egoscue, demonstrates this principle, can be found here on YouTube:Hope this helps!PatrickPostural Alignment Specialist certified by Egoscue University*disclaimer: I am not a medical doctor. If in doubt go see one but always trust your "gut" instinct and your body and never take anyone's advice over your body's innate intuition. Egoscue is a non-medical, holistic form of therapy that requires a very active involvement of the client. My answers on Quora and opinions stated are my own as a private person and individual, independent practitioner/postural alignment specialist and do not represent the opinion of The Egoscue Method Inc. or Egoscue University in any way.
Yoga: I haven't been able to touch my toes since I was a kid. I know flexibility is important for health. What steps do I take so I can touch my toes?
I would practice a combination of the following depending on a number of factors.1. If you haven't stretched for a long time, I would start again in the pool. It's low impact and often relieves a lot of built up muscle stiffness just from moving through the water a bit. If you can relax in a jacuzzi before and after, that's a big help too2. Practice the Standing Forward Bend: Uttanasana. BEND your knees and DO NOT reach for the ground. Just let your body kind of hang there in that position while doing Pranayama: Yogic Breathing. As you relax and breath out, the weight of your body will naturally push you down, little by little.3. If balance is a concern or it is too uncomfortable to bend down while standing (usually from lack of core muscle strength), you should try the Seated Forward Bend: Paschimottanasana. Same as standing - BEND your knees and use a strap to slowly pull yourself toward your legs. Make sure not to hunch - keep a straight back (engage your stomach muscles) and lean forward. Instead of gravity pushing you down, the tension of your arms pulling on the strap should SLOWLY pull you toward the floor. 4. If you are too stiff for both of those,Knees-to-Chest Pose works well for loosening up the lower back before or after the more intense stretching exercises.If your hamstrings are really tight, try this:Bend your knees so you can stretch a little further. Then alternate one leg at a time making it straight to the point you feel stretch, but not pain. Maybe two or three deep breaths on each side 10 times. You will not be able to touch your toes today. But after a month or so, you should be on your way there. You can also do the sitting pose since it will stretch them out using the gravity of your body pushing down - make sure knees are bent and alternate putting one at a time toward the floor to feel stretch but not pain. Hamstrings are always the worst (for me) when I haven't exercised in a while. Sitting a lot really makes them tighten up since they're never extended for very long.It will NOT happen overnight, but I've seen people do things they've never dreamed they could do with a little practice - myself included!