Belly Dance for Spine Health: Simple Moves for Everyday Wellness
Understanding the Importance of Your Spine
The spine is the backbone of your body—literally and figuratively. It supports you, helps you move, protects vital nerves, and keeps you balanced. The beautiful and simple things that can easily be taken for granted, am I right?
In collaboration with Sarah at Heart.Hips.Mind, we bring you this short and simple series about incorporating essential movements of the spine for everyday wellness
WHY your spine is so important! Here's a simple breakdown…
Support: Your spine helps you stand tall, gives your body shape, and supports your head, shoulders, and upper body, making it possible for you to sit, stand, and move around.
Movement: The spine allows you to bend, twist, and move in many directions. It is flexible because it is made up of many small bones called vertebrae, which are connected by joints.
Protection: The spinal cord is like a highway for messages traveling between your brain and the rest of your body.The spine protects your spinal cord, which is a bundle of nerves inside the spine. These messages control your movements and help you feel sensations like touch and pain.
Balance: The spine helps keep your balance when you move. It works with your muscles and inner ear to make sure you don't fall over when you walk, run, or dance.
Simple… but oh, so important, right?
The 6 Essential Spinal Movements
One of the most enjoyable ways to maintain a healthy spine is through Belly Dance! Belly dance naturally incorporates the six essential spinal movements that engage the spine, promoting flexibility, strength, and overall spinal health: flexion, extension, lateral flexion (side bending right and left side) and rotation (Twisting right and left side).
Understanding the benefits of these six primary spinal movements can help belly dancers optimize their practice and maintain a healthy spine.
Flexion (Forward Bending)
1. Flexion (Forward Bending)
Overall Benefits:
Stretching the Back Muscles: Flexion helps to lengthen and stretch the muscles along the spine, particularly the erector spinae, which can reduce tension and improve flexibility.
Improved Posture: Regular flexion exercises can counteract the effects of prolonged sitting and slouching, contributing to better overall posture.
Spinal Mobility: This movement enhances the mobility of the vertebral joints, making the spine more supple and less prone to stiffness.
In Belly Dance: Try undulations and chest slides backwards or downwards, or chest drops/locks to engage in flexion.
Extension (Backward Bending)
2. Extension (Backward Bending)
Overall Benefits:
Strengthening the Back: Extension exercises engage and strengthen the muscles of the lower back, which supports the spine and reduces the risk of back pain.
Counteracting Flexion: This movement counterbalances the effects of forward bending (flexion), helping to maintain a balanced and healthy spine.
Opening the Chest: Extension also opens up the chest and stretches the abdominal muscles, which can improve breathing and posture.
In Belly Dance: Practice chest lifts or slides forward.
Flexion + Extension Combo’s: Warm up with flexion and extension, making letter C’s with your spine. These are our favorite go-to movements for the beginning of class or as a daily routine.
Undulations, regular or reverse, also enhance extension.
Do you have a tight lower back? We love to use pelvic floor lifts and drops to help release the tension, or use it for warm up!
3 and 4. Lateral Flexion (Side Bending Right and Left)
Overall Benefits:
Flexibility and Strength: Side bending stretches and strengthens the muscles on the sides of the torso, including the obliques and intercostals.
Improved Range of Motion: Regular practice enhances the range of motion in the spine, which is essential for the fluid and graceful movements in belly dancing.
Spinal Health: This movement promotes even distribution of flexibility and strength along the spine, reducing the risk of imbalances and related injuries.
In Belly Dance: Try vertical (hip) figure eight’s (mayas and sways) and one-hip isolations (hip drops/lifts/crescents/ figure eight’s etc…) to incorporate lateral flexion.
Upper body: Chest figure eight’s are also fantastic, and if you add a soft movement of the arms, like arm undulations ,or take your head gently with you, it could help circulate the lymphatic system of your upper body.
Rotation
5 and 6. Rotation (Twisting Right and Left)
Overall Benefits:
Spinal Mobility: Twisting movements increase the rotational mobility of the spine, which is crucial for many dance movements that involve turning or twisting.
Core Strengthening: Rotation engages the core muscles, including the obliques, which helps to stabilize the spine and improve overall strength.
Detoxification: Twisting can also aid in digestion and help detoxify the organs by massaging them gently during the movement.
In Belly Dance: Use hip twists, chest circles or outward horizontal figure eight (also known as “egyptian figure eight or “jewel”) to add rotation to your routine.
Incorporating Belly Dance Movements into Your Daily Routine
You don't have to reserve belly dancing for the dance studio. You can easily weave these movements into your daily life to keep your spine healthy and flexible. Here's how:
Morning Stretch
Wake Up with Flexion and Extension: Start your day with gentle forward and backward bends. Stand tall, inhale, and reach your arms up. Exhale and bend forward, reaching forward, pretending to hug a large beach ball. Inhale and slowly rise, bending backward slightly to open your chest and widening your arms, slightly lifting your chip.
Work Break
Lateral Flexion at Your Desk: Take a break from sitting by doing side bends. Raise one arm overhead and gently “rainbow” or make a crescent moon to the opposite side, stretching your torso. Switch sides with your breathing. One of our favorite exercises while at the desk are chest circles. Try this combination: One chest circle, then a chest lift and undulation down, lastly add shoulder rolls to release the upper back and neck.
Cooking Dance
Rotation in the Kitchen: While waiting for your food to cook, practice gentle hip twists, chest twists/circles, and/or crescent hip drops. Stand with your feet hip-width apart and twist your hips side to side, add a hip drop forward and back, then do the same with your chest. Maybe sprinkle a little more lateral flexion with vertical figure eights.
Evening Wind Down
Undulations Before Bed: End your day with soothing body waves and undulations. These movements help release tension and prepare your body for restful sleep. Stand tall and move your chest forward, up, back, and roll down into your pelvic floor in a smooth, wave-like motion.
Benefits of Daily Belly Dance Movements
By incorporating belly dance movements into your daily routine, you can enjoy numerous benefits:
Injury Prevention: Regular practice keeps your spine flexible and strong, reducing the risk of injuries.
Enhanced Performance: Improved spinal health leads to more fluid and expressive dance movements.
Pain Relief: Stretching and strengthening your spine can alleviate back pain and tension.
Mindful Movement: Belly dancing encourages mindfulness and body awareness, promoting overall well-being.
Conclusion
Your spine is essential to your overall health and well-being. By integrating belly dance movements into your daily routine, you can keep your spine healthy, flexible, and strong. Embrace the joy of mindful belly dancing and experience the many benefits it brings to your life and your spine.
Follow me on my Instagram page for video tutorials about this material at @MindfulBellyDance.
Stay tuned for more tips and routines on Mindful Belly Dance, where we blend the art of dance with the science of wellness for a healthier, happier you!
About your writers
Sarah
Sarah is a 700 hour registered yoga and meditation teacher, brain health coach, reiki master, and mindfulness guide. She combines science, spirituality, and sass to help each individual find easy to implement, high impact practices to reduce stress and age with joy. One of Sarah’s favorite quotes is “Flexible spines lead to flexible minds.” (Christopher Grant, Inspired Living). Follow her on @Heart.Hips.Mind on Instagram or visit www.hearthipsmind.com to learn more.
Alexandra
Alexandra is a professional Belly Dance teacher, choreographer and performer. She combines technique and personal practice elements in her Mindful Belly Dance classes. For more, ready her story here.