Flexibility vs. Mobility of the Hips
The first yoga class I ever took was a Bikram Yoga class at The Yoga College of India in North Beach San Francisco. It was a 6 pm class held in a heated room that followed a 4:30 class full of tired, sweaty bodies. The room was ridiculously hot and wet even before I’d even taken my first pose, and I’m certain that I have never struggled and sweat that much before or since.
Besides a sore back and a wounded ego, I came away from that class with the discovery that I was, in fact, pretty flexible. I had no idea I was capable of bending my body in the ways I did in my early days of taking yoga classes. Years later a client came to me who’d been taking Bikram Yoga classes and was recently diagnosed with a disc herniation. She told me that what she really enjoyed most about her experience in Bikram classes was the “noodly bendy” feeling. Her body was already very flexible and therefore being even more “bendy” was the last thing she needed, but I understood where she was coming from. Flexibility is desirable not just because it can be an indicator of good health, but also because it just plain feels good.
After suffering for several years with my own back issues I’ve come to see flexibility in a different way. It’s clear to me now that for myself and the many others who have or have had chronic pain, flexibility is part of the problem. At least the “bendy” kind of flexibility that lacks a stable foundation. People with bendy bodies are often drawn to yoga classes, especially Bikram or other “Hot” yoga classes because bendiness comes easy to them. It can be very challenging for these very “flexible” students to improve their stability doing yoga, and they often manifest injuries that begin to limit their mobility, sometimes dramatically so.
When my “noodly” client first came to me she could barley bend forward, despite her natural flexibility. As I helped her improve her mechanics she gradually became more stable and her mobility improved dramatically without the back pain returning.
When I work with a client who lacks flexibility, I try to help them find ways to improve their mobility rather than just giving them stretches to make them more flexible. It can feel good to be “flexible,” but ultimately it is the quality of our movement that counts. And that quality of movement depends a great deal on stabilization.
Stabilization means that I am able to maintain stability in one part of my body while I move another. If for example I am bending forward, I want to stabilize my spine so that I can generate more of the movement from my legs and hips. Stabilizing the spine is essential for increasing range of motion in the hips. Stabilizing the hips is essential for the long term health and function of these very important joints.
Stabilizing my hip joint requires that I stabilize the femur (thigh bone). This demands a good balance between the strength and responsiveness of my lateral hips and the flexibility and freedom of movement from my medial hip. If the muscles on my lateral hip don’t respond well to loads (ie-lack strength), the medial hip muscles will shorten and pull one femur toward the other. This can compromise the stability of the hip joint and will eventually damage it.
Conversely if I do have good balance between my later and medial hip then I am able to stabilize the femur effectively and this will allow for better mobility of my hip. Better hip mobility improves the health of the hip joint and greater stability through a larger range of motion.
I’ve found stabilizing the hip to be a very effective way to improve hip mobility and resolve hip related pain patterns. In my view mobility is the kind of flexibility we want. That is, not the “noodly bendy” kind but the kind that makes us stronger and affords us more range of motion and freer movement while minimizing wear and tear on our joints.
For a demonstration of one of my favorite posture for improving hip stabilization and mobility, check out this video.