balance

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Balance Exercises

These exercises stretch the hamstrings and hips, and allow you to begin to work on improving balance. Before beginning these exercises, warm up with general hamstring stretches as outlined on the Stretches page.
First, sit up right with your legs folded in front of you. Relax your weight into your lower body, and focus your eyes on a stationary point in front of you. Now, hold onto your left foot with your left hand. Your grasp should be on the arch side of your foot. (picture on left). Next, begin to slowly extend your leg while continuing to hold onto your foot. Your back should remain as straight as possible. (see pictures at bottom of page) If your leg cannot go beyond this point, hold this position and relax. (picture in middle.) Do not let your eyes wander, it is imperative to have focus of the eyes to be able to balance. You may spend weeks or months until you can go onto the next step, which is to extend your leg all the way out, as in the picture on the right.

After stretching both legs, grasp hold of both feet. (picture on left) It is imperative to keep your eyes focused on a stationary point, otherwise, you will most likely fall over. (Do not practice this exercise with anything behind you in the event you did fall or tip over. Also, practice on carpet or a mat at first. ) Now, slowly extend both feet outwards. (picture in middle) This stretches both legs. Relax into your lower abdominal area. Keep your eyes focused. Go slowly. If this is as far as you can go, that's fine. After a while, try to extend both legs out completely. Breath into your belly. (picture on right) You must find your center and relax into it. If you go too fast you will fall over. Best to go slow and work at it a little bit at a time. Return back to the original position slowly without losing your balance.

The pictures below show the side view of this exercise. The picture on the left shows the back bent. This is wrong. The next picture shows the back straight, which is correct. The last picture shows the fully extended position with the back straight. Note the focusing of the eyes.

Standing Balance Exercises

After working on the above exercises, you may attempt the exercises below. WARNING: If you have an inner ear condition which interferes with your balance, do not attempt the exercises below. Be realistic about your abilities to prevent injury.
First, focus your eyes on a target on a opposite wall. This is to train the body to balance using visual cues. Now, bend your right leg slightly, and grasp hold of your left foot with your left hand as in the picture below. If you find that your are wobbly, DO NOT proceed with this exercise beyond this point. Practice this part only until you can maintain your balance to a reasonable degree. If this is as far as you can go, relax the leg down the same way you brought it up, and work on the other side. It may be weeks or months until you can progress to the next part. That's fine, better to establish good balance with your stretch than to rush it and gain nothing.

If you can do the above exercise comfortably, start to extend your left leg slowly. If you can only go out halfway, stop there and do not proceed. Again you may have to work on this phase of the exercise for several months until you can go on. Make sure you extend your right arm to the same extension as your left one. Retract your leg just like you put it out. Again, practice the same on the other leg.

If you can comfortably do the above two stretches, extend your leg all the way out. Do not raise the hip, keep your eyes focused. Bring the leg back the same way you extended it, and remember to extend the opposite arm the same amount as the arm holding the leg. Relax the hand on the non holding side. Repeat on the other side.