Simple Digestion Stretch
Hello friends. Thank you for joining me today for this quick little instruction on a simple stretch that you can do every morning or every evening or both, or three times a day or five times a day, whatever suits you. This simple stretch will help support your digestion as well as support your kidney function. So basically, supporting all of the elimination processes in the body with a simple stretch.
Either right after you get up in the morning or right before bed, or if you feel like you need it multiple times a day, go ahead and do it as often as you need. It should only take a couple minutes. So first, I would like you to start by lying flat on your back. You can do this laying in a bed. You can do this on a floor. If you have something like a massage table, any of these places will do just fine. But you're going to start by lying flat on your back, arms down by your sides, feet out in front of you. And now go ahead and draw your feet so they're flat on the floor. That means your knees make a triangular shape with your legs and your knees are pointing up towards the sky. From here, I want you to take just your right leg and draw that in towards your chest and go ahead with one or both arms, kind of start squeezing your right knee towards your chest with both of your arms.
That is going to help stimulate the ascending colon in the body. So, the right side of the digestive system in the ascending colon is the beginning where all of that elimination waste will start to process through the intestinal system. Go ahead and hold that stretch for as long as you need, or you can take just a couple breaths here, but really kind of using the strength of the arms to draw your knee in towards your chest, squeezing into the digestive system just a little bit. Now, go ahead and drop your right foot to the floor to meet with your left both feet on the floor. And this time, I want you to draw both knees in towards your chest at the same time. And so depending on your flexibility or what range of motion you have available to you today, you can cup your hands around your knees. Or if you're a little bit more flexible, you can give yourself a hug right here. Wrapping both of your arms all the way around your knees, maybe reaching for the opposite elbow and stretching to the best of your ability. Just pulling a little with your arms, pulling your knees in towards your chest, squeezing a little bit, giving yourself that nice hug. And this is going to help support the transverse colon, the one that runs side to side horizontally across your body. And it's a little bit higher in the digestive system, a little closer to the stomach. So just giving yourself a nice gentle squeeze, taking a couple breaths here or holding this part of the stretch as long as you need. This is the part of the stretch that is also going to support your kidney function. It's going to give your lower back a little break. It's going to give the opposite curve to the lower back instead of that lordotic curve where it curves in around the spine, towards the front of your body. This is going to help support the opposite direction for that part of the spine. Curving more towards the back of the body, opening up space around your kidneys, and giving just a little breathing room for your kidneys in your lower back.
Now, go ahead and release the stretch bringing both feet down to the floor once again. And we're going to do the left side just like we did the right. Now, go ahead and drawing in your left knee towards your chest. Again, one or both arms grabbing around the knee and using a little bit of the strength in your arms to pull tighter with the stretch towards your body. And this is going to support the descending colon.
This is the final stage of the elimination process. You might hear some rumbling, especially if it's first thing in the morning. This will get you started to get going in the morning. Hold this stretch here again, as long as you need, giving another gentle squeeze just a little bit longer, maybe for a couple more breaths. Holding it here, and finally, just releasing your left leg back down to the ground. Your foot goes to the floor, meets your right leg, and now you can extend your legs all the way back out once again, so you're just lying flat on your back, and I'd like you to take one more deep breath. I'd like you to, as you inhale, move your arms up over head so that you are stretching all the way across one side of the room.
Your arms are going towards the opposite side of the room from your legs. If you're lying in a bed or on a massage table, you're stretching all the way out from one end all the way to the other. And after you took that deep breath in, I want you to just exhale, letting everything go so that you can move on with your day.
Supporting your digestion, giving a little support to the kidneys, basically giving support to all of the elimination systems in the body, which is so important to let things go. We can do that emotionally. We can do that physically. If it does not serve you, let it go right here. Thank you so much for joining me. I hope you guys had a great time doing this simple stretch. And remember, do this as often as you need, at least every day in the morning, get this stretch going, let go what avoids serving you, and get on with your day.