After teaching class the other day, a new student came up to me and asked me about the numbness in his hands that he feels after sitting at his computer all day. “Is it Carpal Tunnel Syndrome?” he asked. “Yes,” I replied, “but it might not be coming from your hand.” I had noticed as he stood in Tadasana in class that his right shoulder was hiked up higher than his left. I asked him if he also suffered any neck pain on that side, and he said it had been an issue his whole life, and that he could barely bring his chin down to his chest when it was turned to the left. He said he had started yoga because he was hoping to get rid of the pain and heal his neck.
Yoga is a great practice for pain relief (although sometimes the new, unfamiliar poses bring on some new, temporary pains!). For specific concerns, however, it’s always good to get a targeted pose or set of poses to practice.
I recommended he practice the When No Means Yes pose from the Yoga Tune Up® Quick Fix for Neck video posted below and also available here. This will both stretch and strengthen the muscles in the neck and create some relief, both from the pain in the neck, and also from the radiating discomfort that moves down through the nerve into the hand.
great advice
Okay favorite article of the blog thus far!!! I decided to read this based on the fact that i have experienced both neck and wrist pain (I have broken both wrists!). But I love that Sarah’s wit in the classroom came through on the blog. I am a totally self proclaimed comedian AND in my first experience in yoga teacher training i can both appreciate and relate to the comic relief Sarah gives to such an in depth and detailed subject as anatomy. She truely (okay kinda) made it fun!
side note: fun=tolerable
Okay so our teachers obviously make an impression! And ths was an example of apositive one! Thanks Sarah
This is really interesting and helpful since almost everybody spends most of the day in front of a computer.
This is a great example of a simple, closed chain exercise that provides a quick and lasting benefit to two of the most commonly-used, and oft-injured body parts.
What a great exercise for stretching and strengthening our necks and wrists- two very overworked body parts. Thanks!
Jill has such wonderful muscles. You can see the main muscles she is targeting. The muscles that rotate the head laterally and flex the neck are the sternocleidomastoids and you can see them clearly on Jill. They originate at the superior portion of the manubrium sterni and the medial portion of the clavicle and inserts into the mastoid process of the temporal bone and superior nuchal line. The 3 scalenes are also clearly visable between the sternocleidomastoids and trapezius toward the posterior part of the neck and are responsible for the lateral movement of the head and to lift the first two ribs superiorly.
I know the feeling of neck pains from being on the computer all day. This is a great excercise and can easily do at my desk to relieve the tension in my neck. This is great!
Thank you for such a great article. As a newer teacher this article was a great reminder to be observant of your students while teaching. In addition I like how you didn’t jump to one conclusion about his carpal tunnel before ASSESSING the ROM of his neck. Its good to be mindful that your job doesn’t stop because the class is over and that you should take that extra step for the health and wellness of our students.
Great short to help neck. I have neck problems and I like your Yes and No approach Good presentation. Thank you for sharing your yoga knowledge.
Maybe this is what causes my wrist pain. I will have to try it.
I never knew I could give my neck muscles a workout–it felt great! I would like to incorporate this into my routine.
Wrist and neck stretch/strengh exercise I can do from my desk. Thanks Sarah!
This was really interesting. I, also, have a tight neck, only on the left side. I tried the video and it really felt good stretching the neck.
It is intriguing to know how our body is all connected. The neck exercise with PNF is a great way to strengthen the part of neck muscle that is never brought up to our consciousness.
This is a great topic that I am particularly interested in. Recently I find that my wrists ache more during my practice, particularly my right wrist, which corresponds to the pain I sometimes experience on the right side of my neck. I will try out this stretching technique.
It is so helpful to understand how muscles groups are related and create movement together. It seems that one (including me) always thinks about the area that hurts and never about all the other muscles, bones and bones that regulate the affected area. Once one understands this, it can be a revelation and it can be utilized to fix the problem, aka exercise for the neck helps with pain in the wrist.
This is a great exercise for everybody everyday! So easy to do and takes only minutes.
It’s sort of weird to think that a misalignment in the spine could affect a distal body part so profoundly, but when we consider the nerves feeding the extremities and where they originate, it makes a lot more sense. The nerves that exit the spine in the region of the neck and shoulders, the brachial plexus, can be compressed by “wonky stuff” happening in musculature and skeletal system of the neck and shoulders, which can compress or tweak nerves exiting the cervical spine and radiate pain or numbness into upper extremities. Maybe this is one of the anatomical reasons why acupuncturists can needle a point distal from the area of pain and still elicit so much relief even if she isn’t working specifically on the local area of pain. Great case study!
I’ve seen a few cases now of ‘frozen’ shoulder, two of the people where told that it was due to carpal tunnel working its way up to the shoulder. I wonder if this technique has been helpful to anyone suffering from frozen shoulder?
Hi Laura,
I can’t say from experience, but I would imagine that this technique would be useful to people suffering from frozen shoulder to begin to decompress and alleviate the nerve pain that is signaling the shoulder to limit movement.
I started having neck pain on my right side two years ago. I’ve found that this pain is aggravated if I sleep on my right side. I’ll have to try this practice to see if it can alleviate my problem.
what great pnf methods for the neck!!! so easy and convenient to do anytime and anywhere. i will definitely incorporate this into my personal self-care and teachings. in pilates we use closed chain stretches with the magic circle and also the “neck corrector” that can be attached to the cadillac.
This blog makes a great point about how all of our muscles are interconnected. I also have pain in my left neck, shoulder, and recently my left wrist started to bother me when doing too many handstands. I can feel tightness in both my neck as well as the shoulder and wonder if the tightness I feel on my left side might be coming from tension in the tissues, or weakness of my left side, or both.
This is brilliant: I just followed along to the video and I’m so excited to know about this stretching sequence. I am really excited to incorporate this into a stretching and warm-up sequence in the beginning of my classes. Perhaps if more teachers had done this in classes I’ve attended over the years I wouldn’t have the wrist issues I have now. The whole concept of PNF has been incredibly enlightening, and being able to apply it to an area where seemingly everyone has SOME sort of issue is wonderful. Excited to share this with my students.