My ankles wobble, baby, wobble (get it na)

HELLO,

I am the yogasnunch and I wanted to reach out to the community about something I noticed during a recent practice:

While I was moving through poses, I noticed my ankles seem to jut out to the side a good deal. They will meander from left and right, which actually feels most normal, and keeping them centered takes some effort. It’s most pronounced in poses like warrior III and tree, where only one foot is in contact, although I’ve also had it happen in lunges.

Is this normal and ok? Should I let the ankles do as they please, or should I be working to keep them centered and focus on building ankle strength?

-Snunch

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Hello!

Absolutely, wobbling ankles are normal and common. Many people struggle with balancing on one foot, and often it can be due, at least in part, to instability in the ankles.

As with all joints, ideally you’re striving for a happy balance between mobility and stability. I haven’t seen you standing on one foot but from your description it sounds like your ankles are a little on the ‘too mobile’ (or, as you said, wobbly) side of things.
Wobbly ankles (or any very mobile joint) can compromise the health of the joint as well, so it’s a good idea to work toward stability.

You do that by

  1. Establish equal weight on the 4 corners of your foot (base of little and big toe, inner and outer edge of heel)
  2. Keeping equal weight on those 4 points, lift the middle point of your foot up. You will likely see a slight shift in your ankle.
  3. Connect the energy of that lift to your knee, hip and ultimately to the top of your head, so your whole body is lifting and getting taller.

You can try this while standing on two feet, then test it out on one foot with a hand on a support, then remove the hand, then try tree pose.

David

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Wow, that was quick! Awesome. :slight_smile:

It seems as though I may have gotten into some bad ankle habits early on, I’ll go back to the basics for a bit.

Thanks for all you do!

-Snunch

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