This is by far my favorite pose, and it probably will be yours too.

Stress is another huge part of back pain, in fact, Dr. Sarno in Healing Back Pain: The Mind-Body Connection claims that it is the most important precursor to back pain.

Everything that we have done so far has had the side effect of reducing stress. Exercise does that.

Here we attack it head on.

At the end of your workout, or even after no workout at all, lie on your back with your eyes closed.

A good start, right?

Now tense up all your muscles, legs, arms, torso, neck and squinch up your face. Hold it for a minute, and release. (A minute is actually a long time to hold it, but hold as long as possible). Now repeat that two more times.

After that, let your legs roll open, put your palms to the sky and relax completely. Try to follow your breath but don’t manipulate it.

Lie like that for at least ten minutes. I often lie like that for half an hour!

No effort.