Lower back, hips, knees and ankles

Tree Pose: Toes on Floor

Keeping your toes touching the ground provides a subtle anchor that makes balance training more accessible while still challenging your stabilising muscles.

How to do it

1. 1

   Stand tall with your weight into one foot

   Feel the weight settle through the heel and the base of the toes. Look at something still ahead of you.

2. 2

   Turn the other knee out and lift the heel

   Draw that heel up toward the inner ankle of the standing leg while the toes stay resting on the floor.

3. 3

   Use the toes as an anchor, not a stand

   Almost all the weight stays in the standing leg. The toes are there to stop sideways sway, which is what makes this version manageable.

4. 4

   Keep the hips level and the chest tall

   Both hip points face forward. Hands at the chest, or one hand on a chair or wall.

5. 5

   Hold for thirty to sixty seconds, then change sides

   If it feels steady, try lifting the toes a few millimetres for a second or two before setting them down again.

What to watch for

Quietly shifting weight back into the resting toes until you are standing on two feet again. The heel stays lifted and the standing leg keeps doing the work.

Ways to adjust it

• Chair
• Wall

If this one is too much today

Try the gentler version instead. It asks less of you and does much the same work.

• Tree Pose: Holding Chair

Other ways to do this movement

Every version below is the same movement set up differently, so one of them usually suits. See all Tree Pose versions in one place, ordered from gentlest to strongest.

• Tree Pose: At Wall
• Tree Pose: Classic
• Tree Pose: Foot on Chair
• Tree Pose: Holding Chair
• Tree Pose: Lift & Lower
• Tree Pose: Side-Lying

Before you try it

Move within a range that stays comfortable. Stop if this brings on sharp pain, dizziness, or symptoms that travel down an arm or a leg, and speak to a clinician before repeating it.

From the clinically authored Vinys movement library.