If your heels always lifted when you

squat, and you always need a place

underneath your heels to be able to

squat,

your ankles may not be the problem.

First, let's understand what a heel

wedge actually does. This is

dorsiflexion. This is plantarflexion.

When you stand upon a wedge, your feet

is already in a plantarflexion position,

so it requires less dorsiflexion to

achieve to the same depth squat. That's

why you can squat down with your heels

elevated. But your ankles haven't

actually gained any new range of motion.

You've only changed the starting

position. Nothing about your body has

really changed. In this episode, I'll

show you why your ankles become tight in

the first place, and I'll give you three

movements you can use to immediately

improve your ankle mobility. Hey guys,

I'm Gabby from The Body Alignment

Training. Over the past decade, I worked

with everyone from office workers to

Olympic gold medalists. One pattern

keeps showing up. People are stuck in

pain because they haven't tried hard

enough. They're stuck because they've

been solving the wrong problem. They've

stretched, strengthened, foam rolled,

and followed countless mobility drills,

but none of them addressed the

structural root cause.

So, why are your ankles tight in the

first place? Most people think tight

ankles are the problem. They are not.

Your foot is designed to function like a

three-dimension suspension bridge. When

that structure becomes disorganized,

whether the arch collapses or becomes

excessively high, the foot begins to

rotate. And then when your foot rotates,

your ankle rotates with it. That

rotation creates compression around your

ankle joint, making it feel stiff and

tight. So, you don't have an ankle

mobility problem, you have a distorted

foot chart problem. You need to restore

the tripod, rebuild the arch, and the

foot stops rotating. When the rotation

disappears, when everything aligns, the

compression disappears naturally and

your ankle mobility returns naturally.

So, if you've been putting plates under

your heels for years, ask yourself one

simple question, has your ankle actually

changed or have you simply get used to

squatting with the elevated heels? Most

people spend their years treating the

place that feels tight, very few rebuild

the structure that's creating the

problem. That's why the same problem

keeps coming back. If you want to

rebuild your body from the ground up,

not just temporarily making it feel

better, our 28-day full body alignment

protocol will show you exactly how we do

it. When we grow older, we tend to lean

forward because the majority of our body

weight sits in front of our spine. So,

when we lean forward, look, my tibialis

anterior is inhibited, it's no longer

working. So, I want you to find a

relatively thick plate or a thick yoga

block, stand upon it with your both of

feet. Can you see?

It's activated immediately. I want you

to stand straight with your knees

slightly off the lock. Knees, toes

aligned. I want you to stack your body

weight right in the middle. Pelvis upon

your heel and the thoracic spine right

upon your pelvis. Stay in this position,

find the left-right balance, forward and

backward balance, breathe for 1 minute.

Repeat twice. That's it. For the second

movement, I want you to find yourself

some tissue. Tuck the tissue beneath

your toes and grip them as hard as you

can for 20 seconds. You may experience

cramp in this position, but take it

easy, that's only because you never

trained your feet before and they're in

really bad structure. And then I want

you to lie down on your back. The first

thing is to make sure your chest-pelvis

align. You can lift your up a little

bit, try to make sure your lower back

heavy on the floor and relax your belly.

That's it. And then let's learn to

coordinate one leg from flex your ankle,

knee and hip at the same time. Extend

them at the same time. Once you are

familiar with this movement, try to let

the other side joining into lower body

cycling. The key is do not bend

everything together with extended ankle.

That's not okay. Everything coordinated.

I want to stay in this position, relax,

and do the cycling for 1 minute twice.

This is not as easy as you imagine.

The lower body's coordination of this

exercise.

The tension of your legs will be even

out soon in just 2 minutes. For movement

number three, instead of putting a plate

beneath your heel, you should be putting

the plate beneath your forefoot to help

you to create a dorsiflexion. I want you

to put two thin plates on the floor like

this, and then stand upon it. Let the

plate cut your foot into half in this

way. The edge going to help you to bring

the balance back back to the middle in

step forward leaning. That's very

important. And to prevent your knees

from collapsing, you can find yourself a

yoga block, a pillow, or a block table.

Put it between your mid-thigh, prevent

your knee from collapsing. And then, I

want you to put your body weight 60%.

That's a lot on your heels, 30% on the

big toe ball, and the 10% on the little

toe ball. That's the key. I don't want

you to squat immediately. You can shift

your body weight left to right, forward,

back to find the perfect balance.

That's the key of the movement. And

then, stabilize your heel, still 60%.

Try to lower your triple joint all

together until the moment you feel your

ankle getting stuck. Look, this is only

a quarter of squat. I don't need you to

squat down by compensating your knee.

The moment your ankle gets stuck, stop.

And then, stabilize your heels again,

push the floor away, squeeze the big toe

ball. That's how you raise yourself up.

Look at my back angle. It's maintained

the same. Slowly, slowly, slowly come

up. Okay? So, heels stabilize, flex

three pairs of joints together, maintain

the balance, do not lean forward,

do not sit backward, maintain exactly

the same balance, that's the key. And

when you

find the bottom, push the balls of feet,

stand up. Actually, that's how you squat

in a real squat. Hey guys, if you found

this video useful, subscribe to the

channel and give it a like. Every week

we break down another common movement

myth and show you how to solve it by

rebuilding your structure, not chasing

symptoms. Human before athlete, this is

Gabby. See you next time.