What drew me to yoga over 25 years ago and continues to keep me practicing is its emphasis on balance. Not merely the kind of balance that keeps you from falling over, but the inner and outer balance between stability and ease. In its truest intent, any asana pose is meant to reveal where you are over-striving and where you are not investing enough effort. Awareness of this fine balance, or more usually the lack of it, is our first step onto the journey of self-realization. Without this awareness and a desire for the clear-seeing and calm-abiding that balance brings, we cannot generate the healthy state for which our whole being longs.
Over the next several weeks, I will present supine standing poses, which will help you immediately identify where your conditioned (maybe unconscious) holding patterns reside in your body. The physical, energetic, and mental yoga actions provided with each pose will assist you in diminishing the old unserving patterns and in creating new positive habits that promote a more balanced experience of stability and ease.
For Supine Utthita Trikonasana, place a low block under the heel of your back foot. Remember, Triangle is a side-bending pose, so you are moving your front hand and arm in the direction of your front foot. Stay in the pose for 3 minutes on each side to give yourself enough time to first settle into the pose, then practice the yoga actions, and finally allow the body and the Vijnanamaya Kosha (intuition) to respond with truth and wisdom. Listen and learn what life wants to show you.
Yoga Action (Annamaya Kosha):
1. Soften the skin, tissue, and muscle (soles of the feet & palms of the hands) into the bones. Feel as though the feet and hands are like lotus buds blossoming into their 1000-petal form.
2. Notice the broadening across your feet and hands.
Yoga Action (Pranamaya Kosha):
1. With your awareness, sense the rebound of earth energy activating the Pada (foot) and Hasta (hand) Bandhas up through the legs and arms.
Yoga Action (Manomaya Kosha):
1. Silently ask yourself, “Where do I need more stability?”; “Where do I need greater ease?”
2. When you have balanced your stability and ease, rest in the pose by silently repeating to yourself “I am stable and at ease.”
NOTE: It may take more than one pose before you awaken these yoga actions or areas in your body and begin to feel the arising sensations and releases. In that case, apply these yoga actions to the following blog poses in the upcoming weeks.
For more yoga actions and teachings, click here. Namaste.
