Yoga has no one definition, and by further comparison, the connections between yoga and what it offers beyond the physical benefits of its modern-day definition are varied too. In class, we are learning about Ayurveda and The Bhagavad Gita, two different interpretations on the practice of yoga and the importance of Dosha, or one’s purpose in life.
Physical practice online in the West has rarely emphasized these points in ways that are not medicinal. Most of the time, the practice claims to help cure heartburn, relieve back pressure, and help circulate blood flow, therefore improving overall health. These practices encourage the practitioner to engage with the material because it will help them live longer and better. Whether this is true actually has a lot more to do with the individual then the claims that they hear.
That said, this week was strange in terms of practice. I decided to do both a physical practice and a meditative one, as I was inspired by Jenn (last week’s in-class teacher!) to pursue Yoga Nidra and see what this meditative focal practice felt like firsthand.
I will start with the physical practice. Entitled “Backbend Exploration,” the 46-minute Gaia practice led by Ashley Hixon focused on the back-bending benefits of Ashtanga Yoga; the stretches, pelvic reaches, and overall back movements that form a complete, satisfying workout for one’s back. A majority of this practice focused on Surya Namaskar Sets A and B, which I covered thoroughly in my previous reflection on Ashtanga Yoga. Therefore, today I will focus on the new aspects that were introduced by Hixon, including ones that are meant to help students warm their way up into more complex practices.
Emphasizing the location and importance of the anterior superior iliac spine, or ASIS, Hixon opened the practice by encouraging students to locate their ASIS by pressing their fingers to the front of their pelvis. I did just this, locating the bony protrusions that face forward, and rested my fingers gently against them. Experimenting with location as instructed, I inhaled and titled downward in a slightly bent motion, allowing my ASIS to face downwards. Subsequently, I exhaled, tucking in my tailbone and externally rotating my legs upward, my ASIS following suit. The goal was to get the ASIS to face straight ahead, in the middle of these two extremes. To do this, I aligned my pubic bone and tailbone evenly, dropping down so that were in a healthy relation to one another, an important step to master on my way to practicing backbends.
Still in this asana, I raised all 10 toes and arched them as I drew my legs up and stretched through the center of my pelvis. Lifting my sternum up and lowering my tailbone simultaneously, I felt a soft force in my lower stomach, one that warmed up as I rolled my shoulders back. Drawing my elbows in, I hooked my fingers into my armpits, allowing my chest to expand “like a candy cane” as I uplifted myself, once again placing particular emphasis on keeping my sternum lifted and my tailbone down towards the earth, maintaining balance.
Following this, I entered into Prasarita Padottanasana A. While standing, I inhaled as I stepped my right foot out, keeping my toes in a midline as I moved my hands to hip, creating distance between my legs. I bent over my legs and placed my hands on the floor, shoulder distance away from each other. Inhaling, I lengthened my pubic bone and stretched back, moving my arms from the center of the floor to just beneath my hips. As I lowered, I dropped the crown of my head towards the mat, hovering mere inches above the ground.
Next, I rolled my mat so that it could act as a makeshift blanket and brought two blocks, both regular and makeshift, to the forefront of my body. Starting on my knees, I placed my right toes against the wall along with my right knee, while taking my left foot out and forward onto the ground. Using my blocks to move forward a bit, one block per hand guiding me forward, I positioned my left knee just over my left ankle, allowing my hips to go down towards the floor in a gentle, steady manner. I then resisted the urge to push my hands and right hip down, keeping them uplifted as I slowly walked the blocks back, stopping just shy of my right knee. While doing this, I made sure to keep my right inner thigh pulled away from the earth, my chin lowered slightly as I took both of my hands and placed them on my left knee.
I then moved my left thumb slightly into my left hip crease, allowing it to lower and add balance to the overall asana. Inhaling, I stretched my right arm up and kept my left hip down, circling my right wrist with my left hand and tipping my body to the left, feeling the crunch of my abdominal muscles as I bent slowly. Inhaling I came back to center, and then exhaling I came down, pushing my left heel back and my right heel and lower leg even further flush against the wall. Walking my hands up to my left knee, I once again found my ASIS, and allowed it to push away from the wall as my lower ribs simultaneously pushed against the wall. Stretching through my fingers, my shoulder blades moved forward “towards protraction,” as Hixon says, in a movement once again similar to essential backbend motions.
*One important side note: though Hixon was clear and thoughtful in her approach throughout the practice, she made several verbal errors that directly countered her physical cues, which made the practice a bit confusing at times. One of these times was when we were supposed to dip left, in the same direction as the leg that was not kneeling, and she instructed us to dip right. After repeating this asana on the other side and realizing I had moved right both times, I rewound the video, recognized the error on both her and my part, and did the entire asana again.
To complete Hixon’s portion of my yoga reflection this week, I did both my first full Ashtanga backbend, and the practice that led to me safely being able to do so. I will focus on the practice that led to it, as the step by step explanation is one that I have not experienced before. I placed a single block between my thighs, inhaling as I tipped my pelvis forward and allowed my back to arch slightly off my mat. Inhaling, I squeezed the block and allowed my pubic bone to drop down as, one vertebra at a time, I lifted my spine up and off my mat. Exhaling, I slowly lowered all the way back down — once again, one vertebra at a time— my kidneys hitting the floor just prior to my tailbone and sacrum. Countering my tailbone reach with rotation, I shifted my body from side to side and allowed my chest to open further, my hands interlaced beneath me as I kept my arms straight.
Now, for the Yoga Nidra practice. I started with a simple 15 minute, 37 second video called “Dreamtime Nidra” and instructed by Mara Branscombe. Inhaling and exhaling deeply 3 times, I inhaled through my nose and exhaled through my mouth. For the rest of the practice, Branscombe said to inhale and exhale exclusively through the nose. The goal of this meditation is “welcoming in an inner landscape of peace… of calm, of ease, and of letting go,” as Branscombe stated at the beginning,
Branscombe’s way of doing this was to start and stay in Savasana, lying flat and keeping palms open and wide, feet spread out hip distance. She narrated every body part with an emphasis on focus, stating that I should feel my “right big toe, second toe, third toe, fourth toe, fifth toe, and right sole of foot.” I am not sure why, but when listening to her guidance and visualizing my body with my eyes closed, I began to imagine all of the things she was saying, but in an animated form. I saw my body as an animated vessel, the toes alive and zoomed in as if they were the star of their own film, and so on and so forth for every other body part she described. Perhaps it is because of my recent intake of classic stop-motion pictures that I play in the background as I am studying, or maybe another unconscious source. Either way, Yoga Nidra proved to be quite a relaxing and rather odd experience, but I enjoyed the visualization and the accompanying physical rest it enabled.
I can’t wait to see what new things next week’s practice(s) teach me.
Until the Next Reflection,
Moujnir
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