Savasana

ByElizabeth

Savasana–pose of the corpse, the pose of final relaxation, the pose without which no practice is fully complete– is both a very simple pose and one that is rather advanced.

Sometimes when I teach beginners I ask them what was the first Sanskrit word they learned. Usually they guess the word is “yoga.” The first Sanskrit pose name they get, though, and it doesn’t take more than a couple of classes is savasana. For most beginning the practice of yoga, the permission to stretch out on the back after an hour or more of new ways of engaging body, mind, and spirit is welcome indeed. This is particularly true for those who are overly busy and chronically sleep-deprived as are so many people I know.

What teachers often miss about savasana is that it can be very hard for some students. Injuries (chronic or episodic), tightness, or habitual misalignment (or expectations of how lying down should feel) make it challenging to be in the pose. The default can be to put supports under the knees or head without taking the time to recognize that it may be necessary to focus on and adjust the alignment before relaxing to see if ease can be found without props.

Other practitioners find it agitating to be asked to lie still for 5-10 minutes, because they are so used to being active all the time. Even if they can make their bodies still, their minds race around, and the idea of final relaxation seems anathema.

At the beginning,
savasana can be just stopping movement and enjoying letting go and relaxing.

But the pose is something much deeper than relaxing after a good workout. The pose of the corpse is not about being unmoving like a dead body, but about ceasing consciously acting and surrendering to the elemental vibration of universal being so that the inner fullness becomes indistinguishable from that which infuses all of the matter of the universe. As one gets more advanced, the alignment in the pose evidently becomes one of inner fullness and luminousity supporting the draping of the physical body. We practice going to earth and light, dissolving the constant awareness of our individuality.

Peace and light, E — Posted with WordPress for BlackBerry.

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    Dear Friends,

    Recent newsletters I have received from well-known yoga teachers, in addition to sharing their wonderful offerings and teachings about yoga, have included references to the Gulf Oil Spill, the on-going economic crisis, and the humanitarian tragedies in Chili and Haiti and elsewhere.  The information is presented as showing what yoga can do to help us better serve those in need, seek change in ourselves and the world around us, and find our own light in the face of things we cannot change, but these teachers are no longer keeping quiet about the presence of serious turmoil and tragedy.

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    Join me for both class offerings and a special workshop up at Willow Street.  William Penn House classes continue with special pricing for public interest workers, students, seniors, and those with other challenges.  A portion of the proceeds from every student goes to support William Penn House’s work.

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    As always, feel free to email me with questions or comments or join me on the blog:  www.rosegardenyoga.com.  Just FYI, we’ve fixed the issues with subscribing to the blog.  If you haven’t already, just hit subscribe on the home page, follow the instructions, and then get an email in your inbox the day after I’ve posted a new blog entry.

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