Do you want your yoga to help you feel good? Then drop your attachment / identification to which camp or which school of yoga you are in and focus your energy on “feeling”
This is all well said than done. As beginners, seasoned practitioners or even teachers we can get hung up or distracted (confused even) in how the pose should look rather than asking how does it feel
Sometimes we don’t understand what compression is like in the body until we are signing pre operative papers before a hip replacement.
Our societal conditioning of looking good on the outside can be that strong that we may not even know we are experiencing compression.
The desire of looking good overrides the pain that your body is trying to let you know it’s having because you are not paying attention to it!
So here’s some tips to bring some Mindfulness into your asana practice
and some definitions below on what healthy tension may feel like and what compression is and may feel like:
Mindfulness for yr Monday : Turn compression into compassion! It’s amazing what offering a little bit of support can do not only to relieve compression in your body but in your mind.
Everyone’s hips have a different orientation, even the left and right hips on your own body can have a different orientation! So next time you take a pose tune in to the sensations you feel. If it feels like it’s bone hitting on bone or short sharp pain figure out how to create some space to relieve it!
So often we can choose outer form as looking good over feeling good! Crazy thing is if you don’t feel good eventually you won’t look good either. How can you unite the body and mind if you don’t listen to your body when it’s in compression.
There is no yoga teacher on earth that knows exactly how you are feeling . A great teacher will ask “How does that feel” and then skilfully show you ways to find space turning compression into comprehension and compassion.
Don’t let anyone impose ideal outer form on your body. Function is more important than outer form. To know the difference first you have to LISTEN (that’s what yoga is, when we listen we give what ever it is SPACE!) This is the art of practicing yoga and of teaching it.
I’ve attended many trainings where the focus is on alignment (and for very good reason which maybe another blog)
I’ve also attended trainings where the focus is on the shape of the bones
BOTH ARE IMPORTANT but not at the expense of the other. In other words I believe it’s important to study and look at all things that effect us from exploring our full potential as human beings : physically, mentally and spiritually rather than spend time deciding which camp you belong to in yoga and making the other camp / school wrong! Weather it’s intentional or not can be marketing that feeds division ~ the very thing that can create more disease.
I’ve written more on this here
10 Things to consider are:
1. What am I feeling
2. Why am I feeling it
3. What can I change
4. What can’t I change
(A bit like the Serenity Prayer)
5. Study with teachers that help you discern the difference in all areas both anatomically and spiritually.
6. Take marketing with a grain of salt and concentrate on learning from your own experience
7. Remember not everyone has the same experiences so be willing to learn from their experiences too!
8. Consider : Tension, compression, shape of bones, orientation, past experiences, conditioning , beliefs but most of all ……
9. The breath effects it all! Dont discount how the subtle things can effect the gross
10. “See” for yourself
Namaste
Tammy
Below are what just some yoga teachers and scholars have had to say regarding this which has helped me explore further , with all due respect to all who intend to help us with our Yoga (and life) :
“Tension is due to the stretching of muscle or connective tissue but compression is determined by the shape of our bones.
For the vast majority of us who have practiced yoga for several years the restrictions we experience are compressive, not tensile. It is the inherent shape of our bones that determines what we can or cannot practice safely. And because each person’s bones are differently formed then what is beneficial for one person is destructive to another”
Paul Grilley
“I agree that one way to organize our perceptions in a yoga pose is between the sensation of “tension and compression”, as Paul Grilley points out. The sensation of compression is very different than the sensation of tension (or stretching), and is a rich area for exploration – especially for those who are more flexible. For a student to begin to refine their perceptions to distinguish between these two sensations is a starting point for further refining their experiences.
Rather than having compression be the end point for the exploration of a pose, it can initiate another level of exploration – with consciousness, by changing our alignment we can also change the vector of compression, to flow along the line of force in the bone or to shear off at an angle and create stress at the joints.
In my own teaching, as I’ve shifted my focus from encouraging students to seek the sensation of stretching in muscles to sensing the flow of weight or force through bones I have seen them come to a new understanding of the dynamic relationships between the parts of the body, and how those relationships are affected by breath, attention and intention.
I absolutely support the idea that we should be freed from the “tyranny of “proper form” and “perfect pose”” . . . and I would say that part of finding that freedom is re-defining how we describe limits, and how we describe a perfect pose. Instead of saying that a perfect pose is not achievable, my hope is have students look at what they define as their limits, and see if they can change their understanding of what perfect pose is. With that idea, the understanding of perfection would integrate each individual’s context, and no two ‘perfect poses’ will look alike”
Amy Matthews
These are just excerpts I encourage you to read the entire articles and continue to explore for yourself.
(Thanks to e-Sutra, Yoga Anatomy, Paul Grilley , Leslie Kaminoff , and many more who explore this so we can all learn)
For the curious and committed students or those wanting to learn how to deepen their practice and learn how to teach :
?YOGA TEACHER TRAINING
click here
?MINDFULNESS TEACHER TRAINING
click here
