Tag: asana

What is yoga?

KathrinLeave a comment

The question that comes up frequently – what is yoga and what makes it different from any other “fitness style”?

I was teaching the Ashtanga module in a teacher training this weekend and it showed up so beautifully what yoga actually is.

After practicing the primary series, a student told me how she felt her body speaking to her. Telling her what she should look into, not just on a physical, but also on a mental level. She was amazed on how she could focus on herself, not looking at others, but go internal. She practiced yoga.

Another student was struggling a lot with postures, being rather upset after. He wasn’t even willing to share his experience, so I won’t judge, but it felt as if he was caught up in performing.

It doesn‘t really matter if your body can make it into a pretzel or if it doesn‘t find the sweet spot in a balance; what matters is being open to what an asana teaches. We receive lessons on all levels, body, mind and spirit. We can learn so much, If only we would listen.

This is where the yoga starts. 

Let me give you an example. To go deep into backbends, we need to open the front side, particularly the chest area (very simplified!), and if this is difficult for you, ask yourself where else in your life does this show up? How open is your heart? How willing are you to show up as your true self?

Balancing postures are telling us a lot about our stress level…

Asanas can work in both directions, as pointers, and they can also help to address and eventually solve an issue you might face in other ares of your life. 

Yoga isn‘t a fitness regime, although it helps on this level too!

Embrace where you are

KathrinLeave a comment

„From chasing to embracing.“

Jeff Foster

I learned this in my asana practice. Not chasing anymore, I don’t need to be able to do any fancy posture. I embrace what I can do and also what I can’t. Eventually this will merge. Or not. It doesn’t really matter. 

Just be consistent in your practice, your body will change and open. 

Mama India

KathrinLeave a comment

A week ago I arrived in Goa and can hardly express my feelings. It‘s been 7 years that I was here last time. So much changed, but not the mood, the energy and the lovely people. I still love all the smells here (ok, almost all), the food, the heat, although it‘s winter here. Which for me only means less humidity and eventually a bit chilly at night.

Usually it takes a while to settle after traveling for almost 24hrs, but this time, apart from the lack of sleep, I felt being there instantly. My mind calm, without the usual chatter and hearing the waves day and night was just pure bliss.

I had such a beautiful week at the beach with a friend I know from here and we only met now again. A week filled with loads of talks and laughter, many drinks, amazing food, sand and salty water. Thank you hon for your time and company, I miss you already!

Now I changed places, and with the new moon a new start into a week full of yoga with the teacher I learned it all from. It‘ll be tough, age kicked in some time ago and my body pushes back. Something I have to accept and handle mindfully. And same time getting fully back into the discipline of Ashtanga yoga.

Thank you mama India for calming my mind and letting my heart jump! Grateful to be back and I promise, I‘ll be never again that stupid to come here for two weeks only 😅

Uttanasana

KathrinLeave a comment

Uttanasana (Standing Forward Bend) – instead of trying to reach the ground with your hands, ask yourself these questions to tap into a more integrated approach:

– Where is the weight in my feet?
– Do I push my knees back, or can I extend my knees by pressing my calves forward into my shins and then lifting the tops of my thighs up?
– What’s the position of my pelvis?

Check how you are connecting and finally enjoy the experience of being in the pose.

KathrinLeave a comment

Pigeon oh pigeon!

The king of the so called hip openers. A pose that shows me clearly the difference of both sides of my body. My right, the yang, the masculine side is very open, while the left, the yin, the feminine tends to be bitchy. Yup, I know. There’s work to do! 

A pose made for Yin Yoga, where we stay 3 to 5 minutes (or even longer) in a pose. This way we can reach the deeper layers in the body, the connective tissue and the fascia. Excellent to unclench where they stick together and release tension.

What I love about staying long in this posture is the power of working with the breath. Breathing into certain places can create space there, literally cleaning up, like a broom. And all of a sudden you notice that you became soft. Floating. Accepting. Releasing. Exhale all the stuff out, that has manifested in your body without you noticing. Leaving with the flow of your exhales.

And to come back to the physical part of it, pigeon pose increases external range of motion of the femur in the hip socket and same time it lengthens the hip flexors.

Asana or tapas?

KathrinLeave a comment

A posture is achieved when effort stops and the mind is merging meditatively into infinity.

In morden yoga practices, we call the postures asanas. However, following Patanjali’s yoga sutras, the term asana only refers to a seated posture, literally asana meaning „seat“. This could be Padmasana (Lotus pose), or any other seated pose, with the aim to sit firm and still for a longer period of time. Obviously this is not Bharadvajasana, as in the picture!


Interestingly in the early times of yoga, any standing and dynamic postures have rather been named tapas. Studying the yoga philosophy we might find the term tapas translated as devotional austerity, but literally it means „heat“.

So, how comes that we are calling the postures asanas? Shouldn’t tapas be the better matching term for what our physical practice is today? Well, our asana practice today has at least a similar ambition – through steadiness and ease, reaching a state of moving meditation.

Ashtanga

KathrinLeave a comment

Good morning practice! 

I played with the 2nd, the intermediate series recently – fuuuuun! While some of the super fancy transitions and advanced inversions are still out of reach for me right now, I was quite surprised that many postures are fully accessible for me and I’am quite close to others. 

Someone said once, if you always do the same, you can’t expect different results. Well, I don’t agree when it comes to the yoga practice. In the Ashtanga method we do exactly that, we practice the same sequence, the same postures every day. And with this slide more and more into a moving meditation. But not just that, with practice, the body opens, we go deeper and deeper into the poses. Once in a while I try a posture that I couldn’t access before and notice that all of a sudden I can. Without even working on this specific pose. The body changed.

And I’m transitioning more and more into the next series. A new chapter to start, exciting!

Urdhva Padmasana

KathrinLeave a comment

Urdhva Padmasana – one of my favorite postures, as it combines inversion, stretch and balance. The pressure at the thyroid brings my attention up and the posture as such allows some fine tuning in the entire body until feeling steady.

Each time you reach this state of steadiness and ease, it feels like arrived. The posture feels stable, easy and makes me wonder why it was such an effort to reach this state. It’s the same for most postures that don’t come naturally. The moment headstand felt like this, I thought, finally, I’m there. Wrong. Totally wrong. An injury threw me out of my practice and inversions moved far away. Once again. Nothing is for granted only because you were there once. Insecurity and mistrust in my body instead. I know this by now and I also know it’s just a matter of slowly getting back. Accepting the weakness through injury, building up step by step. No doubts, but patience. Consistency. Forgiving. Learning. Benevolence. Trust. Ease. And back you are.

Once the body is back, it doesn’t mean the posture can be easily accessed. And no way to push yourself. It’s the mind that need to follow!

Upavista Konasana

KathrinLeave a comment

Upavista Konasana was a long journey for me and I thought I will never reach the ground with my upper body. Even if not flat yet, I‘m down! It was never a posture that had too much of my attention, as I know it’s a matter of open hips and long hamstrings and it’s an intense stretch of the insides of the legs. Nothing to force, but slowly develop. It’s all about patience. Haha, my strength! Not. At. All.

This posture is a fabulous teacher. Everything is possible and comes when the time is right. When we are ready. The body open, the mind without the intent to push. Allowing the body to immerse into the asana and eventually one day we’re in. And if not? Well, I don‘t worry anymore, I just practice. 

Hesitation

KathrinLeave a comment

Hesitation comes when there’s something we want to do, but doubt we can do it by just being ourselves.

Ups. Read that again:

Hesitation comes when there’s something we want to do, but doubt we can do it by just being ourselves.

Trust that being yourself is all you need! Love who you are! Life is tailor made for you, life happens FOR you. Take a break if you need one, but never stop. Keep on walking your path, trust your intuition. Put yourself into the driver seat, change what needs to be changed, it’s your life, your journey, your decision.

It’s exactly the same when it comes to your practice. Just feel it and do it. It might be slow here and there, that’s totally fine, just don’t stop. If you can’t practice, e.g. due to an injury or sickness, remind yourself what yoga is. No, it’s not just about performing asanas. Keep on going, keep on practicing, you are on the right path!