Mountains of Fun

Hi and Welcome to your Journey into Yoga! I’m Avery Rich and am so happy to have you along for the ride :)  

Mountain Pose.  Tadasana.  Standing.  Yes, there is a pose in yoga that is standing. Just standing.  But is it “just standing?” Is it “simply” standing?

Ok, I confess  

Forgive me father for I have sinned

I am guilty of often cue-ing this pose in my classes in the following ways:

-Just come to stand at the front of your mat

-and now just stand

-Let’s move to simply standing….

Sometimes i catch myself and will then correct my language to indicate how much more Mountain Pose or tadasana is than Just standing…it is so very much more.

Carol Krucoff provides a wonderful explanation of Tadasana or mountain pose, and to quote her words:  “Mountain pose teaches us, literally, how to stand on our own two feet…teaching us to root ourselves into the earth…Our bodies become a connection between heaven and earth.” (Carol Krucoff)

Now certainly in the yoga world of yoga postures, there are complicated poses that require much more instruction and guidance, but this doesn’t make them necessarily more difficult or challenging.  Often the simplest poses are the most challenging (I spoke about this back in episodeone  when I discussed shavasana and how even though physically we are asked to relax and be still, this often can be more challenging than other seemingly more complicated postures).  Simply standing (there I go again…) Standing can be challenging.

When we break down tadasana, which I will do momentarily, there is a lot to notice;  a lot to be aware of.  Our bodies get accustomed to habits in standing, and not all of these habits are good.  I thought it may be useful to go through the various ways people tend to stand and maybe you can relate to one or two, or all of them!

-standing with your weight shifting into one leg - I see this a lot and have lovingly named it the hip just stance.  This tendency can come about for many reasons and is ultimately quite bad for posture and spines

-standing with your weight forward or conversely standing with your weight shifting into the heels:  this throws posture and the alignment out of whack, and can also cause the shoulder neck and head to shift and contort bringing strain into the body.

Look, all of these patterns, habits and tendencies don’t happen overnight and they also don’t often happen on purpose.  we live and life naturally can throw many things out of whack including the act of standing.  Mothers hold babies on their hips and this will cause the side shifted stance…there are too many examples of how and why we get to where we are, but we are here and now we can begin to notice our patterns and maybe even to slowly change them.  Rome wasn’t built in a day and habits cannot change in a day…or even a week, mont, or year but that’s what our journey is about - one step at a time.

Before we get started on our pose today, tadasana is a great pose to help with some postural issues that I often seen in bodies.  Kyphosis, as an example, is a condition where the spine begins to round forward, often as a result of years of excessive slouching.  It often presents with head sitting slightly forward and the upper spine having a rounded appearance.  In tadasana, we are encouraged to roll our shoulders back, open our chest swide, and reach through the crown of our heads. Doing so directly counteracts the slouched shoulders of postural kyphosis. 

For today, you are welcome to do mountain pose at the wall, trying to rest both shoulder blades and the back of your head against the wall.

So on that note, let’s stand! 

Find a place that’s quiet where you can stand on even ground.  Now, stepping the feet about hip distance apart…what is hip distance you ask? Well, have the feet stepped apart narrower than your shoulders, but not right beside each other - hope that helps :) Now that we are looking at the feet, lets stay there for a moment or two.  Take a moment to notice how you are standing on your feet - we often have tendencies to:

-put more weight on the ball of the foot than the heel - if you are doing that try and divide some weight into the heel side of the foot.  If you were putting more weight onto the heel side then do the opposite - tru and put some more weight into the ball of the feet.  Let’s examine the sides of the feet.  Some of us tend to roll or press more onto the baby toes die of the feet, some of u tend to put more weight into the big toe side of the feet - see if you can try to put equal weight onto the baby toe side and the big toes sides of the feet.  Lots of instruction i know, and notice if this feels weird - it probably does because it is taking you out of your regular feet patterns.  We are working at balancing equal weight through all 4 corners of the feet.  Now, let’s move up the body to the hips.  Do you feel your hips shifting forward or back - try and think of your hips balancing on top of your feet…lets keep moving up to the shoulders, and same instruction as the hips…if they are shifting forward or back, see if you can think of balancing the shoulders over the hips. Continuing the journey up to the neck and head - and this one I often see in people.  Slight shifts forward with the head is a common position…see if you can imagine your head balancing on top of your neck - in the middle of the neck so to speak.  This may require you to draw it slightly back.  Now, let your arms rest down by your sides.  

now let’s review from top to bottom.

-the crown or very top of your head is drawing upward towards the sky, your head is balanced on top of your neck and is stacked over your shoulders which themselves are evenly stacked on top of your hips and feet.  Check in with your back body - are you arching? see if you can draw your tail bone in a slightly downward direction.  Or, are you flexing or rounding the back body? See if you can bring in a little bit of an arch allowing your shoulders to open and your tailbone to slightly lift.  

Its all together possible that all of these instructions have created some unconscious tension in the body - keeping everything as it is, can you relax your jaw, soften our shoulders away from your ears, and breathe.  Lets stand for 10 breaths.

Standing. Seems simple? Au contraire; there is so much more to standing than we think. Is the crown of my head extending in an upwards direction? Is my head shifting forward or back? Are my shoulders softening down my back body? What is happening with my tail bone? Are my shoulders stacked over my hips (what does that even mean)???!!! What about my feet and my legs....So...uhhhh...yes...there is much more to standing then we think...

As we begin to release from standing, you are welcome to move into shavasana if you have the time and space.  

If you are ready to close our practice, I will leave you with a few words about not the best habits - they are hard to break.  But bit by bit, by noticing, we can change them into better ones that can result in happier minds and bodies…Until next time