ASANA (Posture)

Asana means posture.  A series of exercises, physical and mental, is to be gone through every day, until certain higher states are reached.  Therefore it is quite necessary that we should find a posture in which we can remain long.  That posture which is the easiest for one should be the one chosen in the beginning.  For thinking, a certain posture may be very easy for one man, while to another it may be very difficult.  We will find later on that during the study of these psychological matters a good deal of activity goes on in the body.  Nerve currents will have to be displaced and given a new channel.  New sorts of vibrations will begin, the whole constitution will be remodeled, as it were.  But the main part of the activity will lie along the spinal column, so that the one thing necessary for the posture is to hold the spinal column free, sitting erect, holding the three parts- the chest, neck, and head- in a straight line.  Let the whole weight of the body be supported by the ribs, and then you have an easy natural posture, with the spine straight.  You will easily see that you cannot think very high thoughts with the chest in.  This portion of the yoga is a little similar to Hatha Yoga, which deals entirely with the physical body, its aim being to make the physical body very strong.  Many of these practices you will find in Delsarte and other teachers, such as placing the body in different postures, but the object in these is physical, not psychological.  There is not one muscle in the body over which a man cannot establish a perfect control.  The heart can be made to stop or go on at his bidding, and each part of the organism can be similarly controlled.

The result of this branch of yoga is to make men live long; health is the chief idea, the one goal of the Hatha-Yogi.  He is determined not to fall sick, and he never does.  He lives long; a hundred years is nothing to him.

One or two ordinary lessons of the Hatha-Yogis are very useful.  For instance, some of you will find it a good thing for headaches to drink cold water through the nose as soon as you get up in the morning; the whole day your brain will be nice and cool, and you will never catch cold.  It is very easy to do; put your nose into the water, draw it up through the nostrils, and make a pump action in the throat.

Asana is the practice of physical postures.  It is the most commonly known aspect of yoga for those unfamiliar with the other seven limbs of Patanjali’s Yoga Sutra.  The practice of moving the body into postures has widespread benefits; of these the most underlying are improved health, strength, balance and flexibility.  On a deeper level the practice of asana, which means ‘staying’ or ‘abiding’ in Sanskrit, is used as a tool to calm the mind and move into the inner essence of being.  The challenge of poses offers the practitioner the opportunity to explore and control all aspects of their emotions, concentration, intent, faith, and unity between the physical and the ethereal body.  Indeed, using asanas to challenge and open the physical body acts as a binding agent to bring one in harmony with all the unseen elements of their being, the forces that shape our lives through our responses to the physical world.  Asana then becomes a way of exploring our mental attitudes and strengthening our will as we learn to release and move into the state of grace that comes from creating balance between our material world and spiritual experience.

        As one practices asana it fosters a quieting of the mind, thus it becomes both a preparation for meditation and a meditation sufficient in and of itself.  Releasing to the flow and inner strength that one develops brings about a profound grounding spirituality in the body.  The physicality of the yoga postures becomes a vehicle to expand the consciousness that pervades our every aspect of our body.  The key to fostering this expansion of awareness and consciousness begins with the control of breath, the fourth limb – Pranayama.  Patanjali suggests that the asana and the pranayama practices will bring about the desired state of health; the control of breath and bodily posture will harmonize the flow of energy in the organism, thus creating a fertile field for the evolution of the spirit.  ‘This down-to-earth, flesh-and-bones practice is simply one of the most direct and practical ways to meet yourself.  This limb of yoga practice reattaches us to our body.  In reattaching ourselves to our bodies we reattach ourselves to the responsibility of living a life guided by the undeniable wisdom of our body.  To this B.K.S.  Iyengar adds: ‘The needs of the body are the needs of the divine spirit which lives through the body.  The yogi does not look heaven-ward to find God for he know that He is within.’

The following are various categories of Asanas:

1.     Standing postures- Ardh Chakrasana (Half circle pose), Vir Bhadrasana (Warrior pose), Trikonasana (Triangle pose), etc.

2.     Sitting postures-

3.     Prone (on belly) postures-

4.     Supine (on back) postures-

5.     Balancing on foot postures-

6.     Arm balancing postures-

7.     Four limbs-

8.     Inversion postures-