My yoga crayons

Tadasana--Mountain Pose

The foundational pose of yoga. It tells us so much about ourselves without having to do anything. I learn so much about people by just watching how they move or stand in this pose. How they hold tension in the body and how they breathe if they breathe at all. One of the most amazing poses that we center our practice on and yet little to no attention is ever paid to how vital it is. If we can do tadasana correct, then all the other poses are just about moving a foot or hand. They are the colors that we paint our practice with. I see so many black and white yogis that just do a pose, then I spot someone who takes a pose and makes it their own. Stand up right now. Feel gravity against your feet. Feel where you put your weight. Taking that time to feel, to analyze and to correct.

Some teachers might say that you lean too far back in your heels that you are living in the past, lean too far forward, you anticipate the future and then there is the person centered and balanced in the middle that takes what they learned in the past and applies it towards their dreams, goals and in every situation moving forward. I love that but I also know anatomically that certain people have only trained certain muscles and this might have nothing to do with the past or future, but about what they can fix right now. They need yoga to teach them not only to center their mind but also their body. Take this pose and make it about you. What do you need in this moment? A calm mind, a balanced body or spiritual session. Maybe next time you step foot on your mat you need to just close your eyes, stop analyzing all the little things you can fix and just be in the now of how your body is behaving.

I can sit here and write all this cool stuff that I know about yoga and the history of this pose but you can honestly just google it. I think what I find so amazing about this pose is how vital our feet are, how when one misalignment is present it affects the entire rest of the body. How true is that then for the rest of your practice? If you cannot properly use your feet, are you properly engaging the legs so that it is evenly distributed?  And then what about the spiritual aspect, how can one common misconception affect everything else that you do? To find the subtle body and mind and make those subtle adjustments.

Time and time again I see students walk in the door thinking they are masters or so skillful in the art of yoga. They just want to be in a pose without exploring all the amazing space between. Tadasana can be so easy, so boring and so beginner. But turn tadasana upside down into a handstand and it is not so easy anymore.We can make this practice very black and white but how boring is that. There are rules to yoga, then there are the people that take the rules, bend them a bit and find that spark, that color, that space. That is how I practice, how I teach and how I live my life.