I practice yoga, or I at least try to, regularly. I am a big believer in the Eight Limbs and I have seen how thoughtful practice of each has positively affected my life. As with all yoga practice, there are aspects of it that can always be improved and worked on. In the West, we tend to focus on the physical practice of yoga, meaning asana and pranayama. I am here today, to let you in on the pose that I fear/loathe/stink at the most.
Crow Pose. Everyone has that one pose that just eludes them. Crow Pose is mine. I usually end up eating crow. I have decent upper body and core strength. But I am the traditional pear shaped woman and I have short arms. So thanks to genetics and physics, the biomechanics creates a very tricky balance situation for me. Hence the face planting.
And, thanks to the struggles, I have developed a pretty decent mental block. The complete opposite of what is supposed to happen from a good yoga practice. It’s a total self-fulfilling prophecy. I take the deep breath and tip over into the pose and the little devil on my shoulder is whispering in my ear, “you’re gonna fall, you’re gonna fall…” So, sure enough, splat.
In fact, this picture, where I am clearly about to fall, took seven attempts.
On the other hand, yoga has taught me to persevere. Which is why I attempt crow pose almost every time I’m on the mat. Practice makes progress right? I researched (and researched and researched some more) ways to modify crow pose. It’s a more advanced posture so there are fewer modifications. But I finally found that I can attempt this asana with my forearms on the ground instead of my hands. And I am finally seeing progress.
My goal for the next several months is to get to a point where I can hold the forearm modified crow pose for at least 30 seconds every time. And hopefully that will increase my strength and confidence that I can try the traditional hands placement again. So, I say to you, fellow yogi, keep practicing that asana that is giving you fits.
Yogajournal.com is a great resource for modifications and for progressions to help with many asanas.
