Flow to find Balance

 

 

 

 

 

Flow to Find Your Balance

Balance. Just the word conjures up a surreal image of a sunny, stress-free life in which work, friends and family peacefully coexist with plenty of time for shared meals, sleep and museum-hopping. But is that idealized vision really what finding balance is all about? 

Yoga has a lot to teach us about balance; the physical practice revolves around dualistic relationships—strength and flexibility, push and pull, engaging and softening. The play between these opposing forces mirrors the fundamental relationship a yogi has with the ground below and the air above, the body serving as the connection between the two.

Take a simple pose like Tadasana, mountain pose. The feet root down into the earth and, in reaction to that, the heart lifts a little higher and the crown of the head rises up a little taller—you push down to lengthen up. Your sense of connectedness to the earth helps you to find an expansiveness up and away from the earth. This kind of oppositional energetic movement is something you can recognize most easily in balancing postures.

Explore your balance with this sequence. Hold each pose for 3 to 5 breaths.

• Start in downward-facing dog pose.
• Inhale to lift your right leg up in the air. As you exhale, step your right foot in between your hands and lift your arms up by your ears to come into a high lunge. 
• As you inhale, bring your palms to meet in front of your heart in a prayer gesture and exhale to angle your torso forward. On your inhale, lift your left leg up into a Warrior III pose. Modify by placing your hands on blocks beneath your shoulders if needed.
• Inhale to come up to stand, balancing on your right foot. Bring your right hand to your hip and take your left big toe in yogi toe lock with the first two fingers and thumb of your left hand. On an inhale, extend your left leg straight out in front of you and lift your right arm up into the sky. Modify by keeping your left knee bent and interlacing your hands beneath your thigh. 
• Open your left leg out to the left side of the room and extend your right arm out to the right side of the room. 
• Come into tree pose by bringing the sole of your left foot to the inside of your right thigh and extending both arms up towards the sky.
• As you inhale, bring your hands into prayer at your heart and exhale to point your left knee to the front of the room.  Move through Warrior III pose with prayer at your heart into a balancing standing split, lifting your left leg even higher behind you and bowing your head closer to the earth. Keep your gaze on the floor for balance. Modify by placing your hands on blocks.
• Gently step back into a low lunge with your hands on either side of your right foot.
• Exhale to step back into downward-facing dog pose. Repeat the flow on the opposite side.

The Well Wisdom:

Life is full of ups and downs. Sometimes we encounter things that are hard and challenging, while other times life feels nothing but smooth. Just remember: these two opposite realms must both exist in order for us to practice living in the middle ground in between—it is there we will find balance.

(*by Jen Guarnieri
August 8, 2011)