Misstropolis

Wednesday, November 14, 2007

Demystifying Revolved Triangle

by Dee Greenberg

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As a yoga teacher, I often observe beginning students calmly coasting easily through their asana practice in my studio (Om City Yoga) until that fateful moment when I utter the words “Revolved Triangle.” Suddenly a roomful of students whose faces were registering internal calm and Buddha-like equanimity is now replaced by students with looks of fear, foreboding and downright terror.

What is it about this posture that has the power to deflate a roomful of yoga students to the point where they are now behaving like insecure, stressed-out high school students on the night before the senior prom? My goal in this article is to demystify Revolved Triangle by breaking it down into bite-sized pieces, focusing on basic alignment issues and giving you a firm foundation from which to approach this very rewarding posture.

If we view asana practice as a metaphor for life, the payoff is that in spite of all the unexpected twists and turns that inevitably will show up on the highway of our lives, we are able to move from a place of calmness and stillness, navigating all these twists with grace and ease.

Revolved Triangle will provide you with many such challenges.  It’s a standing posture, which requires balancing the weight of our bodies evenly over both feet and legs.  The legs and feet create the firm foundation from which we are then asked to fold forward with square hips and to simultaneously twist our torsos while maintaining a long straight spine and expansion through the shoulders, back and chest. 

Begin by stepping your feet about one leg distance apart. Ideally you should line up the feet heel to heel, but it is okay to offset the feet in an effort to square the hips, if necessary. Next, expand your arms out to the sides at shoulder height, slightly bending the elbows, externally rotating the arms, with palms facing in and slightly up and with the heart expanding forward and the shoulders drawing back.

Now begin to twist your torso to the right, keeping the spine long and tall and without collapsing the heart into the body.  Place the left hand on the outside of your right thigh and the right arm bent behind your back. 

This is the first stage of Revolved Triangle. If you are a beginner, start by practicing this foundational stage only.  Stay with this first stage as long as necessary, perhaps extending the right arm up before attempting to take the left hand down to a block. The challenge here is to maintain the length in the spine and openness between the shoulders and across the chest.  In addition, you will need to extend the back leg strongly by pushing actively into the heel of the back foot. This strong extension of the back leg is the key to maintaining balance in this pose. Try to maintain internal rotation of the hip of the back leg (rotating the back hip down and in towards the center line of the body) and rotating the hip of the front leg externally (back and up). Once you have achieved balance and steadiness; turn your gaze to the sky. Eventually, you will be able to wean yourself off the block and extend the right arm skyward.

As you begin to add Revolved Triangle to your daily asana practice, remember to stay completely focused on the breath and on bodily sensations as you move in and out of the posture. Maintaining this internal awareness is the key to transforming the consciousness through the yoga practice. Without this deeper awareness, you are just going through the motions of practicing yoga, essentially just spinning your wheels.

Once you become skilled at staying focused during asana practice, you will eventually be able to utilize this skill in all aspects of your daily life. Begin to notice how you automatically react to the daily twists and turns that occur as a natural part of life – those unexpected annoyances or crises that seemingly come out of nowhere when we least expect it.

Are you able to hold your head high, maintain clarity of mind and stay focused on overcoming obstacles by setting clear priorities and taking down time when needed to rest and regroup? Or is your pattern to overreact when things go wrong, allowing every little bump in the road to knock you down and set you back?

Yoga is no magic bullet. All of these questions are food for thought meant to stimulate witness consciousness – that ability to see yourself clearly as you are in every moment. Once you are armed with this clarity of vision, nothing can hold you back!