Spine & Torso
Week 8 – Ecstatic Joy From Intimate Connection
Introduction
Key Points to Reflect & Integrate:
- Key systems we touched upon in the torso:
- Musculoskeletal system
- Digestive system
- Neuromuscular system
- Cardiovascular system
- Coming into the presence of what is unfolding within us can be overwhelming but it’s also intimately ours, this depth of Self is our being-ness (SAT), there is a level in which we know this depth of Self completely (CHIT), and coming into contact with this depth of Self is joy (ANANDA).
- The movement of the Self is who we are, including that which is beyond our conscious awareness, and when we move into relationship with this movement beneath the surface of things we meet ourselves in the heart.
Next steps:
- Practice Tools: Contemplate the visuals of the intricate domes of sacred structures, consider the same subtle expansion in:
- your own crown
- at your heart
- through the doorway of your pelvic floor
- plus other such organized spaces of palms and soles of your feet, subtle plane including the chakras…
- Bring your awareness to the space of your torso and consider how these systems are centered physically and energetically in your torso for the support of your farthest reaches. Connect to the creative power and support that is within.
- Comment below with your questions, thoughts, or insights.
Unlocking Movement:
Rib Mobilization to Stabilize Warrior 3
Key Points to Reflect & Integrate:
- Key actions in the twisting:
- Standing elbow/hand extends, push the floor away, to keep from collapsing the supporting shoulder,
- Top elbow towards ear, armpit slides around from front to back,
- Head and hand lean into each other, head slides back,
- Chin is up, forehead is smooth.
- Opening the ribs and the range within the neck maintains the lightness of the upper body, buoyancy of the breath and the easeful articulation when we make use of the reach of our arms from a steady base.
Next steps:
- Notice moments in your day when you make use of the range explored in this unlocking movement. To have reach in any direction from a stable base is pivotal to an efficient and expressive life.
- In what other poses could you use the block at your front ribs? In what other poses could the rib articulation and the balanced action through the twisting help unlock? (Answer is ultimately every pose, but particularly those that require steady legs while the upper torso moves through space).
- Comment below with your questions, thoughts, or insights.
Unlocking Movement:
Upper Body Stability for Deeper Flexion and Extension
Key Points to Reflect & Integrate:
- Notes for practicing the flexion pattern:
- Feel free to use one hand on the block to stabilize it as you make contact from one leg to the next, switch hands from time to time.
- Consider how low you extend the reaching leg, lowering extends the hip flexors and/or it can uproot the low spine, stay higher and work towards lowering the leg over time.
- Notes for practicing the extension pattern:
- Continue to compress the bolster, as if to join the two ends,
- From the stable upper body, wriggle down into the extension of the legs.
Next steps:
- Don’t go back to yanking on your neck and head around! Use this stabilizing of the head with strap and block to feed into a strong balance and organization within your neck.
- How does the strength and active use of your upper body free your lower body to reach? What further poses would you explore knowing you can support your lower body’s potential to extend?
- Comment below with your questions, thoughts, or insights.
Unlocking Movement:
Root Into the Crown of Your Head
Key Points to Reflect & Integrate:
- Connect the push from crown to tail.
- Pressure on the crown leads to a flood of fresh blood into the tissue upon release.
- Hand work is pivotal! Using the grip of your fingers and anchor your wrist pulling it away from the wall to keep your shoulders from gripping and squeezing your ribs or your neck.
Next steps:
- Find other ways to bring pressure to the crown of your head, for instance, carry a book on your head, shift the bag you carry on your back to your head, or simply place the weight of your hands on your head. Doesn’t have to be practiced publicly :), but as your connection with this space changes so will your way of moving about the world.
- Practice Tools: see how these unlocking movements inform your further exploration of the asanas offered.
- Comment below with your questions, thoughts, or insights.
Sanskrit Study: Ananda
Creative Bliss Revealed Through Intimate Connection
Key Points to Reflect & Integrate:
- Ananda – bliss that underlies all opposition, the creative power within acknowledges in each moment the infinite multitude of meeting points that are taking place within one’s Self, creating a constant ecstatic swell.
- Access the vibration, harness the power of the bliss by moving into intimate connection with your own self.
- Physically explore bliss in the intimate connection between the heart and the diaphragm:
- the openness in the flow of the back of the heart,
- The gentle nudge of the heart into the front body, into being witnessed.
Next steps:
- Journal: What keeps you from experiencing the subtle, constant bliss that is arising from the creative unfolding within your own Self?
- Journal: What did it take these previous weeks to arrive at a place where you experience the joy of intimate connection within the layers of your torso, and being?
- Comment below with your questions, thoughts, or insights.
Practice Tools: Move
Short Asana Sequence
Live with Julia:
The Upper Spine
HOME PRACTICE
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Seeing the inside of mosques is literally an ecstatic, exciting and joyful experience. It looks like space and its energy are infinitely expanding all the way out to the Universe. Such a detailed design! And all details are beautifully balanced. The detailed beauty and infinite possibilities remind me of the anatomy map of the human body.