The Poses We Dread
One of my regular weekly pleasures used to be Saturday morning yoga in the gardens of a local museum. But even the warmth of the sun and the crows of the roosters (yes, roosters) couldn’t prevent my grimace when the instructor directed us to move into navasana. I used a 6mm thick, Manduka mat, yet I still shimmied as my tailbone took much of my weight and I felt the concrete beneath me. I was the yoga version of The Princess and the Pea, but without the reveal of my royal identity at the end.
I learn my students’ least favorite poses with little effort. I know them like the baristas at my local coffee shop know the drinks of their regulars. At the top of the list of moan-causing asanas are bhekasana and malasana. Sometimes I dutifully avoid those poses, but as of late I’ve reconsidered my approach. After sharing my dislike for boat pose during one of my classes, I had the idea to teach a class that included all of our dreaded poses. This passing thought that I first considered a joke got me thinking about why we practice yoga and how that connects to what happens to me when I practice navasana. I react, resist, and reluctantly move into the pose. But once there, a shift occurs. To get through the hold, I have to sharpen my focus, deepen my breath, and drop my ego.
Why resist a pose that can teach me so much?
In Perfectly Imperfect, Baron Baptiste relays an aphorism that B.K.S. Iyengar shared with his students: "The asana begins the moment you want to come out of it" (21). I use these insightful words as my guiding motivation during the poses that my body finds challenging, and my resistance lessens each time my body takes the shape. The truth is that we tend to avoid the poses we think we’re “bad” at doing or that cause us aggravation, and this response mirrors the way we respond to challenges in our daily lives. If instead we use these moments in our practice to build mental focus and strength, we could view these poses as training for becoming our best selves and reaching our highest goals.
