So I’ve covered frequent fears and questions, sanskrit and mats in my beginners series and now it’s time to move onto the physical practice. Now if you are a beginner really don’t worry about heading to your first class without knowing anything about the physical practice, if you’ve found yourself an amazing teacher they will guide you through absolutely everything. One of the main areas of the physical practice that gets publicity and can be dropped into a class without really any explanation though is the sun salutation.
So what is a sun salutation? In essence it is a collection of postures linked to each other and to the breath and is commonly used at the beginning of classes in order to warm up the entire body, prepare for other postures and begin to create a connection between movement and the breath. Salutes to the sun have been part of human culture for 1000’s of years and there is evidence of elements of what is practiced today originating in the Vedic period 2500 years ago but the sun salutations as we know them, particularly the most common, Sun Salutation A, that I am going to explain here only became a large part of the yoga practice in the 1930’s through the teachings of KV Iyer and T Krishnamacharya. Ultimately though the origins of this particular method of moving with the breath is a mystery, what we do know is it is a great way to prepare the body and mind for the rest of our practice. A great article if you want to have a read about the origins more this one from Ekhart Yoga.
So the actual physical postures… The sun salutation A I am going to run through below includes nine postures some of which are repeated at both the beginning and the end of the sequence.
Tadasana
Start stood in mountain pose at the top of the mat. Grounding down through the feet which are spread wide on the floor. Roll shoulders back and down being careful not to flare the ribs or stick the bottom out. Keep neutral in the spine and begin to connect to the breath
Urdhva Hastasana – Arms Up with a tiny backbend
With an inhale sweep the arms up and over the head, lengthening through the torso and spine before taking a ting back bend. Still grounding down through the feet. Gaze can be with the hands or neutral
Uttanasana – Forward Fold
Exhaling into a soft forward fold with knees bent or straight depending on flexibility and comfort. Fingers a re looking to graze the floor so take the knee bend where it needs to be to achieve this. Gaze towards the legs and neutral, not strained, in the neck and shoulders
Ardha Uttanasana – Flat Back/Half Forward Fold
Inhaling either bringing the hands to the shins or to the finger tips like in the photo above. You are looking to draw up through the belly and torso as well as the shoulders, bringing the chest forward rather than down where it was in the forward fold
Anjaneysana – Lunge
Here is where I teach my sun salutation A in a slightly more classical style, adding in this lunge as a way of moving from our flat back position into our plank. Jumping or floating back to plank can also be taught as stronger variant but I like to teach this slightly softer version which also helps to warm up through the hip flexors a bit more. So from the flat back position exhale and take one leg backwards. Remember which one as we’ll be leading with the other leg on the second round! Once in the lunge ensure your knee is above your ankle on the bent leg and you are lengthening away in the extended leg, pushing back with the heel.
[metaslider id=”711″]Phalakasana – Plank or Hands and Knees (scroll through photos for the two options)
From your lunge position inhale and bring the other foot back to plank position. You may need to take the feet back slightly depending on how deep your lunge was. If this is too strong then drop to the knees and come to a box position. In both positions though the shoulders should be strong, almost like you are pushing through your arms to lift the shoulder blades away from the back, and the feet should be strong. In plank ensure the bottom is lower than the head and you are a strong straight line from shoulders all the way down to feet.
Chaturanga Dandasana
This is the pose that gets rushed through and the least attention of any of the poses in the sun salutation and is actually the hardest. Often referred to as yoga pushups or crocodile it is a way of lowering the body from plank and into the next position. Moving through chaturanga shouldn’t be rushed and should be held momentarily once found. In order to enter the posture the body needs to come forward slightly from plank and the body lowered in a straight line so that when the elbows are bent they are above the wrists and create a right angle from shoulder to elbow to wrist. Don’t panic about this pose though, it is strong and requires a lot of strength through the entire body. In order to develop this strength practice coming from your box position and keeping the knees on the ground bring the body slightly forward and down so only the arms are engaged.
[metaslider id=”714″]Urdhva Mukha Svanasana – Upward Facing Dog or Salabhasana – Cobra (scroll through photos for the two options)
Inhaling from chaturanga or from the laid position from lowering down from your box we now move to a back bend position of either upward facing dog or cobra. Upward facing dog is the stronger of these positions where the feet are drawing away from the body, the thighs engaged and the knees lifted, chest moving forward, shoulders over wrists and shoulders rolling back and down. Cobra is similar and a great adaptation to take early in the practice as upward facing dog is a strong backbend. For cobra we are moving from the floor with hands under the shoulders and peeling the chest and first couple of ribs off of the floor. Again really working on pressing the feet into the ground and rolling the shoulders away from the ears.
Adho Mukha Svanasana – Downward Facing Dog
From either our cobra or upward facing dog we exhale to roll over the toes or tuck them under and with bent knees lift the hips high slowly straightening the legs if it feels good. The key to a good downward facing dog is not to straighten the legs but to ensure the hips are high, torso long and hands grounded into the floor
[metaslider id=”717″]From here we’re on the home stretch and work our way through our lunge, ensuring that the leg that was brought back at the beginning is now stepped forward, back into our flat back position, forward fold and lifting the arms up into our tiny back bend. Meeting in tadasana again ready to repeat as many times as required. (The above gallery shows the full sequence to come back to standing)
And that’s the sun salutation you are most likely to come across broken down. There are other variants and other poses can be bolted on to this basic flow but in it’s simplest form this is it. Such a great way to warm up or maybe just repeat as many times as you want as your whole practice.
I hope this has been helpful and maybe given a few pointers on alignment but if you have any questions or comments please do let me know