Don’t worry too much about your arms that look like a
steeple in this pose. The steps that follow will keep your arms straight.
The wider the stance,
the easier this pose will be, just as in the Standing Separate Leg
Stretching. Also note the difference
between this pose and the Triangle. Instead of keeping your hips and torso
facing directly forward you face
directly to the side.
You’re having trouble? As a beginner, you are allowed to bend the right knee as much as necessary to touch
your forehead to it. If, even bending the knee, you still cannot touch your
forehead to it, you either suffer from a cast-iron spine or you are trying to
touch your nose or chin or chest to your knee instead of your forehead.
This is a forehead-to-knee
pose, and to get forehead to the knee you must tuck the chin in and keep
tucking it in while you curl toward the knee with the forehead, using everything
you’ve got.
I don’t know why, but no matter how many times I (Bikram)
say the word forehead, my students
continue to concentrate on stretching their backs, reaching for their feet,
getting their chests close the their legs – everything but what I tell them.
When finally you
succeed in getting your forehead to your knee and your hands down to your feet (which
can take a day of weeks), begin then to
use the forehead to actually push on the knee and straighten the leg back to
the locked position. As you do this, you’ll feel the stretch in the back of
your knee. This is good. Push more. Breathing will be a large help here. Big exhalations! And with each exhalation you will sink deeper
into the pose.
Once you are all comfortable, forehead touching, both knees
straight, work on twisting your hips
even more to the right. Your goal is to face squarely to the right.
This pose gives many of the same slimming and tightening
benefits as the Hands to Feet Pose and the Triangle, so give it your best effort!!
Benefits
The benefits of this pose are the same as Hands to Feet
Pose. It also slims abdomen, waistline, hips, buttocks, and upper thighs.
Read more
about this poses benefits, pictures, video and tips from here!
Drawings
and info from "Bikram´s Beginning Yoga Class " Book, 1978.
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