Sunday, November 25, 2012

savasana: corpse pose

Michael Stone looks at corpse pose - read the full article here.

Savasana is the art of practicing our death, little by little, every day.  "If student does not get up from savasana," says Pattabhi Jois, "or lifting student up (and he/she) is like a stiff board, savasana is correct."  The aim of yoga practice in daily life is to live vividly from moment to moment without being stuck in thinking or the idea of not-thinking.  Wood floor, open window, blanket, cushion, t-shirt, wool socks -- there is something profound just here.  We are not trying to create an experience; we are making room for experience to happen.  Experience, like the present moment, is always waiting for a place to happen.  The architecture of savasana requires us to continually let the ground we are lying down on, literally the ground of our thoughts and our bodies, to fall away, until the constructs that frame our experience pass on.  This is an act of both dying and being born.  Our imagination makes us very busy exploring the world of choices.  In the end, there will be no choice, just death.  So in the center of your bumbling human life, where you are always looking around for something better, notice how the present moment is just a small death away.  




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