Yoga Pose Focus: Ustrasana (Camel Pose)

Why Camel Pose is good for yoga mamas

Ustrasana - Camel Pose - is generally good medicine for any person. I was going to say modern people, but then again, I’m sure back in the day people were hunching forward a lot, too.

Whether you’re pregnant, newly postpartum, or your kids are older, chances are that this pose is going to give you some relief from your lifestyle. After all, we don’t walk around in a backward bend all day, do we? 

In last week’s post, I introduced a theme for seasonal inspiration: shifting. As we move into Autumn, there is so much shifting. Camel Pose gives us a very physical sense of how we can change our experience in a pose by just shifting a little bit. It teaches us balance without being a traditional ‘balance pose.’

Have you seen this post before and felt daunted? Read on, because I offer some modifications that should make it accessible for most people:)

How to do it

As with many of the poses, there are different ways to do it! Let’s look at some different ways to come into the pose as well as different ways we can prop and modify it. Even if you are familiar with this pose and can move into a really deep expression of it, I encourage you to play around with it! Here is some rough guidance on coming into the pose:

• You can either start kneeling with your hips above your knees or sit in virasana (hips down on your feet). If you are kneeling, bring your hands to the back of your pelvis, fingers facing downward on either side of the sacrum. Roll the shoulders back and down, open the chest forward, and then if (and only if!) it feels good, begin to look up or drop the head back. If you’d like to go a step further, bring each hand down to the heel of the same side, one at a time.

• If you are in virasana (which you can do with a rolled up towel or something else between the thighs and calves (that area that is like the armpit for the leg….legpit??). Toes can point back or tuck under (if pointed back, you can place another rolled up towel or small cushion between the front of the ankle and the ground if that area of your ankle feels better with support). Then you can move into the pose in one of three ways: 

1. Hands cup your heels so that the fingers point along the foot in the same direction as the toes, then lift your hips slowly and push them gently forward. Then if (and only if!) it feels good begin to look up or relax your head back. Otherwise keep looking forward (chin tucked into chest).

2. Do a half version. Start with one hand (let’s say the left one) on the left heel and sweep the right arm horizontally in front of you to the left, then back as you lift the hips and open the chest. The position of your head depends on whatever feels best in your body. Notice that this begins as sort of a side-stretching backbend and then, depending on your strength and flexibility, can become something more of a full camel pose. Repeat on the other side.

3. Do the version in #2 above but place your hand on the ground either straight behind you or diagonally behind you. Alternatively you can place the hand on a block for support. Repeat on each side as many times as you’d like, either moving in rhythm or holding each side for a few breaths.

Whew! That’s a lot of description, especially for mamas newer to yoga. If you prefer to be guided as you go through it, here’s a video just for that:

 

Connecting it to this month’s theme: Drishti

Last week in the post on the theme of this month, I wrote about drishti. The traditional drishti for ustrasana is gazing at the tip of the nose, but I’d like to open it up to a point on the wall or ceiling depending on the position of your head. If you do version #2 or #3 above, you might actually be moving your head as you switch from side to side. In that case, notice if you are really seeing what’s in your surroundings or paying more attention to what’s going on within your body. Or maybe a little bit of both.

The pose on all levels

In yoga philosophy, we can approach our practice with some awareness of what’s called the koshas — these are layers of your being that go beyond the body. Here they are in order from gross to subtle:

1. Annamaya Kosha (physical body)

2. Pranamaya Kosha (subtle or energetic body)

3. Manamaya Kosha (mental body)

4. Vijnanamaya Kosha (wisdom body)

5. Anandamaya Kosha (bliss body)

I’ll write a post dedicated to exactly what the koshas are and how we can live our lives and practice our yoga with attention on all these parts of ourselves. For now, though, I’d like to give a little glimpse of how I might experience ustrasana through or with these various ‘bodies’ or layers of my being:

Physically: chest and heart opening, inhale deepening, shoulders rotating externally and counterbalancing any hunching forward or slouching from my lifestyle.

Energetically: uplifting, stimulating yet perhaps putting me in touch with vulnerability (generally true of most backward bends since we are opening and exposing that front part of our bodies).

Mentally: I love backward bends, so I usually feel like I’m just hanging back and taking a break. Not to say camel pose doesn’t require some effort, but I usually feel like I get a break from being in my head all the time and bring my attention more into my heart and body.

Try it! When you practice camel pose, how do you feel in the different layers of your being? It doesn’t have to be a complicated inquiry. You can just notice, what am I thinking? feeling? How’s my breath? How did I feel before and how do I feel after? Yoga poses always affect us on more than just the physical level and if we pay attention, we get more out of it.

And also…do you like this pose? hate it? feel indifferent about it? What questions do you have left about it? Please feel free to comment or ask questions here and I’m happy to share my thoughts and experience with you:)

This Yoga Pose Focus will be a monthly offering here. This time around, it’s free to all but next month it will be part of the paid subscription. I thought I’d offer it free as a sample so you can get a taste of what it means to be a paid contributor of this community. Also, if you know someone that would appreciate this post, you are welcome to share it with them! Thanks for reading:)