Safety First

I went to a wonderful Ashtanga workshop this weekend. It was called "Modifications and Injury Prevention". Sounds sexy huh? No seriously it was a really good workshop. We talked a lot about the relationship between the neck and low back, the low ribs and the low back, and ways to keep wrists, knees, low back, neck, and shoulders safe.

The main points that I took away are:
-If you want to open the upper back during backbending, and keep your low back from bearing the brunt, you can visualize tucking the low ribs back, drawing them towards the back, while lifting the sternum. Sounds impossible, but I felt an opening across the front of the chest that I hadn't before.
-If you have low back problems, keep the head an extension of the spine. For example, when folding forward during surya namaskara, the head stays exactly as it is when standing in tadasana. Instead of crunching the back of the neck and looking forward as you fold, which creates a deeper, more unsafe curve in the low back, keep the neck long, keep reaching through the crown of the head in a straight line with the spine at all times.
-In cataranga, make sure most of the work stays in the upper back instead of the front and tops of the shoulders by concentrating on gluing the shoulder blades to your back and drawing them down your back. I was sore sore in my serratus anterior muscles (just below the shoulder blades) from my cataranga. This small change is much safer for the shoulders and wrists.

It is going to take a while for all of these changes to become naturally assimilated into my practice. But it was really fun to be so present and active in the practice, instead of going through the motions, much more work, but much more fun!