Asana Practice Week Eleven

Advice for all those students planning on sleeping for 14 hours straight: make sure you pick a position that will be the least painful to wake up in. 

I learned this lesson the hard way this morning after I woke up from a post-Homecoming slumber. In my first sleep in 48 hours, I slept on my stomach, with one leg hiked up to side, and both arms over my head. Although it was extremely comfortable when I first fell asleep, after 14 hours, my body was parts asleep, parts tangled, and many parts in pain. In addition to that, I was extremely sore from sitting on my knees all friday night for face painting, biking in the parade on saturday morning and standing during the football game. I was miserable. 

But then I decided to do some yoga to untangle myself. I did some downward dog, some twists, and plenty of chest and shoulder openers. I felt so much better. I will definitely need an ice bath later but I am so thankful to have yoga to help me on these mornings! 

Speaking of shoulder openers, I have been doing the bound-elbows-behind-the-back pose throughout every day recently. It is my new favorite pose! For someone like me who has terrible posture and is always slouching over, this pose brings me relief in so many ways. First, I have really tight shoulders and this pose relieves the tension around that area and through my neck. Second, this pose also brings relief to my back because it forces me to straighten up. For this reason, I have been doing the pose at work where I sit at the front desk for hours at a time. It has been a lifesaver!