Area Yoga Brooklyn

Bakasana (Crow)

The winds of fall are swirling around us, bringing changes in the weather and our physical world. Trees are releasing their leaves and  birds are taking to the skies for their journey south. In this season of transition and wind, learn to defy gravity and harness the power of wind with bakasana (crow pose).

Erin finds Bakasana

Getting In: Start in uttanasana (standing forward bend) with your feet hip distance apart. Bend your knees deeply to bring your hands to the floor about 6″ directly in front of your feet. Your hands should be about shoulder-distance apart. Your elbows can be soft, but draw them towards your center, like in chaturanga dandasana. Aim your knees so the more you bend them, the more they connect to the outsides of your shoulder sockets. Raise your heels to come up on tip toe and nestle your knees against your shoulders. Look forward and begin to pitch your weight into your hands as your toes slowly peel off the floor. Focus your breathing so that you exhale deeply to draw your knees in closer, your feet towards your sitting bones, your belly button up from the floor, and your elbows towards straight.

Lining Up: Press the space between your thumb and first finger into the ground to help spread your weight evenly through your palms while simultaneously pulling at the ground with your finger tips to draw energy up from your hands into your arms. Give your arms an outward rotation, moving the eyes of your inner elbows to face forward, moving your upper arms into your shoulder sockets. This rotation encourages your arms to move towards each other and hold your heart above your shoulders. The more you encourage your heart to move forward, the more your shoulders move away from your ears and free up your neck. Magnetize your knees in around your shoulders to find lightness in your feet to lift toward your seat, even as your hips lift higher. Use the emptiness of your exhales to make yourself even smaller and lighter to rise out of your hands and straighten your elbows as much as you can — your elbows don’t need to be locked straight. Hollow out your belly on your exhales and hug your rib cage toward your center to encourage more of your energy forward. Keep this compact quality in your torso even on your inhales. Turn your gaze ahead of your hands to lengthen the back of your neck and open the front of your throat.

Tuck your feet, lift your heart, and take flight.

Tuning In: Bakasana helps us to build arm strength, but your abdomen also plays an important role. By shrinking your abdomen when you completely exhale, you activate what we call uddiyana bandha or the “flying-up lock”. Your complete exhale helps you to access your pelvic floor, the very base of your complex abdominal muscles in the lowest part of your pelvic bowl. The action of the exhale draws these muscles up, and in doing so, creates a gravity defying lift. In bakasana, this lift carries your hips and legs along for the ride and makes your feet feel light. You float, coast, and fly in much the same way that birds use up-drafts of wind to minimize their effort in flight. Find your source of lift and you can soar.

I’m always a bit wary when two seemingly unrelated things are combined to make one word.  The slew of celebrity couple pet names (for example Brangelina for Brad and Angelina and Speidi for Spencer and Heidi Pratt) never caught on with me, and I absolutely abhor any iteration of combined languages (Spanglish, Franglish, you get the picture).  When I saw that Area Yoga was offering a new Yogalates class, I was more than a bit skeptical.  After attending the first class, and despite my doubts, it seems that this portmanteau is one worth checking out.

That’s not to say this class was especially easy for me.  I found it to be a challenge, and it’s probably because I used to be one of those gym disciples:  5 days a week, hard cardio, 20 minutes of abdominal workouts.  I’m used to pushing my body to the limit physically – kicking the crap out of it every day just to start over the next morning.  For me, working out was about punishment – and all of my negative energy was felt in my workout.  At yesterday’s class, that simply wasn’t an option.

Yogalates is most definitely a combination of Yoga and Pilates – as the name would suggest.  This isn’t a hard-core ab work out.  Instead you work with your body, utilizing breath to compliment your bodies natural movements while also focusing on core strength and toning.  Candice, the class’s instructor gives focus to each of the abdominal areas:  the pelvic floor and the four main abdominal muscles.  You’ll get a tone for that little pooch over your jeans and also trim some of those lovehandles that are especially pesky in swimsuit season.

Probably because the definition of an ab workout is so hard-wired in my brain, the movements and exercises didn’t come easily for me.  Luckily, Candace was there to show the class how to do each move and to correct students as we moved along in the class.  Just as I reached frustration’s breaking point, we moved on to the more classic yoga movements to close out the class.  As we progressed through the movements, Candace was sure to stretch every muscle we utilized – meaning I was able to move today (a nice surprise for someone who’s used to waking frozen the day after a hard workout)!

If your skeptical, as I was, I suggest you give Yogalates a try.  I can’t say I’m completely a convert, but I do notice a difference in my core strength already.  I’ll be back next week to give it another shot as well!