So, I was thinking about Garudasana. You know, when you have been practising yoga for a long time, your body begins to know what it needs from the practice. There are times when you need power, stretch, sweat and to push to the edge of pain. There are times when you want to curl up like a cat and comfort what Mary Oliver, the poet, called “the soft animal of your body”.
And in your practice, if you are present, you will hear your body call for that movement, or lack of movement, and your breath will move in answer to that call, and, sometimes, if you are lucky, the interplay of breath and body will bring you beauty, joy, peace, energy or rest, whatever it is that you need at that moment.
Anyway, I’ve been drawn to Garudasana a lot recently. I express the pose very badly, not being graced with the long slender limbs necessary to twine one about the other as the instagram version requires. But the pose has been calling to me and I practise.
I’ve been reading about the background to the pose and how it got it’s name. Garuda is the eagle-like creature who is Vishnu’s ride through the heavens in Hindu mythology. He’s very popular, and there’s even an airline, Garuda Airlines, named after him. But the pose doesn’t look like an eagle. There’s an even more bound-up looking version called “crouching eagle”, which looks even more unlikely to be referencing the powerful wings of an eagle, although it does allow for a very piercing look towards your dristhi.
It turns out that the pose references an episode in the Ramayana. Ram, in that story is the mortal incarnation of Vishnu, and is the hero of the tale. His wife, Sita, has been carried off by the evil demon king, and Ram, with his brother and the monkey soldiers are in hot pursuit. The evil king sends his serpents to stop our hero. They bind him up tight and are squeezing the life out of him – That’s where the wrapping of the limbs in the pose comes from. Garuda swoops down to the rescue and saves Ram. That’s where the pose gets it’s name.
So why has my body been calling for that pose? It’s a physical expression of my emotional state. I feel bound by duty at this stage of my life. Ram is the exemplar of the dutiful “servant of dharma”. But the duties are binding and constricting, like the snakes, and I long for Garuda to come rescue me.
Where will Garuda come from? Thanks to Carl Jung, Thich Nat Han and many others, I know that Garuda flies on the wings of grace, and will emerge from within my own centre when the moment is right.
Until then, I must keep balancing on one foot and breathing.
Om Shanti 29 March, 2020.
