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I’ve had my share of identification crises. From after I suffered my first predominant hurt and could not apply nor educate yoga, to after I moved from Los Angeles to San Francisco and felt torn between the two cities, and most not too way back, in the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic, after I (like most lecturers) needed to decide learn how to stipulate myself on this sea of digital yoga.
Nonetheless the most important identification shift of all has been becoming a mother. My son is now one-and-a-half years outdated, and though I am nearly once more to instructing the equivalent classes and doing the equivalent bodily actions that I was doing earlier to having him, I actually really feel totally modified, internally. It’s like starting and ending a yoga class within the equivalent pose—it couldn’t outwardly appear as for those who’ve carried out quite a bit, nonetheless inside you feel as for those who’ve been totally rearranged.
Using postures to satisfy ourselves the place we’re
Eka Pada Koundinyasana II has been a provide of an identification catastrophe for me, too. In my early years of instructing and coaching, it felt like a marker of capability. A method to face out in packed circulation classes. I seen it as a pose I wanted to do to indicate my superior skills. The teacher would say, “And do you have to do Flying Splits, go for it” (often pretty casually, I might observe) and I’d arm steadiness and kick my legs out in opposing directions, with no regard for the water bottles shut by or my neighbor’s head for that matter. Internally, feeling like, “See? I did it! I am a sophisticated yogi!”
As a result of the years went on and I confronted a laundry document of accidents and life modifications, I started to be way more thought-about about this (and totally different) so-called “superior” poses. Over time, I found myself coaching it solely after I used to be accurately warmed up and it was the peak pose versus making it some pointless add-on to knee to reverse elbow. After which I had a toddler, which meant nearly two years of not doing it (spoiler alert: being pregnant is 10 months) and after I attempted it for the first time, my variation was faraway from what it was:
The place I used to soar, I fell flat on my face.
The place I used to essentially really feel sturdy, I felt weak and rickety.
Nonetheless there was one different big shift. The place I as quickly as used the pose as a measure of how superior I was—the place I as quickly as had to do it to indicate my value—I now really have the benefit of working the prep poses as an alternative. In some strategies, additional so than the overall issue, because of after I’m supported with props or the wall, I can actually preserve the pose and profit from the expansive nature of it.
See moreover: 4 Poses and a Meditation to Ease Postpartum Melancholy and Nervousness
Faucet into the ability of pose variations
My ongoing experiences via the years of with the power to bodily do one factor after which no longer with the power to, or on the very least not nearly as merely, led me to ponder the following question: If we’re not doing the overall expression of a pose, does that indicate we’re not doing the pose? What makes a pose a pose?
And what if we might on no account do the “full expression” of the pose inside the first place? After we apply a modified or additional accessible mannequin, does this indicate we’re not doing the pose?
A scorching topic amongst lecturers who’re working onerous to create inclusive yoga areas is regarding the time interval “modification.” Some people actually really feel that the time interval modification implies that the propped-up type is “decrease than” or additional beginner. Possibly because of one in every of many points we unconsciously say as lecturers is, “and for these of you doing the overall pose…” In its place, people are asking that we use the phrase “variation” as the concept is that the phrase implies that regardless of mannequin any individual takes that is most relevant for his or her physique, stays to be the pose.
See moreover: 15 Typical Poses + Variations
Exploring a definite technique to “superior yoga”
Tamika Caston-Miller, curator of Ashé Yoga and co-owner of the Ranch Houston, explains why she prefers the phrase variation: “Using utterly totally different language to deal with a regression or a growth inadvertently creates ranges of yoga when yoga is previous a functionality or choice to hold one’s physique proper right into a type. The physique modifications, our desires change, accidents occur, and as our refined yoga apply deepens, we might choose a variation of the pose that outwardly appears to be like a beginner posture, nonetheless inwardly shows a sophisticated practitioner’s consciousness of what he/she/they sense inside the physique.”
Regardless of you should title it—a variation or modification, like Caston-Miller explains—any change you make to a posture so to work it in another way does not indicate you are not doing the pose. That’s the superior apply: understanding what your physique desires and making intelligent choices.
Eka Pada Koundinyasana II embodies this truth. I don’t know of one other posture that goes by so many alternative names. From Hurdler’s Pose to Albatross to Flying Splits to what we title it proper right here at Yoga Journal, Pose Dedicated to the Sage Koundinya II. Considering that it has so many alternative interpretations reminds us that there is not a a way to do this posture. And that prop variations, whether or not or not the intention is to make a pose additional accessible or harder, are full poses unto themselves.
3 strategies to utilize props to maneuver into Eka Pada Koundinyasana II
Do some warm-up strikes much like Cat-Cow, plenty of Photo voltaic Salutations, perhaps a hip opener or two, then have the benefit of this gratifying Eka Pada Koundinyasana II prop apply.

Eka Pada Koundinyasana II, variation (With a chair and arms on blocks)
Benefits of this variation: There’s some debate amongst yoga lecturers over what is happening with the doorway leg on this pose. Some people think about it to be externally rotated (turned out), nonetheless when you prop the posture and preserve it, you observe that the lifted leg is prepared of abduction, which implies the leg is being taken straight off to the side. The props on this variation assist you uncover this movement, with out weight-bearing, so you can preserve the pose longer, which helps to elongate the groin.
Place a chair on the prime of your mat, so that the seat is coping with you. Kneel onto your shins so the chair is to your correct. Organize two blocks in entrance of you on the low setting. Ship your leg off to the side and up onto the chair. Your leg is straight and the inseam of your full shin and knee are on the chair seat. Work your correct shoulder beneath your leg and place your arms onto the blocks. Bend your elbows to create a shelf alongside along with your correct arm. Your left elbow is hugged in by your side and your hips are the equivalent stage as your shoulders. Attain your chest forward and gaze barely ahead. Take 10 breaths. Straighten your arms. Take away your leg from the chair and swap your physique spherical to do side two.

In Pada Koundinyasana II, variation (Standing up on the wall)
Benefits of this variation: Whereas doing this pose, it is doable you may actually really feel like just a little little bit of a “splat bug.” Fortunately, the wall is an unimaginable provide of help. It allows you to obtain the advantage of the adductor launch (your inside thighs) of the lifted leg, whereas moreover opening the hip flexors of the standing thigh—all with out having to bear weight in your arms or concern about steadiness. Which begs the question: In case you aren’t balancing in your arms, is it nonetheless an arm steadiness? We want to suppose so.
Uncover a nook in your space that is away from picture frames or furnishings. Stand about 6 inches from the wall and pull your left knee into your chest. Open your thigh to the left side and use your arms to straighten the leg, placing your foot inside the crease of the nook of the place the partitions meet each other. Bend your elbows and place your palms on the wall at lower ribcage and even hip peak.
Proceed to face tall, even when it means you may’t get your leg over your shoulder. Make the scale and spaciousness of this variation additional needed than hoisting the leg over your shoulder. Widen your collarbones and lengthen by means of your crown. Keep for 10 breaths. Use the wall for steadiness and can be found out slowly. Shift to the adjoining wall, sooner than taking the second side.

Eka Pada Koundinyasana II, variation (Heels at wall, blocks beneath shoulders)
Benefits of this variation: One amongst my favorite hands-on adjustments on this pose is holding any individual’s once more leg. It gives them the boldness to fly. The props on this variation current that help, which in some strategies is even cooler, because of it implies that ultimately, we’re holding ourselves up. With barely help from the wall, in spite of everything.
You will begin in Plank Pose alongside along with your heels on the wall, nonetheless sooner than you come into the pose, organize 4 blocks, stacked as extreme as they have to be to help your shoulders in a Chaturanga. I am barely over 5’8” with fairly prolonged arms and the height that labored for me was the underside block on its face and the best block on medium. Your organize will doable be utterly utterly totally different. The gratifying is in figuring out what works for you! Within the occasion you solely have two blocks, try using them on medium and in depth and even tall peak.
From Plank alongside along with your heels on the wall, exhale and produce your correct inside thigh in direction of your correct increased arm and begin to bend your elbows in direction of Chaturanga, making your arms proper right into a shelf for the within leg. Prop the fronts of your shoulders in your blocks and straighten your correct leg to the side. Attain your chest forward, nonetheless on the same time, press your once more heel strongly into the wall. Keep proper right here for 10 breaths. Bend your lifted leg and return a supported Chaturanga sooner than lowering to your knees and getting ready in your second side.
Watch this prop apply in movement
Should be taught additional? Sarah Ezrin walks us by means of the three methods to profit from props to hunt out new expressions of this difficult posture.
See moreover:
Inversion Downside With DJ Townsel: Simple strategies to Nail Transitions
Use Core Energy for Simple Transitions in Photo voltaic Salutations
Additional yoga sequences by Sarah Ezrin
Sarah Ezrin is a yoga teacher coach, mama, motivator, and creator. Based out of San Francisco, the place she lives collectively along with her husband, son, and their canine, Sarah is altering the world, instructing self-love one specific individual at a time. Examine additional at sarahezrinyoga.com