Mayurasana

Hi, we're here with our friends Ilana and Betsy, and we're going to demonstrate the Peacock Mayarasana, which is a very, very old yoga asana. It was done originally to stimulate the fire in the belly called the Jatarogni. The yogis in the old days, they didn't eat much food, and they were very concerned about digesting properly what they did eat, and getting rid of the toxins that they didn't need in their bodies. So the pressure of the elbows on the belly in this pose would presumably create that fire, would stoke the fire and help them with their digestion. So the old texts say that you can drink the most virulent poison in the universe and still digest it if you do peacock, but yoga anytime does not suggest you try that at home.

We're going to work with Ilana first as the stand-in for the less experienced student. So the first thing that we'll do for her is bring these blocks into place, and if you could do the back block for yourself, we'll put the block there in front, put the second block behind her, both on their sides. And it's very common when doing this exercise for the elbows to slide apart when they're in place against the lower belly. So the other thing we're going to do with Ilana to demonstrate is we're going to bind her elbows together with this strap. So if you could put these over your forearms and then just slide it up against your upper forearms just under the elbows, yeah, like that.

Now if you separate your knees a little bit apart, put your hands on the floor. And remember when the hands are on the floor like this, these little hollows between the base of the thumb and the base of the little finger want to stay very hollow. So you don't weigh down on the bases of the palms and bring a lot of weight onto the wrists. You want to keep the bases of the index fingers firm to the floor. Now she'll start to walk her knees past her hands, and as she does, she'll bend her elbows and try to tuck the elbows in fairly deep into the lower belly, and that's it.

And then she'll bring her head down onto the front block and start to stretch her legs back to the second block each time with an inhalation. And as you can see, she's nicely supported. Send the tailbone down a little bit more toward the heels. Nope, that's up. Reach the tail, yes, that way. Very nice, and the strap is holding her elbows snug together, and she's very happy in the Mayarasana.

Now to come out, watch please. She'll bend her knees lightly down onto the floor. And I believe she'll have to walk her knees a little bit forward the next step, and then she'll push her torso up with an inhalation. The belt will slide off her forearms. Oh, it won't slide off her forearms. She'll bring it together until Anjali Mudra, that's fine.

Very nicely done. Betsy will start about the same way that Alana started, hands on the floor, fingers pointing back toward her torso, little fingers close together, so the forearms are fairly close and even touching to each other. And again, she'll walk her knees past her hands, and as she does, bend the elbows, and snug the elbows as deeply toward the navel as she can, and then lay her head down on the floor. Inhale one leg back at a time, balls of the feet on the floor. And the first thing to do then is to lift the head away from the floor.

Now if you get to this point, consider it to be a victory, and you can just stay here if you like. But if you want to go a little bit farther, don't try to lift the feet away from the floor. All you need to do is begin to slide the torso a little bit forward, so the forearms are angled slightly relative to the floor, and the feet will just lightly lift away from the floor. Yes. Very nice. She's got it. A little bit more, and she'll have it.

And then exhale, release, bend the knees, sit back on your heels. Well done. Well done. Thank you very much. The Peacock Pose, Mayarasana.