Garudasana | Eagle pose
Garuda – Eagle, asana – pose
Eagle pose also known as garudasana improves your balance and stretches your upper back, shoulders and outer thighs. Regularly practicing this pose will strengthen your legs, knees and ankles. This pose opens the pelvic area and creates space between shoulder blades.
Your spine should be erect and hips and shoulder face forward. Breathing evenly and gazing at a distance of about 4 or 5 feet away will help you in maintaining balance. Do not grip the floor or the mat with toes, since this will make balancing harder. Be cautious if you have shoulder, arm, and hip or knee problems. If you have shoulder or arm problems, keep your arms in the prayer pose. Lifting the hands and arms toward the ceiling without straining the shoulders will increase the stretch in the arms and shoulders. Lightly touch the wall while performing the pose or doing only the arm movements will help you remain balanced and have a great shoulder stretch. ↑
Precaution of garudasana
- Avoid practicing this pose if you’ve had a recent knee, ankle or elbow injury.
- In the event that you are experiencing knee harm or joint-torment, then you should not perform this asana. Likewise, if there should arise an occurrence of pregnancy and corpulence, you are prompted not to go in for this kind of asana. Rather you can do Tadasana. In the event that an individual is experiencing migraine or circulatory strain issues, he/she is not permitted to practice Garudasana. On the off chance that you confront any sort of issues while performing these exercises, you ought to counsel a yoga educator. They will control you and help in tackling the difficulties that you confront. ↑
Procedure of Garudasana
- Begin by standing in Tadasana.
- Bend your knees and lift your left foot up to cross it over the right one.
- Ensure that right foot is firmly placed on the floor and the left thigh is over the right thigh. Your left foot’s toes should be pointing downwards.
- Bring your arms forwards while keeping them parallel to the floor.
- Cross the right arm over the left one and bend your elbows so that your arms are now perpendicular to the floor. Ensure that the back of your hands are facing each other.
- Slowly turn the hands so that the palms face each other.
- Pressing the palms together, stretch the fingers upwards.
- Keeping your gaze focused at one place, stay in this pose for a couple of breaths.
- Slowly release the hands and bring them to the side of your body.
- Raise your left leg and place it back on the floor and slowly come back into Tadasana. ↑
Benefits of garudasana
- Stretches the hips, thighs, shoulders and upper back.
- Improves balance.
- Strengthens the calves.
- Helps alleviate sciatica and rheumatism.
- Loosens the legs and hips, making them more flexible. ↑
