Problems with Head Stand

[Bridgette]

Not being a teacher I can't fully address alignment however I would like to comment on fear. Fear is the reason I started yoga. I suffered from severe anxiety that was not able to be controlled by meds. I experienced problems in tree pose, the crow, and headstand. I attributed all of this to the general fear. It's a natural instinct but can also be over-come when necessary through one important tool...

BREATHING!!!

A good powerful breath will carry you. I started against a wall of course and felt rather weighted down both physically and mentally. I had alot of self doubt purely because like mentioned earlier extra weight in the thighs and butt can make the pose difficult. While this is very true if you envision yourself as a blade of grass simply rising after the weight of rain had fallen off you can defiantly accomplish it.

I'm still working on doing a free-standing head stand with fairly good progress. One thing that helps is laying a bunch of pillows behind me. It makes for a comfortable landing.

Before you can walk, you must first learn to fall.

[yogabond]

Originally Posted by ELNINO

How do you strengthen your neck? Is holding half-headstand for 5 breaths or so on a regular basis a good way to do it?

I also come from a martial arts background so some of what I do I take from that course of study. I find the best way for me to work out my neck is doing kip-ups. Be careful with it, you will only need to do 5 or so every few days when you are getting started. You may not realize how much you work your neck out like this when you don't do these often.

Basically you lay down on your back and kick up onto your feet. At the most basic stage you will use your arms heavily. To work out your neck use your neck and head to help push your self up. Eventually you can work up to not using your arms at all and just your momentum and a neck strength to kick yourself up. Has a lot to do with your overall core strength.

If you don't want to start there a lot of gyms offer specific equipment for resistance training the neck muscles.

Here are some clips:

YouTube - Kip Up Tutorial
YouTube - No hand KipUp

[suryadaya]

Originally Posted by Ananda

Hari Om
I hv been practicing Integral Yoga for five years and I still hv this problems with the Head Stand. I wonder if it brings memories of a past life because the "fright" I feel cannot be normal. If any of you hv tips, adv or comments they will be most welcome.
Love & Light

Hello Ananda! I'm not sure how far you've progressed since you originally posted, but I thought I'd offer you some advice on what works best for me.

I don't practice against the wall. I rarely get up there if I try. I practice against the front of the couch and now sometimes just freestanding since I've gotten better. I theorize that when the wall is there I am too conscious of trying to space myself far enough so I don't hit that wall because it will mean that I have gone too far -- and then pushing myself back off the wall will usually overexert and bring me back down. When that support is not there, I wave upside-down in the air in freedom until I find my balance, or if end up going to far back then I land in an sloppy backbend on my couch cushions and am perfectly fine.

I used to have the same irrational fear of going up into the inversion that you have - fears that I wouldn't make it, that i'd fall off to the side and land on my head, that my neck would crack into pieces, that I was a weakling etc etc)... and nothing like that has happened yet. I've had the same irrational fears about most backbends too. Each time I overcome them its as though suddenly I understand the whole world for a while until the next obstacle arrives. There is a quote from Vivekananda that says "It is fearlessness that brings heaven in a moment".

Sometimes it also helps to think of all things you have done that you never thought you could before, or that other people cannot surpass because of their own self-limitations. For instance - I can lift a couch, change the fuel lines on my car, work 70 hours a week, be compassionate in the face of adversity and learn to speak Hindi but for some reason I am scared to death of bending over backwards into chakrasana. Now - if I can get into chakrasana from the floor with ease and comfort, even crawl around sorta in it - why can't I just slowly lower into it? A great internal burning fear that occurs somewhere halfway backwards where I suddenly just can't go any further and I sit down or stop.

Guess I'll have to take my own advice and go try it in front of my couch.

[YatraYoga]

I think one of the keys to headstand is to Relax into it. For years, I thought my arms were simply not strong enough, or my core, so I'd strain. I wasn't able to get into the pose until 1) I dropped my fear, and 2) while against the wall, literally focusing on relaxing the upper body while in the pose. So much is about surrender in this practice, no? All the best to you.

[spyrotone]

Om to the wise,

All due respect to you Yatra, this is highly inadvisable. Please! The only thing we want to "surrender" in asana practice is ego, and NOT THE RULES! I do not write here to criticize anyone, but only for the safety of those seeking fulfillment in their practice.

Propping oneself up against the wall and stacking weight into the neck and relaxing in this way is unwise, neglectful and a gross misinterpretation of the posture, completely missing the potential it offers.

Whichever way one chooses to practice sirshasana, it's important to understand, injury sustained by performing this asana incorrectly may not show up today or tomorrow, but rather next year or the next, or even in ten, after which correction becomes quite difficult or maybe impossible.

Rules are rules. Don't underestimate their significance. Or, why would we have them?

Om Shanti,

Emil

[YatraYoga]

Thanks for your response my friend. I swear I read that very instruction in a yoga magazine this winter... Maybe what really happened is that I surrendered the ego first, and had a bit more success? Regardless, safety is always first, and I appreciate your reply, as I grow into my practice and learn, literally, every single day. Namaste!

[Hubert]

Originally Posted by yogabond

I also come from a martial arts background so some of what I do I take from that course of study. I find the best way for me to work out my neck is doing kip-ups.

YouTube - Kip Up Tutorial
YouTube - No hand KipUp

If I had the agility, spine condition, and strenght to do a kip-up, I would stop doing asanas alltogheter and concentrate on meditative practices.
To use kip-ups to strenghten the neck muscles, in order to perform headtsand ... seems a bit far fetched to me. But each to his own.