Salabha means a locust, grasshopper. The pose is said to resemble a locust resting on the ground.
Salabhasna is a beginning back bend. It builds the strength in the back body to prepare for all of the other back bends. Although it is called a beginner’s pose, it is not that easy to do. Because we spend so much of our time hunched forward, it is often difficult to arch back. The muscles on our back body become atrophied from disuse.
Technique:
Begin by lying on the floor in the prone position. Stretch the arms back.
On an exhalation, simultaneously lift the head, chest and legs off the floor as high as possible. The arms are stretched back alongside the body and lifted off the floor as well. The body weight rests on your abdomen.
Contract the buttocks and stretch the thigh muscles. Keep both legs fully extended and straight.
In the beginning it is difficult to lift the chest and legs off the floor, but this becomes easier as you grow stronger. There are modifications to make it easier: lifting just the front body, lifting just the back body, lifting the opposite arm and leg, lifting one arm and the opposite leg and using props to support the chest or the legs.
The benefits of Salabhasana
This pose is said to aid digestion, relieves stomach problems, improves the function of the bladder and prostate and helps cure flatulence. Arching the back in this way improves elasticity in the spine and can relieve pain in the sacral and lumbar areas. Mr. Iyengar states that regular practice of this pose can help people with disc problems without recourse to surgical treatment.
After all of the other challenging poses we have worked on this year, you may be wondering why I chose Salabhasana. One reason is that it is the one basic back bending pose from which your ability to do all other backbends originates. The other reason has to do with a new word that has been introduced in the English language: “i-hunch”; that head forward position we assume when we are looking at our phones. We are spending more and more time hunched over our electronic devices and it is affecting our posture. Salabhasna is a counter-pose, a remedy if you will, for i-hunch!
Where can we go from here?
Salabhasana is the foundation for other back bends such as Bow, Camel and Wheel. But the strength it develops in the back is also important for Caturanga and the lift you need in Forearm Balance and other arm balances such as Scoprion. So, expect to see some of these other poses in the more advanced classes as we work on Salabhasana to set the foundation.