Ever since I started my own daily practice, I’ve been meaning to post about the details of surya namaskar, or the standard pattern of poses that comprise the sun salutation. However, I found a page today that serves as a good resource, so rather than paraphrase, I will just thank Kitty Williams for her work and link to her explanation:
Honor the Sun–and Yourself–with a Daily Yoga Sun Salutation
The sequence she diagrams is the sequence I follow, except that in Step 9, I keep the same leg back as I do in Step 4. That is, if I step my right foot back into high lunge, I then step my left foot forward after downward dog. This maintains emphasis on one side (the right leg is long the whole time)–which means a second set with emphasis on the left side is required to complete a cycle. The video Kitty links to at the bottom of her post, which I am embedding here, shows exactly how I do my daily salutes (including the need to pick up my foot for adjustments), minus the beach:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eGXgoW70IB0&feature=player_embedded]
[…] Sri Dharma Mittra is in his seventies and way better at yoga than me. His class tonight was open level, but hardly for beginners–we started off with some nice oms, then shook out our shoulders and wrists, rolled our necks, and embarked on a brisk series of sun salutations that would have left me in the dust if not for my daily practice. […]
[…] want to try that move even if her upper body strength isn’t ready for it. So the version of surya namaskar she is learning–and the one I prefer, anyway–foregoes chaturanga for the simpler […]