The head loop

This week’s class focused on head loop, the seventh and final loop in
the body. This is a subtle loop and over engagement can cause the airway to
constrict, blocking energy and airflow. To find proper alignment and to practice
engaging this loop Melonie instructed us to place our hands on the back of our
heads at a place directly in line with our ears, or ‘ponytail placement,’ tip ours
heads back as if taking a drink (a cocktail perhaps?), and then to slowly engage
the loop by lifting up from the back of the head as if pulling the ponytail up. This
causes the chin to come down slightly and the back of the neck to elongate and
extend. When aligned correctly, this loop can engage other loops in the body,
such as kidney and pelvic loop, and cause the tailbone to lengthen, abdomen
to draw in and up, and the kidneys to puff (it’s subtle, Melonie insists). We
practiced this maneuver in poses like Parvotanasana (extended side angle
pose), Virabhadrasana I (Warrior I), and Trikonasana (triangle pose).
We also practiced many a three legged dogs as a warm up. Special
attention was given to the alignment of the arms and the gaze, which is three
to six inches behind the hands when in Adho Mukha Svanasana (downward
facing dog). We ‘experimented’ (Melonie was high on Yoga) with sun salutations
where we were feet gazers only for one round and then visual ignorers of feet
for another round. We noticed that when visual attention is given to the feet, the
front part of the body contracts and movement between poses becomes more
challenging. As non feet gazers, we saw that more openings were created in the
body and transitions were more fluid, such as when moving from Adho Mukha
Svanasana to lung pose, to Utanasana (the trick is, the butt leads the way, not
the foot).
The culminating pose was Wild Thing (Unmaditasana?) to Chakrasana
(Wheel pose). This is a very disorienting pose as the hand has to spin so that
the fingers are facing the feet in order to get into Chakrasana. We practiced
manually externally rotating the arm bone into the shoulder socket from
Vasisthasana (side plank) and then curling the upper body back as in Camel
pose, moving the truck of the body away from the arm on the floor towards the
knees in order to get the space needed to turn the body and come into wheel
pose. Done in this way, we were protecting our shoulders from being the sole
body part responsible for moving into the full pose.
It was a great class- I look forward to next week with all seven loops at
once (yikes!)