I just found a new website, called Ask the Swami.com.   It is a treasure trove of recorded lectures made by my teacher, Sri Swami Satchidananda, in which he answers  questions from his students.  Today I watched one about Savaasana, the Corpse Pose.  You can watch it here.

My teacher, SS Satchidananda

In Yoga, we begin to learn how to be still.  It’s the opposite of everything normal in Western culture, where we are constantly busy, achieving and acquiring.  “Getting and spending we lay waste our powers.”, says the American poet William Wordsworth.  But it Yoga, we train the body to slow down, we guide the mind to get quiet, and when we practice these things together in Savaasana, we can allow the body to right itself.  Profound healing can happen in this magical stillness.

So don’t just do something.  Lie there!