Use Your Eyes
By Gail, 15 April, 2010
Have you ever noticed how often your teacher makes reference to the use of your eyes in a Bikram Yoga class ‘look in the mirror’, ‘keep your eyes open’, ‘look up’. In Bikram Yoga you learn to focus your eyes, instead of allowing your eyes to be soft you learn to direct your gaze with purpose. Looking in the mirror not only helps to correctly align your body in the postures, your gaze can help direct the energy of a posture and help you stay mentally clear. Your gaze can help in many postures. In balancing postures setting your gaze straight ahead in the mirror can help keep you upright. You can deepen you backward bends by focusing your gaze as far back as possible, in spine twisting your gaze can help you turn further and in the spine series you can use your gaze to lift yourself higher in the postures. Remember where your eyes look your body follows.
The next time you are in class, notice how you use your eyes. Are you sharp and precise in your focus, or do your eyes seem to wander? See if focusing your eyes more carefully can improve your postures and also focus your mind.