The Saddle Pose with Knee Issues

One of the reasons why I want to be able to achieve the full saddle pose is to cure my digestion problems. In another school of yoga, this is known as vajrasana or something along that line.

Doing the saddle pose is painful. Maybe I am bony because I can feel my ankles and legs digging into the floor. So to solve that problem I do the saddle pose on the bed.

Then comes another problem. My knee screams at me. I have to pile up a stack of pillows and cushions behind me and rest my back on the pile. If I still feel knee pain, I have to raise the stack higher until I feel no more strain or pain. Great! I can now stay in this pose for 5 minutes! I have been practicing this for a few weeks now. No pain during the pose.

But there is another problem after that. Whenever I come out from that pose, my ankles feel stiff and painful. I have to slowly flex my feet to get the blood circulating again.

To go an extra step further, I tip toe around the room for one minute and then walk on my heels with my toes pointing up for another minute. My feet feel so much better after that.

To end it off I then do the tree pose for a minute in each leg. The tree pose has its own set of benefits. It trains your reflexes to balance yourself and break your fall faster. There is a saying that our reflexes tend to slow down as we age so the tree pose helps prevent this. The tree pose is also a good grounding exercise if you are into chakra stuff.

And now back to saddle pose. I always have this fear I might hurt my back. I am not sure if we can break our backs if we bend back too much. My pillows and cushions are there to assure me but still...sometimes the scary thought crosses my mind.

It's also been a few days since I modified my caterpillar pose or forward bend. I didn't practice last night as I was too tired. Not much progress there yet. Will I ever achieve my target? I don't know. What the gurus say about yin yoga, I can only confirm months or years later.