Shavasana In The Float Tank; The First Ten Sessions
- By Chuck Seegert
- October 21, 2014
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Combining yoga and floating to pursue meditative growth begins. For me, the most obvious place where these practices cross over is shavasana, or corpse pose in the tank. Here I review the first 10 sessions and what I’ve learned.
While not an expert, I’ve been engaging in the physical practice of yoga for about two years now. Sometimes five times a week, sometimes only two or three times a week. Usually I did this at a gym where I was a member and one thing that seemed consistent to me as I went through these classes was that shavasana never seemed to be long enough.
While extolling the restorative virtues of shavasana and often saying things like: “It’s the most important pose in your practice!”, the instructors never failed to cut it off after about five to seven minutes. I was just settling in and beginning to start relaxing myself at that point.
As I brought my float tank online, I realized I had a unique opportunity to use that resource to rectify my shavasana complaints and maybe take things to a new level with yoga in general.
Approach/Methods
To incorporate floating into shavasana and the yoga practice I am required to do the yoga near the tank. My goal was to incorporate it into the practice with as little variation from what is normally done in a yoga session. So I would do my yoga session, typically a 40-60 minute practice then prepare myself for two to three minutes (ear plugs etc…) and get in the tank for shavasana.
Settling in the tank is important and more float tank than yoga focused as the goal is to allow the agitation to the fluid that I caused by getting in to dissipate. I usually center myself and then keep my arms touching the edges of the tank until the waves stop and I can gently disengage from the edges. The goal being to disengage such that there is no motion that will lead you to touch the side of the tank during the session.
My relaxation method is one I’ve used over the years, sometimes to help me fall asleep, sometimes after a strenuous workout to help recovery. It starts in the lower body with my feet and legs. I imagine them relaxing and do what I imagine is a “neural disconnect”, where I mentally remove all voluntary signals that are going to the lower body. This generally encompasses everything from the top of my pelvis down (this is probably at the level of 3rd of 4th lumbar vertebrae). It is relatively easy for the lower body, the higher portion of the lumbar spine region is a little more challenging.
Once the lower body is relaxed, I start on the upper body, which is again more challenging given my need to breathe. I start with my upper extremities, working through the shoulders to my back muscles and disconnect them one side at a time and them allow this feeling to continue down my spine. Given the relative absence of gravity, I can feel the lumbar spine opening, or that space between vertebrae expanding. This leads to what I believe is stretching of the connective tissues and ligaments around the vertebral column and something I can particularly feel in the lumbar spine.
What I’ve described to this point is equivalent to the muscle relaxation and sense withdrawal portions described at Yoga Art+Science.com on the Shavasana page. It takes about four to five minutes to attain this.
Breathing is the next focus as I attempt to do it with the least amount of muscular involvement. I focus on belly breathing from the “tantien” as it was referred to in my martial arts days. Flowing… each inhalation and exhalation blending continuously together… only taking as much air as I need, not more… This may take another two or three minutes.
Finally, the meditative state, where I practice observing thoughts and disengage from them when I start to be drawn into them. Sometimes, to help reduce the quantity of thoughts I focus on ujayyi breathing for a short time.
Once the sessions are complete, I then enter my impressions in a journal kept for this purpose.
Outcomes/Excerpts From Journal Entries
5 August 2014 ~1202- Session #1
I did manage to keep my eyes open pretty well (keeping my eyes open helps prevent getting too relaxed and falling asleep) and I experienced some visual displays, though minor, the auditory were more prominent and pretty much random. My body relaxed in an amazing way and was able to let any remaining tension from my exercise go. I had a sensation of floating to the right briefly, which was interesting because a few minutes later I realized that in reality I had floated to the left because there was a small light leak that could only be visible from that side of the door. I re-centered in the tank and again made effort not to dwell on thoughts that were entering my mind.
I was somewhat successful at this, but eventually I did come close to sleeping with the only hypnic jerks I experienced happening to my jaw, which tends to snap close when I start to sleep. This is a particularly annoying thing because my lip tends to droop down inside my teeth and in the past I have repeatedly bitten the inside of my lower lip. Painful! This time I avoided that and used it to reawaken and concentrate on seeing the darkness.
The most notable part of the experience was coming out of the tank, which is pretty common for me. The air (even in the summer when it’s 90 degrees outside) is fresh on my skin, cooling the moisture from the water, the colors and sights exist in sparkling clarity and the smells wash over me in waves. Today it is a rainy day in Northern California where I live and I smelled the dampness of the earth, the dry and dead grasses that are now moistened. When I take out my earplugs a small ditch that crosses the ranch chuckles in a soothing way and I hear its every splash and bubble. I wash the salt off with a cool shower and dry myself feeling fresh and reborn.
As I reenter my life the pressures of deadlines and even writing this entry start to reinstate themselves in my mind. To me this is probably the greatest way to become aware of the “The Deep Self”, or “The Center of the Cyclone”, as John Lilly put it. That is: I become most aware of it when I leave it.
And so, I walk up the hill and face the blank page.
15 September 2014 ~1256- Session #2
So, I did a full session of P90X yoga and then climbed into the tank for an open ended shavasana session in the tank that lasted 27 minutes. I focused on letting go of my body and getting all muscles relaxed, something the tank is especially good for. I went into a power nap sort of state and avoided snapping on my lip when I had a little jaw based hypnic jerk. I had a couple other small hypnic jerks, but not much. I did notice a little bit of work in relaxing my fingers or they would develop a feeling that they were under slight amounts of tension.
Now that I’m out and I’ve showered I feel pretty good. Wrung out of all the poisons. I’m ready for an afternoon’s worth of various kinds of work.
16 September 2014 ~1241- Session #3
Today I did my own yoga routine that I made up on the fly. I focused on torso flexibility and wringing poisons out of my quads and hips. After ~30-35 minute session, maybe a little longer I went into the tank.
After that I settled in and let the images of the day flow out of me. I started ujayyi breathing and with the disconnection of voluntary muscle action on each exhale. The whole body eventually being relaxed, I started focusing a little on my vision for myself and my body and the incorporation of the exercise I’d just undertaken into my body as I heal and adjust to it.
Eventually, all images left me and I was on a verge of sleeping and waking. I almost fell asleep, but I had sensation of a hand reaching out and grabbing me under the chin and shaking once and that brought me back from that edge. I was disconnected from my body and focusing on things, or nothing outside my body.
Again it was a balance between waking and sleeping.
19 September 2014 ~1716- Session #4
So, today I wasn’t feeling on top of my game. I did about 25-30 minutes of yoga, but it was a lackluster practice. I climbed in the tank and did about a 21 minutes shavasana. It was somewhat unremarkable except I needed to scratch a couple places that were bothering me. Through ujjayi breathing I did finally reach a quiet state where everything was quiet in my mind. My right shoulder was tight and distracted me as well.
23 September 2014 ~1157- Session #5
So, had a nice rigorous session of yoga with the P90X dvd and then immediately climbed into the tank. I let my mind wander each time it latched onto a thought I would eventually remember to let it go. I didn’t sleep, though it is very close to power napping it seems. I did focus on relaxing my body completely and incorporating the exercise into my body.
It was exactly 20 minutes and I came out of it relaxed and rejuvenated. That is a heck of a way to unload anxieties, or build up of information overload and reset things. Amazing and awesome. I feel great. Especially after last night when I woke so early. I did lose some sleep despite the restful sleep I get in the tank.
On another note, yoga and floating seem to be reversing the effects of my carpal tunnel syndrome. I will follow this more closely.
29 September 2014 ~1312- Session #6
So today I did the P90X yoga again and I marvel at where I am again. I feel weak! Anyway, I had a 20 minute float and was more conscious this time, less power nap-like. I felt very relaxed as I started the float with the intention of internalizing the yoga practice and having my body absorb and grow stronger from it.
I floated without event and had a tactile display in my left small toe, which led me to believe that I was touching the side of the tank. I reached out and there was no tank there. Similarly, I had another tactile sensation in one of my right fingers making me think I was touching the tank again, but no, it wasn’t there when I reached out.
Again very well rested and wrung out of the poisons.
2 October 2014 ~1449- Session #7
So today I did a P90X session that I noticed some improvement with on the challenging poses. Seemed to be a little left side stronger on some of my poses. Anyway, I had a 13 minute shavasana session characterized by a settling down of the mind where I eventually watched images and thoughts come out of my mind. Eventually reaching a quiet state where I was verging on sleep, after which I came back and started to emerge.
I felt renewed as usual when I came out, smells were distinct to me and the air very fresh. No remarkable visual or auditory displays.
7 October 2014 ~1226- Session #8
So today I did the Rodney Yee yoga, which is better than the P90X in my opinion. He is a real yogi, not a fitness yogi dabbler. In any event, I did an 18 minute Shavasana in the tank and settled into a quiescent state relatively rapidly. I cleared my mind and went to the borderline between sleep and waking, riding the line with much more control now it seems. I had some visual displays including Will Ferrel wearing his Elf outfit and talking about investing in some other clothes.
There were many more that I let come and when I grew too relaxed I roused myself mentally a little then settled again until it went a little past the dividing line a little too close to sleep and I would again return.
9 October 2014 ~1446- Session #9
So, today I had a nice yoga session with the Rodney Yee video and then went into the tank for a 13 minute float. I did my breathing exercises and stilled my mind, eventually leaving the realm of thoughts that might be crossing my mind and entering the one where dream-like visual displays appear pretty much randomly. I’m not sure if this is the desired state for Shavasana, or if I should be more awake. It is restful, but I am wondering if there’s more I should be getting out of it.
13 October 2014 ~1536- Session #10
So, today was my 10th shavasana in the tank. It seems like I am getting more efficient at relaxing and moving past my thoughts. I find that while I’m not asleep, I am close to being asleep and having visual displays similar to dreaming. I am not sure if this is the desired state to achieve at a yogi in shavasana. It is restful and I arise refreshed every time.
Today I had a 17 minute float. I used the Rodney Yee video and did the session up to the point where we do camel pose and then bridge.
Overall Impressions-
It seems like anything that this meditative practice becomes easier the more I do it. The phases of relaxation and settling in lead to reactions in the body that are like sign posts on the edge of a road when you go on a familiar journey. In general it seems like the time required to get to a certain point in the meditation goes faster as I become more familiar, just judging my the timing in the sessions noted above. It also seems that a more thorough shavasana speeds recovery and jump starts the body on the healing cycle by opening pathways for blood and circulation through the relaxation process.
This is only the first 10 sessions, though, we’ll see where it goes from here.
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