YOGAJOURNAL.COM / 60 / FEBRUARY 2018
Why Should We Understand the Planes?
In a word: proprioception. This refers to the body’s ability to sense
joint position and movement, enabling you to know where your
body is in space without having to look—and to know how much
force is needed to create movement. It helps us feel grounded and
balanced, and it allows us to move in and out of yoga poses safely.
Proprioception can be enhanced over time with mindful, repetitive
movements, such as asana.
One of the obstacles to healthy proprioception is chronic,
unconscious, habitual patterns in the body. Whether these patterns
arise from injury or overuse doesn’t matter; they aff ect your posture
and keep you moving in habitual ways. To wit: Take a moment to
think about your highly mobile shoulder joint, which is built to
move in many diff erent directions. If you start to favor moving it
just one way—say, reaching your arms forward and up in the sagit-
tal plane and avoiding reaching them out to the sides in the coronal
plane—that pattern can create an imbalance in the joint, leading to
chronic pain and even injury.
One way to wake up from these unconscious patterns is to try
less familiar movements and shapes in the planes you tend to avoid,
which will help bring fl exibility to stuck areas and strength to weak
ones. Exploring simple movements in all three planes, especially
your nondominant one(s), with an open, playful attitude—frustra-
tion and shame are not helpful here!—can help you develop new
neuromuscular pathways and more balanced movement patterns.
Over time, there’s a good chance you’ll fi nd this leads to more effi -
cient posture, improved balance, and healthier joints.
If you’re a yoga teacher, including poses and cues that take
your students through all three planes (whether you name them
or not) can help them develop healthy and balanced bodies.
What’s more, using the framework of the planes to see distortions
and imbalances in a yoga practitioner’s body can help you use
more eff ective cues.
As you try to understand and analyze how you move separately
in each of the planes, keep in mind that the goal isn’t to dissect the
body. After all, the body exists in all three planes at the same time.
The point of this work is to try to bring the body into balance in all
three planes, at all times, to create a feeling of wholeness. This, I
believe, is one of the keys to feeling more embodied, both on and
off the mat.
OUR PRO Teacher Annie Carpenter is a yoga teacher
and teacher trainer in San Francisco. She’s also the creator
of the SmartFLOW method, which she teaches in classes,
workshops, and her 200- and 500-hour teacher trainings
across the globe. Learn more at anniecarpenter.com. Model
Cynthia Sing is a yoga teacher, a rock climber, and a student
of Carpenter’s who lives in Boulder, Colorado.Put the planes
into practice
Want to get comfortable with these ana-
tomical planes and expand your movement
range (or teaching skills)? Start here:
STEP 1 Make lists of your 10 favorite, and
10 least favorite, poses. Consider which
poses you tend to practice at home and
which ones you avoid.
STEP 2 Determine the primary plane
for each of the poses on your lists.
STEP 3 Name the planes in which you
seem to be most and least comfortable.
STEP 4 Create a list of poses from your
least favorite plane, and plan to practice
these poses several times a week. Are
these poses challenging for you? Are they
easy? How do you feel when you practice
more from the plane in which you’re least
comfortable? Get curious.
STEP 5 After a couple weeks of practicing
your least favorite poses, go deeper with
your line of questioning: What has practicing
movements you’d been avoiding revealed?
(Yes, I am talking poses—and anything else
you tend to avoid in life.)
If you’re a teacher, take these same steps
when it comes to assessing your go-to
sequences: Look at the poses you teach
often, as well as the themes that you choose
for your classes. Which plane is over-
represented? Which one(s), if any, are under-
represented? Do you tend to teach the plane
that is your personal favorite and avoid the
one that’s your least favorite?
Finally, whether you’re teaching or simply
moving through your own home practices,
commit to creating sequences that include
poses that highlight your least utilized plane.
How do you feel when you practice (or teach)
them? How does your body feel after a few
weeks of moving in your less utilized plane?
Do you feel more embodied? Are your
movements more balanced in all three
planes? See if these simple inquiries help
you feel more awake and whole.