Posture of the month: Ganda Bherundasana
In Indian mythology, the Ganda Bherunda is an intimidating, formidable bird with two heads - an incarnation of Vishnu who can travel time, has tremendous magical powers and feeds on elephants.
To this day, the Ganda Bherunda is the official emblem of Karnataka (a state in India), after being a royal symbol of the Mysore kingdom in this region for centuries.
In Sanskrit, Ganda Bherundasana means formidable face posture. (From Ganda: face/cheek, Bherunda: terrible/formidable/frightening and Asana: posture).
Read on to learn about Ganda Bherunda’s background story, and find out about the multitude of health benefits you can gain from practicing this challenging but rewarding inversion…
The Ganda Bherunda in Indian mythology
The story of the Ganda Bherunda can be traced back to the Puranas, a vast and ancient genre of Indian literature. In one of these scriptures, Lord Vishnu appeared on earth to defeat the evil demon king Hiranyakashipu and save his son, the young, saintly Prahlada. To defeat the almost invincible demon, Vishnu appeared in his form as Narasimhadeva - an awe inspiring beast, half-lion and half-man.
In the story, after killing the demon and having tasted his blood, Narasimhadeva turns into a destroyer due to uncontrollable rage. To bring the earth back to balance and tame Narasimha, Lord Shiva (Vishnu’s best friend) takes the form of Sharabha: part-lion and part-elephant. After he tames the beast, Sharabha ,in turn, becomes destruction personified. So Vishnu has to incarnate as Ganda Bherunda and tame Sharabha. Hence, he is often depicted as defeating and/or eating elephants.
In an interesting depiction titled the chain of destruction, a deer is prey to a large python. In turn, the python is being lifted by an elephant, who then is attacked by a lion. This lion is being devoured by Sharabha who, in the last scene, is destroyed by Ganda Bherunda.
The benefits of practicing Ganda Bherundasana
As an advanced backbend posture, Ganda Bherundasana requires a proper warmup and quite some practice - ideally with the guidance of an experienced teacher. There are several contraindications (situations in which you shouldn’t practice the Chin Stand): If you are suffering from a back injury, have issues with your neck or heart, suffer from high blood pressure or any other intestinal disorders, please let your teacher know and practice one of the preliminary postures instead. If, however, you are practicing Ganda Bherundasana, it will help you:
Strengthen your back, hips, pelvis and legs
Stretch and tone your spinal nerves
Improve the flexibility in your back
Improve your overall balance
To find a step by step video, check out last year’s chin stand blog post.
And as always, remember to come along to Flex regularly and practice with us! There are over 25 classes/week, and we will practice Ganda Bherundasana daily during all of July 2020!
Flex Yoga Teacher Jay, practicing the Chin Stand during his holidays at the Maledives…