Meditation Positions

This blog accompanies the Whole Health programme 30 Days of Meditation - see here for more details and to sign up

Meditation is not just about sitting

Images of meditation are widespread, often giving the impression that simply sitting serenely is what it's all about.. but meditation is steady, focused, mindful attention - as explored in Whole Heath - and this can be explored in many positions; it is finding ease, comfort and a place where awareness can be cultivated that is the guide for where you need to be at any time. 

Although most meditation images are seated, if you don’t often sit cross-legged, this can initially create more tension in the neck, shoulders, chest, back or hips and dominate the experience. It is better to be fully supported in a way that allows the whole body to rest and the chest to open easily or you can feel like you are swimming upstream rather than flowing with the river. There are enough undercurrents to meet without adding more! This preparation is part of our practice – we can be used to holding ourselves in uncomfortable positions and sometimes cannot recognize where we need to physically let go.

In Zen traditions, four states of ‘being’ are used for different meditation practices and these are a good guide to the possibilities; sitting, lying, standing and walking. These also illustrates the scope for meditation to not have to be rigidly within one set rule of thumb. The moving meditations within Calm Club may help you come down out of your head and into your body if you are prone to a racing mind or anxious thoughts, but you can also try the various positions below to find what suits you at any given time, or as your body opens and your posture changes.

Laying positions

When you are new to the practice or simply feeling tired, laying rather than sitting whilst meditating can create the safety you need, as you don’t have to hold yourself up from gravity. If you have had habits of hunching over a desk or in a chair, then the act of lifting up through the front of the spine needed for comfortable sitting may create tension that may dominate the experience unnecessarily. Coaxing and inviting new body patterns through the movement practices, awareness and also seeing an osteopath, physiotherapist or Rolfer where needed, can lead towards comfortable sitting in meditation in time.

A word of caution though; we may lie down because we feel tired and are therefore much more likely to nod off! Yes you may need the sleep, but ultimately meditation to not just to stay awake, but ‘awakened’ (the meaning of the word Buddha), so a shorter seated practice in a fully supported upright position may be a what you need. Play around as each has a different quality – lying is more restorative, but sitting keeps the brain stem active and consciousness more alert.

Savasana – ‘corpse pose’

This position is fully supported on the floor with the head supported to where the chin drops in lighter towards the throat, particularly key if tightness or rounding in the upper back means the head drops back or chin lifts to the ceiling when lying. Have your feet as wide as comfortable for your lower back.

Savasana – hands into belly

Whilst savasana is ‘classically’ lying with arms out to the side, with room to breathe around the ribs, if you need the comfort and reassurance of touch, do feel free to place your hands on your belly or anywhere else that feels right. You can also put a blanket over you to feel safe and cocooned.

Savasana – legs over a bolster

If you tend to any pinching in the lower back, then placing a bolster, thick rolled blanket or several towels under your knees can relieve that compression there. This is also simply a great position to allow more movement and softness into the lower back and feel the breath in the belly.

Savasana – legs on a chair

If your lower back really struggles when lying, then bringing your lower legs up onto a chair can create the length you may need to feel relief. Have a blanket underneath if you need some more padding and something under your head if it tips back. This can help your lower back by freeing tension in the neck and shoulders, which can track down lower too.

Modern postural issues and sitting

It is not unusual for the majority of a modern day to be spent hunched over a keyboard (the left example in the picture to the right), if this is not with conscious, supported upright posture (the right-hand side example), it can quickly descend into a hunch that can contribute to a collapsed standing posture, where we lift up from the ground ‘up the back and down the front’ rather than the more open, grounding and supportive ‘up the front and down the back’.

This means when it comes to sitting for meditation, we can tend to take this pattern into our upright posture. So if hunched, to look forward we need to tilt the chin up away from the throat as you can see on the skeleton to the left above. This creates compression in the base of the skull; a large source of neck and shoulder pain - 'tech neck' (see above right) which places a huge amount of pressure on the cervical spine or neck, and prevents us from full relaxation mode. When you’re working, lifting up through the front of the spine and moving the eyes, not the head, to look down and/or forward can help to avoid this.
You can see that these two meditation positions above left are collapsed in the spine and front body and the ‘chin-lifting’ habit continues compression in the back of the neck.

Even simply sitting up onto a block or two can help raise the pelvis and create the space to start to lift up through the front of the spine and chest. The illustration to the right above shows how the posture is naturally aligned with ears above shoulders, shoulders above hips

This is also where the arms are easily raised as the chest can open and shoulders stay soft. Finding this lift when sitting where there is uplift through back of the skull – as if it were ‘floating’ above the tailbone – is the optimum position to be able to stay fully present in an upright seated meditation position. See the following options to see where you can most find this upright ease.

Seated Positions

Sitting on a chair

If you sit on a chair often and do little movement to open and create flexibility in the hips, then if you sit cross-legged you may find that you find it difficult to lift up from the back of the pelvis. Sitting on a chair takes the hips out of the equation. Sit to the front of the seat, feet hip width-apart and heels underneath the knees for a stable lower body.

Sitting up onto blocks or a meditation cushion

The pose shown in the middle below is sitting on two yoga blocks to raise the hips above the knees, where we can feel like we lift the abdomen up and out of the pelvis and feel a lightness up through the spine. You may be able to sit on just one block, but it is not simply better to have less; meditation cushions are designed for the optimal support for the pelvis to allow the knees to drop beneath - where the sacrum can be naturally angled forward (about 30 degrees) to retain the supportive inward curve of the lumbar spine. This is where we might rise up with ease through the curves of the spine (which should never be 'straight'!) - where the neck does not have to strain  Find where your knees drop most easily and let your arms drop, elbows beneath your shoulders.

Virasana – hero pose

If your hips are tight or have lowered range of motion, then supported versions of virasana can help you raise up out of the pelvis, sitting up on at least two yoga blocks or a high, firm cushion. Finding a position where the knees are happy is vital; the option shown with a small, rolled blanket behind them can relieve pressure, but many use a meditation stool to lift the weight fully off the knees.

This blog accompanies the Whole Health programme 30 Days of Meditation - see here for more details and to sign up

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