Salamba Sarvangasana, Non-Attachment and Jeremiah 29:11
April 13, 2025
8 min read
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Newsletter
{Body}
Shoulder stand before bedtime
Salamba sarvangasana – aka shoulder stand – is known as the queen of all yoga poses for its remarkable ability to prepare the body for deep sleep.
Yes: going upside-down helps you enter sleep!
Several physiological mechanisms contribute to this powerful effect:
First, inverting positions your brain below your heart, significantly reducing how hard your heart needs to pump to circulate blood to your brain. Your brain registers this shift and signals your heart to slow down, which cascades through your entire nervous system, initiating relaxation.
Second, the pose naturally compresses your throat, gently pressing on the vagus nerve that runs through this area. This vagus nerve stimulation is crucial for activating your parasympathetic nervous system — your body's rest and digest response.
As a natural consequence of this throat compression, your breathing must slow dramatically, creating yet another signal to your system to power down and prepare for rest.
Finally, practicing in a dark room with closed eyes provides additional light-related cues that reinforce to your body that it's time for sleep.
{Mind}
Detaching from the world
An unfortunate assumption non-meditators make is thinking that meditation leads to emotional detachment, resulting in a boring, stuffy life.
This delusion comes from the misunderstanding of the Buddhist’s second noble truth, which essentially states that suffering is the result of attachment.
We hear the above statement and then logically conclude “well…if attachment creates suffering, then detachment must end suffering. And since I don’t want to become detached from my life, I’ll just stick to attachment, even if that means suffering.”
Alas, if only these people knew that the opposite of attachment is not detachment…it’s non-attachment.
Non-attachment is about full engagement without clinging. It's the ability to be completely present with your experience — whether joyful or painful — without desperately trying to hold onto it or push it away.
Think of it like this: when you're watching a sunset, you can either frantically try to capture the perfect photo (attachment), completely ignore it while scrolling your phone (detachment), or simply drink in the experience fully, at peace with its finitude (non-attachment).
The attached person suffers when the moment ends. The detached person misses it entirely. The non-attached person experiences its beauty completely and then gracefully lets it go.
{Soul}
Do you still have the nagging feeling that this Universe is apathetic towards your existence? Do you really believe that the Source of all life doesn’t care if you thrive or not?
Sometimes perception puts a heavy cloud on our shoulders and convinces us that no happy ending can come of this — that we will be stuck at this level of the game forever.
But just as the tiny seed must work day and night to break through the heavy blanket of soil covering its inheritance of light, so too must you be persistent in this period of darkness.
Have faith and look up. This place does not have to be what you think it is. Reclaim what is rightfully yours, and watch the blessings and revelations roll in.
April 6, 2025
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