I have done many back bends in my yoga practice. I must however say that today’s description of it was the best. I was preparing to move into camel pose (Ustrasana) and Raya Una Datta, a Iyenger teacher, came up behind me and placed one hand on the back of my head and the other on top of my sternum. He then gave me all the typical cues. Shins, legs, torso, lift this, turn that, relax this……all of it. He was trying to get me to not engage the neck moving into or out of the pose. He then said, “lift the back body into the front body, do not lose the back body lift, relax the head into my palm, give me the head, but keep the back body lifted.” This went on for 2 minutes, but if I relaxed the neck, I would lose the lift, I could not totally give him the weight of my head. Then he paused, and in a slightly softer voice said, “Charlie, lift the back ribs up as the sun rises up in the east, and let the front ribs soften, as the sun sets in the west. And the head is the sky, not affected by the rise or setting of the sun”. At that moment I was able to maintain the lift of the spine while giving him the weight of my head. He felt it in his hands and said, “ahh, now you are the sky”.