The Warrior poses or Virabhadrasana 1-3 are some of the most well-known and popular during Yoga classes. We practise Warrior 1 – 3, the reverse Warrior, the humble Warrior (and the retrieving one).

All are powerful poses, as the name would suggest. Do you know the story behind them?

It is not a pretty one though, just to be warned.

The story takes place in the celestial realm with Shiva as the main character and his wife Sati, the love of his life.

Sati’s father, Daksha, did not approve of Shiva. Her father was an eminent priest whose job was to ensure that rituals were done properly. As an important person, he had important friends and a reputation to uphold.

When Shiva arrived at their wedding, it was in his wild look, with matted hair, covered in ash and snakes around his neck. Sati's parents couldn't believe their eyes.

To express his malcontent Daksha didn't invite them to the next big fire ceremony.

So, on that day all the guests passed by Sati’s and Shiva’s home, Sati was wondering about the occasion. When she learned about the big fire ceremony, she thought her father, must have forgotten to invite them and decided to go anyway. Shiva knew Daksha’s intent, to humiliate him, and warned Sati, but she didn't listen.

When arriving at the ritual, Sati confronted her father and he told her that he doesn’t like Shiva and that he was dirty and archaic. Sati was outraged and to punish her father, she threw herself into the ceremonial fire and died.

Shiva was beside himself. In his fury, he tore a lock from his head, threw it on the floor and a huge warrior, Virabhadra, appeared. Shiva gave him orders to kill Daksha and all guests.

So, Virabhadra appeared at the ritual site by rising from the earth. With big swords in his hands, he looked around and started to do what he was ordered to, kill everyone.

Afterwards, when seeing the carnage, Shiva realised that he might have overreacted, so he brought Daksha and all guests back to life. But, as Daksha’s head was cut off, Shiva put the head of a goat on and hence Daksha had to live with a goat's head.

This is quite a gruesome story, right? Why are these poses so popular and what can we learn from them?

After his fury was over and he saw the destruction, Shiva felt remorse for his action and hence he brought everyone back to life.

The Indian philosophy gods and goddesses make mistakes and mess up just as we do. They need to make amends, fix situations again and admit their wrongdoing, just as we do.

The story reminds us that instead of letting our anger, fear, and insecurity get the best of us, it would be better to remember and tap into our strength, power, and courage.

All Warrior poses embody the auspicious and heroic energy of a warrior, enabling us to connect with our own strength, confidence, compassion, and power.

The Benefits of the Warrior Poses

The Benefits of Warrior 1

• Representing Virabhadra emerging from the ground with his swords overhead. This pose is a great way to strengthen the feet and legs as well as the core. It helps the mobilise the shoulders and is a good preparatory pose for backbends.

• All Warrior poses improve our ability to focus. This version helps you to stand tall at the same time with the feet firm on the ground and active legs, it gives us a sense of grounding.

• Warrior I invites strength and courage to face our fears, insecurities and anger. It strengthens our hearts.

Benefits of Warrior 2

• As Warrior 1 so is Warrior 2 a strengthening pose for the legs. This version opens the hips as well. Holding the arms at shoulder level, it strengthens the upper body and promotes strength, stamina and courage.

• This asana challenges us; it takes effort which encourages us to look for the ease and find it in challenging situations.

• Warrior 2 lets us tap even more into our own strength and focus, to face challenging situations from a place of calm and courage.

Benefits of Warrior 3

• This balancing Warrior creates strength and stability as all the muscles in your body are engaging, legs arms, core and back, at the same time we need also length.

• This challenging pose strengthens your focus. As we balance on one foot, we need to remain calm and collected. It encourages presence, balance, grace and ease.

• Learning to balance on one foot requires patience, inner strength, courage, and humility.

Benefits of Reverse Warrior

• Or crescent Warrior deeply stretches the side body, the hips, spine, chest, and inner thighs. It strengthens your abdominals and intercostal muscles, neck, arms, and the psoas.

• It is a gentler and calmer version of the Warriors. The opening of the side body allows the breath to deepen which increases the pranic energy in your body and mind.

• Emotionally and mentally, reverse Warrior is a great way to add strength, power, perseverance, self-esteem, and beauty to your daily practice.

Benefits of Humble Warrior

• This asana can be challenging for the legs, as we fold forward from the Warrior 1 leg position, with the arms extended and fingers interlaced, it opens shoulders, chest, arms, and hips.

• It builds awareness and shifts the focus inwards.

• The pose encourages vulnerability, humility, and a sense of surrender. Bowing towards the earth supports the surrender of pride, judgements, and expectations.

Conclusion

We all have faced situations where we lost our cool and regretted it later, tried to humiliate the ones we felt threatened by and felt empty afterwards rather than empowered by our actions.

Regular practice of Yoga postures and breathing brings us into contact with the place inside which is not affected by whatever we experience in day-to-day situations. This helps us to become less reactive.

All Warrior poses strengthen our bodies and bring focus and stamina to their own rights. Every time we practise a Warrior pose, we tap into our inner strength and become less reactive and more in charge of our actions, we can choose to act.

This shifts everything in our life.

So the conclusion is to add these poses into your daily practice and awaken your inner Warrior.

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