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How to master the pendant pose (lolasana)

Read about the steps I took to try to learn to master the pendant pose, and follow my progress as I share my successes.

The pendant pose is a yoga posture that requires quite a bit of strength in your entire body. You can find a description of the pendant pose in the Yoga Bible.

Muscles of the back, abdominals, shoulders, and triceps must work in harmony to be able to lift your body weight off the ground and have it swing between your arms like a pendant on a necklace.

Needless to say, this is a very difficult posture to master, especially if you have weak arms and a weak core.

The beginning
Approximately two weeks ago I started working on building up strength to master the pendant pose.

Because I was unable to tuck my knees in and get them close enough to my chest, I decided to use yoga blocks to try to build strength in my arms, abdominal muscles, shoulders, and back.

The yoga blocks I used were high enough to allow me to practise lifting myself up using my shoulders and lats, and squeezing my chest, but low enough that my feet still touched the ground, so forced me to practise lifting my knees up to my chest to increase strength in my abs.

Jan 6, 2012: Lifted toes off the ground
Today I finally managed to lift my toes off the ground for two seconds. The next step will be to increase the amount of seconds I keep my toes off the ground, to try pulling my knees closer to my chest, and to start regulating my breathing so that the movement becomes more comfortable.

My upper body is still very much in a vertical position at this point, so I will have to increase the strength in my lats and abs to be able to rock my body backwards.

Jan 7, 2012: Lowered blocks
I decided to lower the blocks I’ve been using to practise the pendant pose and build strength to perform the pose, and I was still able to get my feet off the ground, so my abdominal strength is continuing to increase.

Jan 15, 2012: Incorporated forward leans
As a way to strengthen my shoulders a bit more and get the upper back strength I need to perform the pendant pose, I started to perform forward leans.

This exercise involves kneeling down on the floor, placing your hands shoulder-width apart, and then leaning forward while keeping your arms straight. Your natural instinct will be to keep yourself from falling over on your face; this should activate your shoulder muscles and upper back muscles to keep you from falling.

Jan 16, 2012: Started rocking back and forth
The forward leans have been targeting the lats (lattisimus dorsi) a lot, so I should see strength increase in that area of the back soon.

Today I started rocking back and forth. However, I’m still on the blocks and not on the floor, since I do not have enough strength yet to lift my torso up horizontally to the ground and/or lift my knees high enough up to my chest. So I will continue working on these two points.

Jan 19, 2012: Can hold torso horizontally
Today I was able to hold my torso horizontally to the ground for about 1 second. Yes, I know; that’s not long. But that 1 second feels like an eternity to my shoulders, upper back, and lats. I reckon they’ll get stronger soon!

Still working on pulling my knees up to my chest and making my body more compact.

Jan 29, 2012: Making slow progress, but abs got stronger
While my progress doing the pendant pose is slow, practising it does seem to have strengthened other parts of my body, and in particular my abs.

Because of this, I am currently able to do the full boat pose, although I still require more flexibility in my hamstrings to be able to fully straighten my legs.

In addition, I can now also do the scales pose, although I have to do a variation of it, since I do not yet currently have enough flexibility to do it in lotus.