Josh Rosen, Alex Domingo, David Asuzu

yale school of medicine

Balance

Model: Alice Lü

Pose: Lord Shiva’s Pose (Saral Natarajasana)

Photographer: Joshua Rosen

Lighting/Typography/Yoga Director: Alex Domingo

In anatomy, we learned about the evolutionary adaptations that allow humans to stand up and walk on two feet. In the gait workshops, we explored the complex ways our bodies manage to constantly keep us upright and balanced. The actions of our muscles rely on various inputs from our visual, vestibular, and proprioceptive organs. In yoga, we put ourselves in positions that force ourselves to consciously consider every aspect of our balance in order to bring control to a precarious posture. In this pose, you can see how thought has been placed into the controlled positioning of every part of the body from the ankle, to the knee, to the hip, to the shoulder and spine. Also note the calm fixed gaze, which maximizes the use of visual feedback to maintain the pose.

Steady State

Pose: Easy Pose (Sukhasana)

Model: Laura Yockey

Photographer: Joshua Rosen

Lighting/Typography/Yoga Director Alex Domingo

In anatomy, we learn about all the systems of the body that are connected and work together to produce a dynamic steady state that we call life. For example, the opposing effects of the sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous systems maintain a steady state of activation in our body and allow us to function in a wide range of situations. In yoga, the concepts of balance and steady state are always at the forefront of our thought. Every pose has a counter pose, and every sequence of exertion and stress is followed by relaxation to balance it out. Easy pose highlights the importance of balance in yoga and in life. Following a strenuous sequence, it is a time for our hearts to relax, for breath to soften, and for muscles to detoxify and recover.

Pushing the Limits

Model: Kaoru Takasaki

Pose: Camel (Ustrasana)

Photographer: Joshua Rosen

Lighting/Typography/Yoga Director: Alex Domingo

In anatomy, we learned how the body works as a whole to allow us to survive against constant insults. But as we all know, there is a limit to what our bodies’ can do. Likewise, in anatomy we learn to push our own limits; how hard we can work, how fast can we soak up knowledge, and how comfortable we can become with what we must do in lab. We constantly pushed ourselves to take as much from this experience, and our donors’ gifts, as possible. In yoga, we also constantly push not only our bodies, but also our minds to their limits; putting ourselves in contorted and sometimes painful positions with the ultimate goal of improving and expanding our abilities. In Camel Pose, its not only about how far you can push your body to bend, but how much you can overcome the fear and discomfort of the pose in your mind.

Ventilation

Model: Daniel Zheng

Pose: Upward Facing Dog (Urdhva Mukha Svenasana)

Photographer: Joshua Rosen

Lighting/Typography/Yoga Director: Alex Domingo

Consultant: David Asuzu

In anatomy we learned that ventilation is both a passive and active process, both conscious and unconscious. We also learned the difference between primary and accessory muscles of respiration and how they act on the skeleton to move air into and out of the lungs. In yoga, we attempt to take complete control of our ventilation, and use it as a tool to bring focus and awareness to our practice. By expanding our chests and actively focusing on diaphragmatic breathing, we seek to maximize the efficiency and flow of our ventilation, to enhance relaxation, and to move deeper into a pose. We chose the upward facing dog pose to emphasize this concept because it illustrates the idea of expanding the thoracic cavity and lengthening our trunk to obtain maximum ventilation. Note the softened and calm expression on the practitioners face as the focus on breath and ventilation becomes paramount.

Strength

Pose: Scorpion (Vrschikasana)

Model: Alex Domingo

Photographer: Joshua Rosen

Typography/Yoga Director: Alex Domingo

Lighting/Consultant: David Asuzu

In anatomy, we learn how the architecture of the body is positioned to maximize strength, we discover how to test strength, and we explore the consequences of losing it. In yoga, we expand our knowledge of anatomy by understanding how engaging different muscles gives us the strength to maintain a particular pose. When we fail at a pose, we tend to trace it back to a lack of strength in a particular muscle group. In this way, Yoga helps us to understand our own strengths and weaknesses and provides us with a means to fortify our bodies to overcome the weaknesses we identify. Scorpion Pose requires immense strength in many areas of the body, making areas of weakness readily apparent. Amazingly, over time we can not only address our weaknesses, but also develop the strength to ultimately push our bodies beyond their normal capabilities.

Range of Motion

Model: Tsion Aberra

Pose: One-legged King Pigeon (Ek Pada Rajakapotasana)

Photographer: Joshua Rosen

Lighting/Typography/Yoga: Director Alex Domingo

Consultant: David Asuzu

In anatomy we learned how the construction of a joint determines its range of motion and specializes it for a given set of tasks. The orientation of each muscle, tendon, and ligament within this architecture allows us to perform a wide variety of tasks and move our limbs through their full range of motion. In yoga, we seek to utilize and maximize this range of motion to encourage the proper alignment and functioning of the body as a whole. As we learned in workshop, many of the movement abnormalities we see are in fact the body compensating for a defect, and not the defect itself. By exercising our joints to the fullest extent of their design, we ensure that our articular cartilage stays supple and the muscles stay loose, preventing problems from developing. We chose Pigeon Pose to demonstrate this concept because it helps to counteract many of the limitations and stresses placed on our bodies by our often sedentary lifestyle.

Adaptation

Model: Taber Lightbourne

Pose: Downward Facing Dog (Adho Mukha Svenasana)

Photographer: Joshua Rosen

Lighting/Typography/Yoga Director: Alex Domingo

In anatomy, we witnessed and learned about the body’s tremendous capacity for adaptation, and how we as humans can augment it. From the tan lines on one donor signaling a life working in the sun, to the dialysis shunts in another reminding us how adaptation can only go so far, walking through the anatomy lab provided a diverse and ever-changing view of the capabilities of the human body to adapt to stress. In yoga, the first time we do a pose we are often disappointed that we can only go so far. But over time, with repeated exposure, we force our minds and bodies to remodel adaptively to the stress we place on them. The Downward Facing Dog Pose is one of the first poses taught to novice yogis, and at first it feels completely unnatural, uncomfortable, and almost impossible to perform correctly. But over time, our bodies adapt; our arms develop the strength to keep our elbows straight, our shoulders develop the strength to extend against the floor, we learn to retract our scapulae and abdomen to maintain proper spinal alignment, we learn to utilize our iliopsoas to flex our hips and point our tailbones to the sky, and we slowly lengthen our hamstrings so that our heels can finally touch the floor.

Proprioception

Model: Alex Lu

Pose: Upward Lotus in Headstand (Urdhva Padma Sirsasana)

Photographer: Joshua Rosen

Lighting/Typography/Yoga Director: Alex Domingo

Consultant: David Asuzu

In anatomy, we probed into the murky concept of proprioception and began to understand its central importance to how we function in our world. We also studied the devastating consequences that can occur when this key sensation is lost. We maximize the use of proprioception in each yoga posture and movement as we focus our gaze on and align our head towards a single point, leaving us blind to the position of our limbs in space. In this headstand variation, proprioception becomes key to the practitioner’s ability to align and maintain the position of his legs and trunk in space, without being able to see them.

Antagonism

Model: Ankit Kansal

Pose: Boat (Navasana)

Photographer: Joshua Rosen

Lighting/Typography/Yoga Director: Alex Domingo

In anatomy, we learned about the concept of antagonism in which opposing muscles work together to produce smooth, coordinated actions. In yoga, antagonism plays a key role, allowing us to position and maintain our bodies in various poses. Furthermore, it allows us to move into and out of these poses safely and gracefully. Boat Pose highlights the use antagonistic relationships to not only hold the body steady and aligned through pain, but to exit the pose in a controlled way.

Synergy

Pose: Warrior II (Virabhadrasana II)

Model: Joshua Rosen

Photographer/Typography/Yoga Director: Alex Domingo

Lighting: Ankit Kansal

In anatomy, we learned the concept of synergist muscles that allow for the fine control of movement around a joint by neutralizing unwanted actions. In yoga, we often rely on the actions of synergist or fixator muscles to stabilize movements around a joint to produce the desired outcome. In this pose, we use the rhomboids to fix the scapula in position. The scapula can then serve as an anchor for muscles such as the serratus anterior, which pull on the ribs and expand the volume of the thoracic cavity. The fixed scapula also serves as anchor point for the muscles of the rotator cuff to pull the arms into alignment.

the concept for form and function

alex domingo and josh rosen

yale school of medicine

This project began as we started to consider the many different ways in which our experience of anatomy has affected our lives. On one level, there is a professional value in the knowledge we have gained; knowledge that will be used to guide our future studies, our interactions with patients, our physical exams, and our understanding of symptoms and pathology. On another level, anatomy has given us the privilege of deeper insight into the functioning and design of our own bodies. Often while preparing for lab or studying for a qualifier, we were awestruck that the connections and systems we were studying on paper were working inside us every moment.

This year, many of us have taken up the practice of yoga; we meet once a week for a student-led session that includes a series of postures, movements, and breathing exercises. As we concurrently progressed in our yoga and anatomy studies, we came to realize that the knowledge we gained in the anatomy lab could be used in many ways to further our yoga practice, and vice versa. Understanding the layout of our skeletons, muscles, and organ systems allowed us to take greater control of our yoga practice and to further refine and perfect our poses. The language of anatomy gave us a more precise means to teach and learn about yoga postures. In addition, anatomy enabled us to deepen our understanding of how yoga postures are designed to enhance the function of various body systems. Our yoga practice has enhanced our study of anatomy in the lab and classroom by providing a functional context for our knowledge.

For this project, we selected ten concepts that are common to both yoga and anatomy and that have contributed to our understanding of both anatomy and yoga. We chose core yoga poses that embody these concepts and photographed various members of our yoga class performing them. Our selection of the historical library and yoga studio setting parallels the learning that occurred in both the classroom and studio. We hope that these pictures provide a unique perspective on how anatomy has impacted our lives, and how thankful we are to the donors that made this knowledge and insight possible.