Yoga Nidra Is Just a Long Savasana, Right?
Wrong.
That beautiful pose at the end of your yoga practice—the one where you lie flat on your mat and let go—is called Savasana (shah-VAHS-uh-nuh), from the Sanskrit words Sava, meaning “corpse,” and Asana, meaning “pose.” It’s often referred to as the most important posture in all of yoga.
And for good reason.
In a well-sequenced yoga practice, movement builds gradually, inviting attention to the body, breath, and nervous system. The final rest in Savasana is not just a break—it’s the space in which all the shifts you've cultivated can be absorbed and integrated. It's a return to stillness where your whole being—body, mind, and spirit—can recalibrate.
Savasana is essential. It gives your nervous system the pause it needs to settle, much like resting between sets when strength training. Without this moment of stillness, your body doesn’t receive the full benefit of the work you've done. Without rest, we risk becoming over-trained, overstimulated, and undernourished—especially in the subtle systems of mind and spirit.
So if it's so important… why do so many Western yoga classes rush through it?
Because our culture often values speed over presence. We like our wisdom in sound bites and our healing in quick fixes. We’re often so eager to get to the “next thing” that we skip the very thing our nervous systems—and our souls—are yearning for: integration, softness, and quiet.
Traditional teachings allow for Savasana to last 15 to 30 minutes. In many modern classes, it's reduced to a rushed 1-2 minutes, or skipped entirely. But when given the time it deserves, Savasana becomes a sacred bridge between practice and life. A sweet ceremony of stillness.
Enter Seven Seeds Yoga Nidra.
If Savasana is the fertile ground, Yoga Nidra is the seed. Yoga Nidra is a guided meditative journey—an inward descent into deep rest, insight, and restoration. While it is most often practiced lying down in Savasana, it is far more than just resting.
In Seven Seeds Yoga Nidra, we move through a specific sequence of stages that lead the practitioner into profound states of ease and presence. This path leads us toward Pratyahara, a yogic state often described as “withdrawal of the senses.” But really, it's a restoration of the senses—a return to clarity, balance, and true perception.
The framework of this practice draws from the Koshas, the five subtle layers of our being: the physical body, the breath/energy body, the emotional mind, the wisdom body, and the blissful core. With techniques like body scanning, breath awareness, sensory attunement, and visualization, we journey inward—layer by layer.
As brainwaves slow from beta to alpha and theta states, the mind softens, the body lets go, and the subconscious becomes accessible. This is where healing begins. It’s here that we can move from the analytical left brain into the intuitive right brain. From doing into being. From noise into knowing.
This is also the space where we plant Sankalpa—a heartfelt intention.
San = Heartfelt desire
Kalpa = Committed intention or vow
We enter and exit the practice with our Sankalpa. This present-tense statement is delivered from the conscious mind into the fertile soil of the subconscious. Think of the conscious mind as the Queen Bee, issuing instructions. The subconscious—the diligent hive—carries them out without question. It doesn’t distinguish between what is real and what is imagined. It simply follows the lead.
Yoga Nidra—literally “Yogic Sleep”—is not a nighttime nap. It is a dynamic state of awareness that exists between waking and dreaming, where the body is deeply at rest, and the mind is alert and receptive.
Ordinary sleep refreshes.
Yoga Nidra rewires.
Savasana, then, is a beautiful, necessary conclusion to your Hatha practice—a physical, emotional, and energetic exhale. A moment of embodied peace.
Seven Seeds Yoga Nidra, on the other hand, is a complete practice of its own. A devoted meditation. A modality that marries ancient wisdom with modern neuroscience, spirit with science, silence with structure.
And in that sweet union, we find something extraordinary:
Healing without force.
Insight without effort.
Access to intuition, creativity, vitality, and abundance.
Here—beyond striving, beyond words—you touch the edge of your True Nature.
Here, there is deep remembering.
Here, there is rest that restores the soul.