The Shava: Learning to Let Go

When we arrive in Śavāsana, the “corpse pose,” we lie down in stillness. On the surface, it looks like nothing: bodies stretched out, eyes closed, breath soft. But symbolically, it is a moment of surrender — a small rehearsal for death.

Not only the death of the body someday, but the death of identities, of stories, of old skins we’ve outgrown.

For years, I clung tightly to certain labels. I was a nurse. I was a veteran. These roles became my identity, and yet they were not me. My time as a veteran of Iraq and Afghanistan became the armour I wore in the world. It was my proof of worth — that I had served, that I was strong, that I had seen things most could never imagine. Even after I left the service, fourteen years ago, I held that identity close. To let it go felt like erasing myself.

But here’s the thing: these versions of me — veteran and nurse — they are real. They are threads in the tapestry of my life. Yet they are not the whole cloth. They are not all of me.

What I’m learning — slowly, sometimes painfully — is that we outgrow identities. They serve us when we need them. They protect us when we feel small. But eventually, they constrict. Like a uniform that no longer fits, they remind us of who we were, not who we are becoming.

This is what Śavāsana whispers each time we lie down: let this version of you die. Let go. Trust the rebirth.

In yoga, we speak of aparigraha — non-grasping, the courage to loosen our grip on what once defined us. And of īśvara praṇidhāna — the surrender of our small, personal will into something larger, a divine current carrying us forward.

And in Vedantic philosophy, we are guided by the practice of neti neti — “not this, not this.” I am not the body. I am not the mind. I am not the roles, the titles, or the stories. Each time I peel one away, what remains is closer to truth.

Nothing is lost in this letting go. The essence of who I am — the Self beneath all change — remains, even as the outer forms dissolve.

And so, breath by breath, practice by practice, I learn to lay down my armour. I learn to stop clinging to titles that no longer fit. I learn to honour the woman I was, but not mistake her for the woman I am becoming.

Now, I am simply me. Just Sara. A soul on a path. And for the first time, that feels like enough.

When I rise from Śavāsana, I rise not as veteran or nurse, but as something freer. Something lighter. Something more true.

What can you let go of in Śavāsana?