Yogic Seal Poseयोगमुद्रासन
Yogamudrāsana — an intermediate seated pose that works the spinal erectors, shoulders, hip adductors.
30–60SECONDS HELD
One line on the timetable. Yogic Seal Pose is held 30–60 seconds, with the breath moving throughout — and no set practice here is built around it — it is held on its own.
SOURCE·YogaPath sequence data — stay times as taught·one breath ≈ 5 s at an even pace·REVIEWED JUL 2026
How to do Yogic Seal Pose
Read all of it before starting, and read the cautions further down before starting at all.
Sit in a cross-legged seat, half lotus or full lotus on a folded blanket.
Take both arms behind the back and clasp one wrist with the opposite hand.
Inhale and lengthen the spine, drawing the shoulder blades towards each other.
Exhale and fold forward from the hip crease, letting the arms lift away from the back.
Rest the forehead on the floor, a block or a bolster, hold, then rise on an inhale.
Hold: 30–60 seconds. Keep the breath moving throughout — if you are holding it, the pose is too much for today.
Muscles worked
Where the effort and the lengthening land. Primary groups do most of the work; secondary groups assist or are stretched.
What Yogic Seal Pose does
Described mechanically — what the movement does to muscle and joint. Not a list of conditions it treats, because a pose does not treat conditions.
- Combines a forward hip fold with the shoulders held in extension and internal rotation behind the back.
- Lengthens the whole back line of the spine from the pelvis to the base of the skull.
- Stretches the front of the shoulders and the chest as the clasped arms lift.
Yogic Seal Pose is one of 29 seated poses in this library and one of 60 poses rated intermediate. Poses taken on the floor, where the pelvis is the base and the spine works above it.
Who should skip Yogic Seal Pose, or change it
- Shoulder injury — release the clasp and rest the hands on the floor.
- Knee injury if using a lotus base: sit cross-legged instead.
- Low back or disc injury: fold far less and support the forehead high.
- High blood pressure or glaucoma, where holding the head low is not advised.
General information only — not medical advice. Some asanas are unsuitable during pregnancy, injury or specific conditions. Learn from a qualified teacher and stop if anything hurts. If you are pregnant, recovering from surgery or managing any health condition, ask your doctor before starting a practice, and learn the pose itself from a qualified teacher who can see you move.
Common mistakes in Yogic Seal Pose
What tends to go wrong, and the specific correction — not "engage your core".
MistakeLifting the arms high before the trunk has folded.
FixFold from the hip first and let the arms rise only as the chest lowers.
MistakeRounding hard from the waist to reach the floor.
FixSupport the forehead on a bolster and keep the fold coming from the hips.
How the energy figure on a yoga timetable is reached
- Nobody has measured a single asana in a metabolic cart, so no per-pose figure is published here — not by this site and not by anyone.
- The pose is matched to the nearest style of practice in the 2024 Adult Compendium of Physical Activities. Yogic Seal Pose sits at code 02150, yoga, Hatha, 2.5 MET.
- That MET value is put through the standard ACSM relationship for a stated reference adult of 70 kg.
- The result is the cost of a practice of that kind for as long as you practise — not the cost of holding this one shape.
- Scale it to yourself: the relationship is linear in body mass, so multiply by your own weight in kilograms and divide by 70.
kcal/min = MET × 3.5 × kg ÷ 200
= 2.5 × 3.5 × 70 ÷ 200
= 3.06 kcal per minute
The same practice, hour by hour
Read it the way you would read a timetable: pick the length of session you actually sit down for, and that is the figure.
| Time practising | 10 min | 20 min | 30 min | 45 min | 60 min |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Calories | 31 | 61 | 92 | 138 | 184 |
SOURCE·2024 Adult Compendium of Physical Activities·code 02150 · 2.5 MET · 70 kg reference adult·REVIEWED JUL 2026
The whole activity dataset, including everything that is not yoga, is at BurnLab.
Asked before class
How do you do Yogic Seal Pose?
Sit in a cross-legged seat, half lotus or full lotus on a folded blanket. Take both arms behind the back and clasp one wrist with the opposite hand. Inhale and lengthen the spine, drawing the shoulder blades towards each other. Exhale and fold forward from the hip crease, letting the arms lift away from the back. Rest the forehead on the floor, a block or a bolster, hold, then rise on an inhale. Hold for 30–60 seconds.
What does Yogic Seal Pose work?
Primarily the spinal erectors, shoulders, hip adductors, with the chest, lower back, hamstrings assisting or lengthening. In mechanical terms: combines a forward hip fold with the shoulders held in extension and internal rotation behind the back.
Who should not do Yogic Seal Pose?
Shoulder injury — release the clasp and rest the hands on the floor. Knee injury if using a lotus base: sit cross-legged instead. Low back or disc injury: fold far less and support the forehead high. High blood pressure or glaucoma, where holding the head low is not advised. This is general information, not medical advice — if any of these apply to you, ask your doctor and learn the pose with a qualified teacher rather than from a page.
Is Yogic Seal Pose suitable for beginners?
Not as a first pose. Yogic Seal Pose is rated intermediate here: it assumes a working base of strength and range, and a teacher who has watched you move. Build up through the seated poses marked beginner first.
How many calories does Yogic Seal Pose burn?
The honest answer is that nobody has measured a single asana. The 2024 Adult Compendium of Physical Activities publishes MET values for styles of yoga, not for individual poses. Yogic Seal Pose sits closest to Compendium code 02150, yoga, Hatha, at 2.5 MET — about 92 kcal for 30 minutes of that kind of practice for a 70 kg adult. Holding one pose for a minute is a rounding error either way.
The rest of the seated poses on the wall
More seated poses — first at the same level, then the rest of the family.
Asana names are traditional. Every step, benefit and caution on this page is written for YogaPath rather than reproduced from any book, studio or other library — see how this site is written and what it is written from. General information only — not medical advice. Some asanas are unsuitable during pregnancy, injury or specific conditions. Learn from a qualified teacher and stop if anything hurts.
SOURCE·Published asana references·asana names, alignment and cautions as taught·REVIEWED JUL 2026
The people behind these sites
Follow the build
This site and nine others like it are built and photographed by two people: Amit Sharma — behind the build; Geeta Patel — the poses, demonstrated. New work goes up on Instagram and Facebook before it reaches a page here.
Amit Sharma
@amitsharmaofficial
Instagram
Geeta Patel
@geetapatelnz
Instagram
Geeta Patel
GeetaPatelYoga
Facebook
Following changes nothing here — every page stays open, with no account and no wall.
