"Tadasana" is my most intimate work as a filmmaker and artist. The work was inspired by my struggles with my well-being, both physical and mental. It is a non-narrative experiential short film that unfolds in the form of a guided yoga meditation. The narrator instructs the viewer through the foundational yoga pose, Tadasana (Mountain Pose), while simultaneously delving into themes of mental health, perception, and the inherent links between the body and the mind. The film’s meditative guidance is contrasted with invasive interjections, intrusive thoughts similar to my own battles with anxiety and depersonalization-derealization disorder, where both internal and external perceptions become foreign, distant, and disconnected from the self. The focus on body awareness highlights my personal health struggles, where rather than a source of strength, the body is viewed as a liability; fragile, fallible, and unreliable, a vessel constantly at the brink of breakdown. The film concludes with an assertion of the unavoidable: “We all die.” The final fade to black is representative of this inevitability, completing the transformation of the experience from a meditation on posture to the ephemeral nature of life.
Tadasana is both a guided meditation and a journey into the existential angst I carry, where the body is both a source of grounding and disconnection, and every breath is a reminder of life's fragility.
Running time: 00:10:30