What can Yoga do for Your Posture?
As I watched through the big windows at the gym I saw what I would say are very difficult poses. I am not a flexible person by nature and at the time I was not very strong physically either. Still, I was very curious about yoga, but perhaps a little intimidated about trying something that seemed, to me, to not fit a person that was weak and inflexible.
My Sister In-law became an instructor a little while after that and convinced me as well as some friends to hold a small private group class for her to teach. It was such a great experience! I was still inflexible & weak, but after the class was over I felt great. I was full of energy, and yes I admit I was sore for a day or two after the class, but how was I going to get strong without first becoming sore?
I stuck with the private group session and soon I could see my own improvement. I grew more flexible and stronger as I stayed involved in Yoga, plus I felt that I accomplished something important. Of course I wasn’t the best student or the most flexible, but that didn’t matter to me. Each class I became more determined to improve for myself.
My posture was still pretty bad and I had some minor back pain so in addition to doing yoga regularly I started seeing a chiropractor. My Chiropractor once told me that I had to posture of a 60-year-old woman. Wow, that hurt but the truth hurts sometimes. My posture was horrible!
At this same time I enrolled in the yoga teacher training and started to learn more in-depth the correct alignment for each pose. Slowly I started to see an improvement with my posture. I was still seeing the Chiropractor, but I was amazed at how much my yoga practice was helping me correct this horrible state that back was in.
While in the teacher training program we were also challenged to improve our yoga practice by taking the time to sit in a relaxation asana and to start to process of meditating. My instructors challenged us that when we were having a rough day to take the time to sit down, even for a few minutes, to start reflecting on what had happened throughout the day. Reflect upon our reactions to different events and to ponder on how our day could improve. It was enlightening to see how my day improved, if only a little bit, with the time that I spent in the relaxation pose of my choice. Everything wasn’t magically better, but it gave me new strength to try to improve my day by starting with the only thing that I can control, myself.
Morgan Turley is a yoga instructor at Essence Yoga Studio, an Arizona Yoga Studio.
