Finding your yoga practice
Finding your yoga practice is an organic process that should take into consideration different factors. To me, there are three major ones.
First, who are you ? What body structure you are working with is important. A qualified yoga therapist can help you determine what your overall posture is and whether there are any imbalances.
The goal is not perfection, but rather, symmetry and balance. You can use yoga postures to strengthen dormant muscles, or areas of awareness, as well as to relax the ones that are highly over worked.
Second, what kind of time do you have? The time you can commit to may change, but usually we have enough of a tight schedule, that we can determine a bottom line clearly. When you know, then you can format things accordingly. Some poses require a lot of warm-ups so if you are not able to devote a lot of time, just keep things simple. Chose something that will be refreshing. If you have time to center, warm-up, do a few static poses, a few restorative poses, a savasana, then you can get a bit more complex. Don’t forget, that relaxation is a practice in and of itself, as is a restorative like viparita karani. Breathing practices that are simple enough can also form a nice simple practice. Check out my Yoga Mind Cd
Third, what are you going through right now? Postures are neither one size fits all, nor are they all necessary or recommended for every one at every stage. I find several postures way too heating and agitating for menopause, but they work really well for someone who needs to ‘get’ energized and moving. Use what you have and again, strive to use your yoga practice, not for perfection, but for symmetry, harmony, balance…to the best of your ability. Get some qualified help too
Rana Waxman is a registered yoga therapist ERYT-500, with 20 years of teaching experience. Rana is a freelance writer and social media expert in addition to leading yoga workshops internationally and teaching alignment focused private and group Yoga Lessons in Hoboken and Jersey City NJ.
