Resilience through Yoga

Resilience through Yoga

“Sharing, listening and building community builds collective resilience…” expounds Sheryl Sandberg, the COO of Facebook in her new book Option B. One of my friends recently asked, “If you are so passionate of yoga and want to practice yoga mindfully (she took a jab at me there!)  Why don’t you practice at home?” I had an answer and now a convincing one. I had written about the importance of practicing in a group setting in the past. Talent, effort, skill, passion and perseverance are key to success. Studies have shown that human being absorb thoughts, practices and skills of the group they hang out and adapt to it. The opportunity to watch, observe and learn in a group setting makes one gritty; it creates herd immunity.

Having a home practice is also equally important:

• A dedicated and ritualistic routine makes any practice effortless and we cultivate a discipline.
•  It helps to explore your mind, body and spirit and challenge at your own comfort.
•  It is an opportunity for teach yourself. One of the key component of ashtanga yoga is “Swadhyaya”- teach yourself.
• Challenge your poses. Finding solutions to the challenges is the beginning of your intelligence.
• At home you are the Queen and the King; the Guru and the Sishya; and the teacher and the student. A good teacher is the best student.

This year I changed the way to set theme for my yoga instruction. Rather than dwelling deeper into a theme for weeks, the new spiraling themes address several benefits of yoga preparing the participant for a home practice. Unless driven by a dedicated commitment, a home practice becomes a daunting task for many. Monotony coupled with boredom and lack of motivation seem to be the reasons for this non-adherence. With millions of yoga poses and the myriad of ways to access a pose, boredom may easily be alleviated. The four notches in my spiral theming are detox, strength, balance and mindfulness. If we align proper qualifiers for each theme, picking up easy and comfortable poses become easy and with practice they transform as your second nature. The qualifiers for the themes are:

1.     Detox: A) Various breathing techniques including Bhastrika and Kapalabhathi pranayama. B) Poses that access abdominal muscles and organs. Complement them by coupling with flexional and rotational poses. C) Poses that activate lymph nodes. D) Inversions, preferably after C. D) Enhance basal metabolism by recruiting major muscle/ muscle groups in poses. E) Enhance aerobic capacity.

2.     Strength: A) Explore and engage core (abdominal) muscles. B) Hold BEADED poses longer. C) Improve aerobic capacity by breathing techniques and poses designed for this. D) Execute poses to isolate muscles/ muscle groups to strengthen them.

3.     Balance: A) Pranayama techniques. B) Poses and counter poses in sequence.

4.     Mindfulness: A) Mindful breathing. B) BEADED poses. C) External, Internal and Cognitive focuses. D) Synchronize the breath and movement in vinyasa.

5.     Comfortable execution of these themes in your practice should set the stage for a dedicated home practice.

I plan to write on these themes later and hope to see you in one of my classes.

Love,

Jay