In Yoga’s Defense
I am often asked, “Is yoga really a workout? What else do you do to stay in shape?” I had many misconceptions about yoga myself before I inadvertently stepped inside a yoga studio nearly 20 years ago. Up until then, I had been a dance and step aerobics practitioner from the age of 15. My fitness influencers go way back to Jane Fonda, Cher, Denise Austin, Gilad, Karen Voight, Margaret Richards and Gin Miller. I was way into those Danskin leotards, suspenders, belts and leg warmers! What a costume!
Coming from an aerobics instructor’s mentality, the very idea that yoga could get me to my target heart rate seemed absurd, let alone provide me with the level of fitness and challenge I thought I needed at the time. I had the same misconceptions back then as many still hold: Yoga is not enough of a workout to tone your body. Yoga is just a stretch class or a meditative experience. Yoga is just a series of nonsense postures and contortions. I mean, I get it. What’s to be gained by wearing your leg like a scarf? In yoga’s defense, a lot actually!
Once I stepped onto a yoga mat, it didn’t take long before I left all other fitness practices behind for this calming, yet demanding and energizing practice. I was hooked and went on a deep-dive discovery into the various traditions and styles of yoga that led me to attend trainings, earn credentials, and soon after, yoga studio ownership. I developed my unique vinyasa flow fitness style which inspired the curriculum creation for my Registered Yoga School’s UbU Yoga & Fitness’ Yoga Teacher Training Programs. Yoga provides an endless discovery for living your best life as the best version of yourself keeps evolving.
Yoga is my only workout that keeps me on this betterment journey. I want it all. I want a sharp mind, sensitive spirit, and a toned body. My get-it-all practice is yoga. I believe yoga has something to offer anyone seeking self-improvement. Yoga is more than… well, just about anything you might insert to complete this sentence! Yoga is understanding the powerful control you have over your mind and body in a vinyasa. Yoga is an inward spiritual journey through meditation. Yoga is empowerment in the uplifting of yourself in an arm balance and discovering you actually can wrap your leg around your neck! Yoga lights up your can-do spirit when you’re amused at feeling pretty good in this tangled up position! Yoga can be any experience that harnesses your mind, body and spirit energetically to promote vitality because yoga simply intends to unify.
The origin of the word “yoga” comes from the Sanskrit root “Yuj” - to join, yoke or unite. Yoga was created to establish order and unity within ancient civilizations. It was created to strengthen the minds, spirits and bodies of its community members. When we attend a yoga flow class, we join together to contribute our own moving and breathing human experience. I often begin a corporate yoga class with the acknowledgment that we’ve all made a choice to be here today. We all invested precious time and money in this next hour toward a guided personal discovery. I remind my class that yoga is intended to be taught and practiced compassionately. Compassion is shared suffering. Yoga has endured through the ages because it was created to address our human condition, reconnect us to the God of our creation, and to transform human suffering. It was created to help us gain control over our urges and impulses and to manage any dis-ease we experience. I think yoga students are entitled to know a little bit more about the tradition they’re participating in, and yoga teachers are responsible to inform their students as best they can, that the next hour is not just about a cool sequence of yoga poses, but more about uniting our energies and suffering together!
Yes, misery loves company! Thank you for joining me on your mat today! Let’s begin in child pose for a life-force practice that will lay you out like a corpse in the end!
The suffering, that is the inherently compassionate practice of yoga, does not come from twisting and contorting your body into pretzel shapes. The kind of suffering yoga intends for us to experience in each practice is to simply step out of our comfort zones when we step onto our mats. Expect a bit of personal confrontation with each practice. The space on your yoga mat is a great test pad for managing the ups and downs of life. Your yoga practice brings awareness to your way of being. The positions you take reveal and develop your character. How you manage and take care of yourself on your yoga mat is a reflection of how you manage and take care of yourself in life. Are you patient and accepting of yourself through that wobbling balancing series? Do you force your resistant body into positions? Can you customize your practice to accommodate your anatomy? How is your breathing? Do you welcome challenges as empowering discoveries? Do you obey or rebel against your body language?
Yoga will pose questions as you pose your body. In yoga’s defense, yoga is entitled to be confrontational. Yoga is entitled to be transformative. Yoga is entitled to be empowering. Yoga is not yoga without challenges that require you to have solidarity in mind, body and spirit to lean into, resist, flex, stretch, adapt, press, pump, and pivot. These challenges are balanced by moments of ease throughout the practice to realign us, ground us, uplift us, and prepare us for further discovery. A power vinyasa yoga class lets you practice self-management strategies on your mat.
Yoga unites the fragments of our hearts and minds that are continuously flowing through our central nervous systems. Every thought, feeling, and experience we’ve ever had is scripted and embedded within us. Yoga works for anyone who wants to understand the language in their body. Yoga, when practiced diligently, can become a deeply organized workout. Your gut has a brain. Your heart has a brain. Your organs are vital members of your body and yoga can have a powerful core impact on your organization’s wellbeing. The transformative results of a yoga- activated core are amazing!
Is yoga really a workout that can tone and carve your body? I’m a grandma. I celebrated my 60th birthday on May 16. Absolutely yes! A well defined yoga body can be yours with a mindful and consistent practice. Some tips to making your yoga practice a great body toning workout:
You have to want a sculpted result from your yoga practice so set your intention to fully embody your time on your yoga mat. Engage opposing forces and resistance as you transition from one pose into another.
Every movement matters. Avoid swinging your limbs. Lift and lower your arms and legs as if they’re moving through thick air. Control your energy.
Breathe. The better we breathe, the better we can activate our bodies. When we inhale, we fill our lungs with oxygen. However, it’s often overlooked that when we exhale, that oxygen is released into our bloodstream fueling movement. Carbon dioxide is the byproduct of the breath cycle’s completion. By exhaling completely, you lengthen the breath cycle that calms and energizes your body through your yoga practice making the subsequent inhalation all the more revitalizing. In yoga we participate in deepening and lengthening our intakes and outtakes of air to awaken our life force or prana. We fuel our systems with higher octane for better total body functionality and to enhance fat burning capability.
Deposit your body into each pose and bring the pose to life. Stay to get an energetic return on your investment for at least one full extended breath cycle before moving out and into the next position.
Avoid body dumping from one pose into the next. Body dumping is a crime scene on your mat and a crime against your body. Do your body good. Honor it. Build a stronger you. Your muscles want a close relationship to your bones. Give them time to get acquainted. A great power vinyasa flow is paced to fully engage every muscle in your body.
A disengaged body that noodles through a yoga practice results in a doughy body. A reckless practice that moves haphazardly through twisting, turning and transitioning will create an alarming stress response in your body.
Continuously stressing your body in yoga or any workout will result in excess cortisol production wreaking havoc on your adrenal glands, hormone levels, and will inhibit your body’s natural ability to burn fat. You may actually gain weight if your practice becomes too aggressive. Work smarter not harder with your body on your mat.
When practicing yoga, know the difference between stress for strength, distress that signals danger, and challenge that produces change for your body. Check your breathing to help determine this.
A fast-paced class, often confused as a power vinyasa, can become your yoga body’s worst enemy.“Vi nyasa” - comes from two root words in Sanskrit: vi - special or sacred, and nyasa - to place. The word “power” in association with vinyasa, means to control your movement and breathing while you position your body with care. We think “power” implies fast, strong and fierce. An appropriately paced power vinyasa flow class becomes absolutely empowering when you feel you’ve completed your fullest expression of each position. Moving too fast on your mat will result in body dumping, not body toning. Use sound body mechanics to move in and out of poses with concentric, eccentric and isometric muscular engagements.
In yoga’s defense, understand yoga. You’ll get more results from your yoga practice when you indeed practice mind, body and spirit unification. This is yoga. Practice compassionately. Confront challenges to create change. Keep moving the just-enough dial to define your limits, then push them to new thresholds. Smile through your practice. Love all you can do with your divine equipment on your mat because no one can do what they can’t do, until they discover all they can do.
Get what you want from your yoga. Yoga was created to liberate us from our own suffering, and to promote a highly productive and close working relationship between our body, mind and spirit. If you want it all, and you feel inspired to step away from your comfort zone and step onto your yoga mat to discover a better you, I’m looking for 8 women with yoga experience to join me in a compassionate 4 - week Yoga Body training program in June and July. Ready to transform the way you look and feel? Details on my Workshops & Retreats tab or Reach out by email: karen@ubuyogafitness.com for further details.
