My Yoga Journey

I  did not always love yoga.  My first yoga class was at a YMCA and it was a hatha yoga class. My friend convinced me to do it.   I thought it was terrible. At that time, I liked to spin, taught exercise classes, lifted heavy, did a ton of cardio, and more. Sitting and not flowing when I first tried yoga was terrible for me. I had a difficult time sitting still, but I finished the six weeks program because I paid for it. When I finished the program, I told myself never again.

How My Yoga Journey Began

Once I got out of chiropractic school, I started taking hot yoga classes. I loved it because I was good at it and who doesn’t love things that come easy to them.  I’ve danced my entire life and did cheerleading and gymnastics. I was super flexible/hypermobile and good at standing on my hands.  Hot yoga came easily to me because it incorporated all those things. I also loved how hot yoga made me sweat because it felt like a good cleansing workout.  I liked a lot of Vinyasa flows that link each pose with a breath and create almost a dance. This type of yoga quickly became my release.  

What I didn’t like is the fact that in a yoga class, it’s not like they tell you, “This is exactly how I want you to do this.” You kind of just look around and occasionally the teacher will give you cues. I didn’t like doing things wrong as I wanted to know exactly how each thing was supposed to be done.  So, when a teacher training came up, I jumped at it to learn more about the proper way to do things.  Although I knew I did not have the time to teach, it seemed like the best way to get better at what I loved doing. I thought I could definitely use what I learned with my patients. After the teacher training, I started incorporating the different poses to my patients that I singularly picked out from the yoga practice.

I noticed from my job that I was getting super restricted and tight from being bent over all the time as I treat my patients. I would do stretches and incorporate some foam rolling and yoga poses. That’s when I started incorporating that for not only myself, but  later for my patients alongside yoga poses.. A lot of people who would come into my office would tell me that yoga is just about stretching.  While that might be true for some forms of yoga, you can also get a lot of strength benefits out of yoga. For example, the chaturanga is very much like push-ups so I can say that yoga is very strength-based depending on what type of yoga you are doing.

I still love hot yoga classes, but I now have an incredible love for Ashtanga. Ashtanga is the predecessor of vinyasa yoga (usually used in hot yoga classes) and one of the focuses that the studio has in my town where I live.  When I first went to an Ashtanga class, it was super humbling because it incorporates some binds and a lot of lotus positions that I was not used to seeing in regular hot yoga classes.  This was lacking in my training for the Vinyasa 200-hour teacher training program. After struggling with lotus and binding, I thought to myself I had to practice more. What was difficult for me was all the arm binds because even with doing preemptive, prehab type of activities at work, my shoulders get tight from working on people all the time. I got really into doing the Ashtanga classes and compared to when I first attended it when it felt like I had two left feet, six months later I became better at it as I became one with the practice.

I do love Ashtanga because it’s the same thing each time, but it builds on it and you can move up to the next series. As you master each one, you can move up. Lots of studios only stay at series 1 because it sometimes takes a lifetime to learn it.

What I See With Patients Who Practice Ashtanga Yoga 

The thing that I see with patients who come in and practice Ashtanga yoga is that they are good with push movements like down dog and chaturanga, which engage the front side of the body.  They lack the pull movements, which engage the back. Sometimes, that imbalance can result in shoulder issues and those kinds of things. 

When I have someone who loves to do Ashtanga regularly, I like to give them simple exercises to prevent that asymmetry from happening. We want to keep the shoulder joints centrated. What that means is that the top of your arm bone, your humerus, has a ball at the top and it should fit in the little cup or socket at the scapula just perfectly. It should be centered so it can move nice and smoothly. If it’s not, it’s going to draw forward or back, it’s not going to be lined up, and it can cause friction and degeneration leading to a shoulder problem.

What Yoga In General Seems To Lack

The other thing that yoga in general seems to lack pertains to hamstring, glute, and inner thigh engagement. Those are super important for hip centration. The shoulders and the hips have balls that sit on the top of the bone that should fit in a cup-like socket. If they are not centered, you’re going to have a lot of problems. I have super flexible hips and it created a lot of problems in degeneration of my hip.

If I am teaching, which I haven’t done since pre-pandemic, and if I were to structure a Vinyasa flow class, I would incorporate a lot of going from Warrior 3 to standing to get that glute and hamstring engagement. This is because it’s super important for your hip and low back health. I will do stuff like side plank, too, but with the lower leg lifted to engage your inner thigh.  These are also very important in centrating the hip joint. That’s how you can make a more balanced body flow in a Vinyasa class.

If you are doing Ashtanga, you won’t have that flexibility or that option to modify  because you are doing the same series each time. So, if you want to engage the three body parts I mentioned above, think of it as if you are an athlete and you need to do some cross training to prevent injury. It’s not bad to practice Ashtanga, but you have to do the prehab to avoid having an injury with that type of yoga. It’s all about balance.

Incorporating Mobility Classes When I Teach Yoga

When I was teaching yoga in person, I would incorporate mobility work that would use yoga tune-up balls and foam rollers. We would do some mobility and a flow of yoga poses to tap into functional and flexible strength.  Then we would do some strengthening. It was almost like doing prehab without people realizing it was prehab. We would also do a shoulder day, a hip day, and those kinds of things. I loved piecing together parts from all these different things because I find that a lot of times, patients are given these static stretches and passive flexibility, which is not functional. It’s easy to just passively stretch something, but it usually doesn’t help in the long run.

You want to have active flexibility and strength that can give you mobility. Mobility is what helps us be pain-free and injury-free.  That’s why I like to incorporate the strength component because I feel like that’s what keeps you healthier in the long run and that’s definitely how I feel and how I was able to rehab my hip issue myself.

Conclusion

I would say  that now I am much more open to all different types of yoga. I still love Ashtanga classes because I know what I’m going to get and I will do the other stuff that I know that I lack in. I also love a good, hot sweaty flow class, too. At this point in my life, I am also much more tolerant of slow paced classes occasionally.

If somebody has taken a yoga class and thought that yoga is not for them (that was me before), I advise that they keep searching for the style that works for their body and minds. There probably is a form out there that is for you. 

You might also be dealing with an old injury that does not allow you to do a certain type of yoga. From the musculoskeletal standpoint, adjustment and props like a yoga block or strap are meant to help you and make your practice better and not worse. When I first started my yoga journey I felt like I did not need these props, but now I maximize using them to help me practice better and get the most benefits.

If you have any more questions regarding yoga, you can drop it in the comment section or you send me a message through Facebook or Instagram. I’d be happy to do another podcast about your questions. Also, if you want me to talk about something specific, let me know!

You can also check my TikTok account as I use the platform to educate viewers about movement, chiropractic education, yoga, pregnancy, and more! 

Thank you for listening and see you next week!