Hi Warriors! Being a yoga instructor has a lot of challenges, but being able to accommodate your student’s needs should not be one of them. Unfortunately, we get one body to live our lives in and if we don’t have the lived experience of different bodies sometimes it can be difficult to assume what someone else might need. If that isn’t tough enough, many students don’t want to feel like they are being called out for a different need. So, today I want to teach you a few practical ways that you can adjust yoga asanas.
The first thing you’ll need to do is be honest with yourself. I feel like I say that a lot, but truthfully Exercise Culture has gaslit most of us. Rather than allowing us to walk or interval jog, we are told we aren’t doing things correctly if we aren’t running. So, start by getting the Exercise Culture devil off your shoulder.
We all have unique abilities and going into yoga by recognizing your own set of these and owning them is the single best way to set yourself up for success. This means acknowledging if you have tight hamstrings. Or a shoulder injury. Or if you don’t feel you are flexible enough (spoilers, you don’t have to have a certain level of flexibility to participate in yoga).
Once you have an okay understanding of where you are at, you’ll want to be able to apply that to the asanas themselves. Different classes of poses will require different adjustments. Meaning, you aren’t going to tweak a standing pose the same way you will a seated one. And even within the same category of pose, you may need different things.
The easiest way I teach students to do this is to spend a few minutes centering. This should be part of the start of every yoga session, whether you are in class or not. Centering is a way to be completely present in your body. After a few deep breaths, do a body scan. Notice if there are any places where you feel tension hanging out, joints that might feel stiff or locked up, muscle soreness, or any discomfort. Then make mental notes.
If you encounter a pose that centers on of these areas or triggers feelings of discomfort, you’ll be ready to tweak things. The simplest way to give yourself alternatives is to modify the position of your limbs. For example, you’ve got choices for you arms in most asanas where the standard pose is stretched or extended. You don’t have to stretch upwards. You can extend from the shoulders, which will decrease compression in your cervical spine (you’ll feel less pinch in your neck and shoulder blades) and increase your sense of balance and stability. You can also bring your arms in with your hands in prayer pose which is a more natural position for your shoulders.
You have similar options with your lower body. You can take a shorter more compact stance if you need more stability or if your hips feel tight. You can create better balance by not lifting a foot or leg as high if a pose requires that. If twists or rotations are challenging, start with a smaller range of motion and run the pose a few times. Same for backbends. In fact, I always program backbends that way, but if your instructor doesn’t, ask before class if they would be willing. The instructor’s response will tell you a lot, too.
Seated poses offer challenges if your body doesn’t conform to Western ideals. Forward folds are tough if extra flesh gets in the way. Same goes for twisting your legs around. Please don’t forget that yoga is meant for every body. Shift what you need to shift or use props and straps.
Upper body supported poses can be uncomfortable for a number of reasons. If the pressure is too intense, you can shift depending on which joints are experiencing the most difficult sensations. If it’s in your wrists, make a fist and rest on your knuckles. Sounds weird, but this takes the stress off the little bones in your wrist. If your shoulders are the source of the most discomfort, use a chair or the wall so your upper body isn’t taking the full force of gravity on this one.
The most important thing to remember is that the asanas are not about trying to emulate a posture perfectly. Yup, you read that correctly. The asanas are about trying to create sensations in the body. In downward facing dog, you should feel the stretch down the back side of your legs. It’s not about whether your heels can actually hit the floor. Side Angle isn’t about reaching the floor, it’s about relaxing the hips open and stretching the side of the torso.
Taking the time to figure out what options allow you to feel the pose will be how you reap the most rewards from yoga. Using the options doesn’t make your yoga practice worse than anyone else’s, it makes it yours. If you are interested in specific versions for poses, check out the Yoga section under the Exercise Tab in the menu. Until next time, be well friends!
