An Adjunct for Exercise and Fitness

Yoga is an excellent addition to any exercise or fitness program. Most sports and fitness activities focus on a specific set of muscles and use that set repetitively. Yoga is a balancing activity which requires many areas of the body.

Many poses are practiced in both directions, to ensure equal stretch and strengthening on both sides of the body. Other poses are balanced by their very nature requiring many diverse muscle groups to perform.

A good start to a yoga practice is the ever-popular Sun Salutation, a sequence that is many thousands of years old. It is performed twice, once to the right, and again to the left to maintain balance. This will take just a few minutes and will expand and release many areas tight from other activities.  

By adding a short yoga practice before or after your sports or fitness program, you can let your body use all your muscles, not just a select few.  

Backbends: step by step

Preparing for backbends is an incremental process. First, an adequate warmup is essential for a backbend practice, ensuring supple muscles and a flexible torso. Next, when you are warmed up, set up your backbend practice so your spine flexes in small increments, either moving up or down the spine.

For example, lying on your back on your mat, position a block or firm blankets under your back to allow your shoulder blades space to release back and down. After several breaths, move the prop down your spine to the base of your rib cage, releasing at that location. The next position for the prop is just above the waist and the last is at the sacral spine. At each prop position, release into a backbend using your breath to assist in the release.

To increase the release you can use a larger prop. Be sure to support your head so as not to hyperextend your neck.

Backbends open the chest and heart chakra spaces as well as release tight shoulder and back muscles, step by step.