Yoga has been known to improve flexibility, strengthen
muscles, and enhance balance. However, if practiced incorrectly yoga can
do more damage to the body than good. Misaligned poses can lead to
injuries ranging from aching joints to pulled muscles. “Yoga
injuries are often a result of not knowing or realizing your body’s
limitations,” says yoga instructor and
educational kinesiologist Candace Morano. “This goes for
beginners and advanced students, as some beginners underestimate how strenuous
yoga can be and some who are more advanced overestimate their strength and
flexibility,” says Candace.
Below, Candace highlights the Do’s and Don’ts of
the top five yoga techniques commonly misaligned.
#1 Seated Pose with Pranayama:
DON’T: Sit in a slumped position. It
decreases the ability to breathe into a straight, long spine. “Not
breathing fully into the torso and body can also lead to anxiety and low
energy,” says Candace.
DO: Sit in a comfortable
cross legged position on the floor or on a blanket. Loop a yoga belt or one of
your own comfortably around your lower ribs. The belt will serve as a boundary
for feeling the connection between your diaphragm and breath.
As you begin to breath feel your lower belly expand. Then
feel your breath extend higher above the belt, into the mid-chest as you extend
your breath further into your top chest. Follow this pattern as you begin to
descend downward and start to exhale. Using the belt will help you understand
how to breathe into the lower and upper torso and how to preserve the space
that is created within, even as you exhale with full attention.
#2 Standing Forward Bend:
DON’T: Hyper-extend
knees.
DO: Slightly bend
knees and move your hips directly over ankles. This will encourage top of shin
forward and engage your front thighs and avoid hyperextension.
“Yoga practice has a building block effect,” says Candace.
“Remember to take what you learn in every pose and apply it to the
next.”
The Standing Forward Bend is the practice of grounding into
the support right under our feet. Standing tall in mountain pose, inhale, lift
your arms upward and extend your spine forward towards your toes. Inhale from
the heels to the balls of the feet, keeping the toes relaxed, and follow
muscular attention upwards. Feel your kneecaps lift towards thighs and thighs
engage strongly towards pelvis. This will help to bring the knees into
alignment over the ankles. On the exhalation, stay with the essence of strength
in front of legs as you practice releasing any tension in the back of the legs,
back to the source under your feet; the earth. Practice this cycle of attention
and breathe 3 times. Feel the upward magnetism of energy into the pelvic floor
as you lift and extend back down through tailbone on the descent towards the
earth.
#3 Warrior III Pose:
DON’T: Extend in
one direction rather than feeling polar attraction of opposites.
DO: From mountain pose,
inhale lifting your left leg off the floor reaching your arms straight out in
front of you and as best you can, bringing both hips points level to encourage
them to be even and square. As you bring your torso forward, extend through
your left leg imagining a see-saw playfully finding balance between the front
and back body, using your arms and legs as anchors. Your head and chest stay
lifted. Make sure to practice the other side and notice any differences and
imbalances on one side versus the other.
#4 Upward Facing Dog:
DON’T: Tense and
compress neck and shoulders, hyper extend elbows, or put any strain on the
wrists. “Tense shoulders cause problems in the wrists,” says
Candace.
DO: Micro bend elbows
or as much as needed until you can keep your shoulder blades engaged on back as
you lift your chest high. Lie on your belly with your chin or forehead on the
floor. Your palms are shoulder distance apart and next to your chest. Breathe
into your hands, pressing evenly through the palms as if you were energetically
pulling them back to your feet. Grounding hip points, legs and tops of feet
down into earth, lift pubis, belly, chest and head toward the sky feeling the
length you are creating from your waist to your armpits. Feel a soft bend in
elbows as shoulder blades soften onto your back. This muscular action
encourages your chest to expand while feeling vulnerability in the heart.
Exhale and slowly lower back to the support of the earth allowing any stress,
extra effort or tension to release.
#5 Triangle Pose:
DON’T: Hyper-extend the
front knee or lean weight into bottom arm and front leg, shortening bottom side
of front waist, allowing torso to lean in towards the center instead of lifting
upward and away from the earth.
DO: Stand tall with
your feet wide apart. Turn your right toes forward and your left toes 45
degrees towards the front, arms extending in a T position. The instep of your
back foot aligns with the heel of your front foot. Inhale, grounding into both
feet and exhale tilting your hips towards your back leg and lifting your navel
and chest as you extend your spine long and out over your front leg. Inhale,
lifting from the earth up through your body. Exhale with your right hand
to your right ankle, a yoga block or the floor on the outside of the right foot
if you have found flexibility without compromising the extension of both sides
of the waist and spine. Inhale into the ball of the right toe mound, as you
reach down into the support of the earth to rise up to extend upward to the
expansion of the sky.
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Meet Candace Morano
Candace
Morano is a certified yoga teacher & educational kinesiologist based in New York. For the
past seven years, she has brought together the teachings of yoga, kinesiology,
psychotherapy, and aromatherapy to transform the lives of the adult, children,
and disabled clients with whom she works. Combining her degree as a
social worker with yoga and educational kinesiologist, Candace began to work
privately with children with Cerebral Palsy, Down Syndrome and Autism.
For three years, she taught the yoga program at the Cooke Center
for Learning, working with a body of students with a wide range of special
needs. Candace also works with adults. She has taught programs to the parents
and teachers of the Learning Spring School
and the Rebecca School both based in NYC, incorporating
yoga, educational kinesiology, and stress reduction techniques. Candace's
practice incorporates the use of medicinal oils for injuries and aromatherapy
in the private classes she runs throughout New York City.
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