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This Yoga class is focused on:
- becoming more flexible
- becoming more elastic
- re-balancing posture
- recovery from injury
What is it?
This Hatha Yoga class is more physical than the Classical class whilst still being true to developing your Prana/Chi/Life Force.
This Life Force energy is what keeps you feeling vital and alive and full of energy.
The same principles as in the Classical Yoga classes are followed but the Asanas are different and held for different lengths of time.
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This class is suitable for:
- Sporting types
- Runners
- Cyclists
- Kayakers
- Golfers
- People who work physically.
Some Anatomic information.
Muscles will shorten with use, so unless you actually stretch them they will stay short. The ligaments and tendons will thicken so reducing flexibility. Movement will become restricted. Elasticity will be reduced so that a sudden slip will more easily cause a tear in a muscle.
If you only use one side of your body, such as in tennis, or using only one hand for physically hard work then the muscles will develop in an unbalanced way and can easily cause postural misalignments. This causes joints to wear in unnatural ways.
If you do very repetitive work then you are putting a lot of wear on a particular place in your joint.
How does it work?
- Your Concentration is focused on feeling the very edge of the stretch.
- You will be gently and with great awareness, pulling more into the stretch and feeling the point where the stretch receptor is about to fire.
- This is a mechanism designed to protect your muscle from harm. When the receptor feels that there could be danger to the muscle from going too far it will send a signal which causes the muscle to contract and stops the movement.
- The key element is not to pull too hard and force the stretch. You will only cause micro tears in the muscle. This causes stiffness the next day.
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Areas of Focus
- There will be a much bigger focus on Asanas which open the hips, the adductor muscles, the lower back, the hamstrings and shoulder girdle.
- More time will be spent on having the feet above the head to help the waste products to disperse.
- Deep, diaphragmatic, breathing will activate the ‘abdominal pump’ and help with the action of the Lymphatic system to clear and cleanse the waste from the interstitial fluid and muscles.
- Visualisation has been shown to be very powerful in all physical performances and also in healing, so there will be some guided visualisations during the holding phases.
Please note - if you really want to do a Classical class but a Stretching one is the only one available to you due to your time constraints, you can still attend and do it in a more Meditative way and, of course, you can attend a Classical one but do it in a more physical way.
Just let me know before the class starts so that I can guide you more fully.
As always - you are the important one, so variations of Asanas will be shown in class to meet your needs.
Just let me know what doesn't work for you and we can change things to suit you.