3 Yoga Myths
When I talk to people about yoga there are a couple of common phrases I hear on repeat.
“I’m not flexible enough - I can’t even touch my toes!”
“I need something a bit more high intensity than yoga, I like to get a sweat on”
“I struggle to take it seriously - I can’t sit in silence for ages, I just need to be busy!”
Ironically, before I started regularly practicing yoga, I’m pretty sure I said all of these. It will depend on what type of yoga you choose to practice and your teacher but I can safely say these are all misconceptions.
So let’s dispel them one at a time shall we…!
“I’m not flexible enough - I can’t even touch my toes!”
I hate to break it to you, but you do not have to be flexible to practice yoga. I repeat YOU DO NOT NEED TO BE FLEXIBLE TO PRACTICE YOGA.
The most common thing that people say but quite frankly, complete b*******.
Lots of the poses, especially the more advanced poses, require a fair amount of flexibility to replicate the traditional images of the poses. However, it’s not such common knowledge that traditional yoga was practiced by teenage boys who have a very different body shape from a lot of us. All bodies are different, poses will look different in each of us - even from day to day!
A regular yoga practice will increase your flexibility but as a yoga teacher who has been practicing yoga for nearly 10 years and can only just touch her toes (!), you may not ever be able to fold your body into tiny shapes, and that is okay!
“I need something a bit more high intensity than yoga, I like to get a sweat on”
There are two points to consider here.
The level of intensity completely depends on what sort yoga you do. There are different types of yoga and different levels of sweatiness. Some of my sweatiest, most intense, heart-pounding workouts have been yoga - look for ‘Ashtanga’, ‘Vinyasa’ or ‘Power’ yoga classes for something with a bit of spice.
What is the reason you are gravitating to high intensity workouts? To prove to yourself you’ve done something? To burn a certain amount of calories so you can eat that bar of chocolate? I was stuck for years wanting high impact exercise classes to make me feel like I had ‘worked out’ but the benefits of yoga are a lot than burning calories. It might feel unnatural at first if you’re used to HIIT or bootcamp-type sessions, but the focus, stamina and strength it takes to find your yoga poses is real.
“I struggle to take it seriously - I can’t sit in silence for ages, I just need to be busy!”
My first experience of yoga was aged 15 at school. The yoga was slow, the music was monks chanting and a lot of it was focused around touching your toes (which I could not). I quickly decided this was not for me and did not try yoga again for another 5 years.
The world we live in at the moment is impossibly busy; we are quite regularly staring at one or more screens whilst trying to keep up a conversation and moving quickly from activity to activity.
Find a yoga class that works for you, that has moments of stillness but also keeps moving. Instead of jumping straight into an hour silently meditating, find a class that has a pace to it and gradually find more stillness. The myth is that yoga is only about being in stillness and silence, but equally we could all do with a bit of space for the mind and yoga can let you start dipping your toe in…
Any other myths about yoga that you often hear?
