Yin Yoga 101

Dating back to the earliest ancient texts in India, ‘Yin’ like yoga is said to be the first type of asanas practiced, mostly seated, holding for multiple minutes at a time, to increase mobility and prepare for meditation. 

This transitioned over the centuries to ‘Yang’ like asana (Hatha, Vinyasa, Ashtanga, Power, Bikram) for many different reasons and goals, one of which is strengthening, in addition to increasing mobility and preparing the mind to meditate. 

In the last decade of the 20th century, a couple western teachers started to feel an imbalance and brought attention to the practice becoming too 'Yang'.

• Paul Zink
• Paul Grilley
• Sarah and Ty Powers
• Bernie Clark

They were on a mission to bring 'Yin' postures back into the prominence they once had, with entire classes being solely seated, supine (on back), or prone (on stomach). 

The term 'Yin Yoga' might have been born for the first time, but this practice was just born again in a different form.

Yin Yoga is now a slow-paced style in which poses are held for 3-5 five minutes.

Even though it’s passive and slow, Yin Yoga can be quite challenging physically and mentally, due to the long holds, particularly if your body is not used to it.

It's practiced by applying a moderate amount of stress and rest to the connective tissue – fascia, tendons, ligaments, and joints, with the aim of increasing circulation, improving overall mobility, pain reduction, relaxation, and releasing unsupportive mental patterns and emotions that we might be storing in our tissues, organs, systems and parts.

This is also very helpful when preparing for meditation. 

Yin Yoga different from Restorative Yoga.

The development of Restorative Yoga is attributed to B.K.S Iyengar – an authority on yoga and the creator of his self-named style of alignment-based postures. He is known for using props to modify poses to avoid strain and to help students recover from illness or injury. Judith Lasater (one of Iyengar’s students) was instrumental in popularizing this style in the West. 

Restorative is even more gentle, relaxing, and passive, allowing students to release the body into a gentle stretch with zero to little sensation by using props such as blocks, bolsters, blankets, towels and straps to eliminate all muscular engagement.

In both styles, poses are held a couple minutes, allowing muscles to release through passive stretching, but the difference with yin, is we are still trying to experience sensation and a 'good stress' on the tissues, bones, and even in some cases some of our systems and organs surrounding the muscles. The postures are usually adapted from supine and prone, to seated and 1 standing position, and the shapes can be modified for any level and what each person wants to experience.

Yin Yoga and Restorative Yoga are great for days you are:

• Not feeling well
• Tired
• Recovering from illness or injury
• Very Yang in nature and busy and need some help slowing down
• Wanting to prepare for meditation or access deeper meditative states

Yin Yoga and Restorative Yoga can ultimately help you move the body, mind, and emotions towards a more balanced state physically, mentally, emotionally, energetically, and even spiritually.

Benefits include:

• Enhances mobility
• Deep relaxation
• Stills mind
• Enhances mood
• Takes the nervous system to parasympathetic - rest and digest
• Encourages the body to heal itself
• Can boost systems like: immune, digestion, endocrine, and more
• Work on the ENTIRE yoga practice by deepening your relationship with Self and the external world by reflecting on philosophy like the 8 Limbs of Yoga:
  1.  Yamas: Ahimsa, Satya, Asteya, Brahmacharya, Aparigraha
  2.  Niyamas: Saucha, Santosha, Tapas, Svadhyaya, Ishvara Pranidhana
  3. Asana
  4. Pranayama
  5. Pratyahara
  6. Dharana
  7. Dhyana
  8. Samadhi

• Want to book a private or corporate Yin Yoga experience in San Diego?

• Want to attend a Yin Yoga Training in San Diego or virtually?

• Want to attend a public Yin class in San Diego?

  
  

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