6 FREE Yoga Practice Benefits

I started yoga a few years ago out of pure luck. One of my friends had a free pass and I took a couple classes at Hot Yoga in Portland. I’m completely embarrassed to admit that I thought “Hot Yoga” meant, like “sexy hot” and it was just going to be fun and silly. I literally wore a long sleeve shirt and pants to the class. Needless to say it was “hot” like the temperature and there was nothing sexy about what I was doing.

Anyways, I ended up really benefiting from a yoga teacher describing the motions and then the mini-meditation at the end of the class. It was a great workout as well. After the classes though, I could never get myself to actually practice yoga by myself without the instructor there. I would get bored and I always had to have music on or watch a show during the session. See, I hadn’t figured out yet that yoga is actually less for your body and more for your soul and mind.

Too Busy to See the Benefits

It took me a while to figure out the actual benefits of a yoga practice. I was too busy to do yoga! I needed to burn 500 calories in 30 minutes or my workout would be a waste. I didn’t have time to just sit on the floor. Who has time for that? What’s funny is that I never had time “for that,” until I was the busiest I’d ever be – a new mom, with a new business, and a new job. It’s when you lose yourself, that you see exactly what you need.

Thank goodness I found yoga, but now I see it was only a matter of time. I love to move my body, and I meditate while I run frequently. Moving and working my body is my way into the present moment. I’m sure you’ve experienced some type of experience like this before. You turn the corner on a snow crusted path, and pause to see your breath rise up in the winter air, or perhaps your feet crunch over the Fall leaves and you watch a water droplet glisten on a leaf above you. Meditation through movement, and especially when in nature can be surreal. Yoga does just this and more.

6 Yoga Practice Benefits

Yoga For Mental Clarity

Here are the 6 surprising amateur yoga practice benefits that I have personally experienced. If you’ve never tried yoga, now is a great time to start. I would recommend going to a class first, since a physical teacher is the best way to learn the moves correctly, but then you can practice as an amateur and reap the benefits just as I have.

Meditation Practice

A yoga practice helps you to begin a meditation practice.  During yoga you focus on your breathing. Focusing on your breath is a form of meditation and mindfulness. When you focus on your breath you allow thoughts to come and go without holding onto them. You find an inner calm, a “centeredness,” if you will. From the book Wherever You Go, There You Are author Jon Kabat-Zinn explains that from this place of meditation, daily stressors and discomforts exist, but it’s as if you’re watching them on the bank of a river as they float by (9). You end up thinking clearly, as if you’ve hit the “reset” button on your day or week.

Mindfulness

Author Jon Kabat-Zinn writes that mindfulness is a key ingredient in Buddhism, Taoism, Yoga, and sprinkled in the works of Emerson, Thoreau, Whitman and Native American wisdom (5). These ancient teachings, through practicing yoga, provided my first glimpse into a busy easily distracted chatter box of a mind. At first, I couldn’t even practice yoga without music on. I needed constant noise to avoid becoming bored. I was trying to distract myself to get through physical activity. Kabat-Zinn writes that “We tend to be particularly unaware that we are thinking virtually all the time. The incessant stream of thoughts flowing through our minds leaves us very little respite for inner quiet” (9). It took a yoga practice for me to realize that I can actually observe my thoughts, and that my thoughts are not actually me.

Also, feeling “bored” is a state of mind, and you must train your mind to accept your boredom and focus on your breath. I noticed that I seemed to be uncomfortable without being immediately entertained. This lead me to think “why do I need to be constantly entertained? What else am I consuming, just because I’m bored?”

Gratitude Practice

I’ve written previously about the benefits of a gratitude practice, and I think yoga helped me arrive at my current practice. Having a gratitude practice just means you take time out of your day to appreciate what you have, who you are, and the present moment. Being mindful is the “direct opposite of taking life for granted” (5). If you are mindful, you are intentional. If you are intentional you are serving yourself and the people you love. What better way to show gratitude than by your life’s actions? Yoga helps you remain intentional because it clears the mental clutter.

Flexibility

Photo by Jacob Postuma on Unsplash

Another great benefit of yoga is flexibility, both your mind and your body.  Most yogi’s will state that a flexible body equals a flexible mind. The motions of stretching and increasing your flexibility can be a teacher in creating your mind to be more flexible. What situations have you recently viewed that you thought were unsolvable? The flexible mind might either change the perspective, or think creatively to solve the problem. Viewing your physical flexibility as a hint to your mind’s flexibility can release physical tension, but also tension and stress in your mind. It helps you view the world as one big puzzle with multiple ways to arrive at a solution.

Being Present

Yoga teaches you to be present in the moment wherever you and your mat happen to be. I rarely go to a class now. I just turn on my favorite online yoga instructor, 5 Parks Yoga,  and she leads me through the 30 minute session. I don’t listen to music anymore because I try to focus on each move, my breath, and the sensations in my body. This is what the present moment feels like, and most people never allow themselves to be there.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m a frequent planner, worrier, and hypothetical thinker. Committing to my yoga practice and focusing on the movements allows me to really enjoy the moments that I am given. It’s mental practice as much as it is physical.

Less Busy

Photo by Dave Contreras on Unsplash

A yoga practice allows you the opportunity to do nothing at the end of each session. It’s a shame that when I was “too busy” I would skip this part of the session, completely cutting off the opportunity to meditate. Being “less busy” is “difficult for Americans to grasp because our culture places so much value on doing and on progress” (39).   Yoga has allowed me the opportunity to prioritize time to not be busy. It’s really the best part of life, when you don’t need to be anywhere, complete anything, or worry.

I actually have found that I get more done if I prioritize time to be not busy, because that is actually when creativity begins. Boredom has turned into a sign that I am uncomfortable with just being. It’s a sign that I need to give myself more time to sit in a quiet moment and enjoy.  

Final Words

From someone who is a complete amateur at yoga, the benefits are still there. I can’t do the advanced poses. I fall all the time, and I still can’t get my heels to touch on downward dog, but I’m there on my mat in the present moment focusing on my practice and listening to my breath, and I think that makes all the difference.

Join the Discussion

What have been some benefits you have noticed from a yoga practice? What “aha moments” have you discovered while practicing yoga?

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Source

Kabat-Zinn, Jon. Wherever You Go, There You Are: Mindfulness Meditation for Everyday Life. Piatkus, 2016.