5 Benefits Of Yin Yoga

Hi,

I'm Caroline and this is The Active Yogi,

The podcast that shares with you all things health and wellness related from a yoga,

Fitness and wellbeing perspective.

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Thanks for joining guys.

I am going to talk today about,

In my opinion,

Five benefits of the Yin Yoga practice.

For me,

There are endless benefits of the practice and there are many things that I could talk about as well.

I'll probably do a part two,

Maybe even a part three to this at some point in the future or write a blog or something on it.

I wanted to just touch in with some of the benefits of the practice on a very,

Very simple fundamental level.

The ones that I'm going to talk about today are,

First of all,

How it complements our existing practice.

Those of you that don't know what Yin Yoga is,

This is where we put ourselves into shapes in a simple way.

We ask the muscles to relax.

We come into stillness once we're in the physical shapes and the muscles have relaxed.

With time and gravity,

We're working our way towards just a bit beyond the comfort zone in shape.

We're trying to do a little bit of a physical release but also a mental journey as well.

It's a practice where we hold the shapes for longer than we would in a Yang practice,

So three to five minutes typically.

With that in mind,

Let's explore the top five benefits that I see in my own practice.

Number one is that complementary nature to the Yang practice that we all have.

I'll go into that in more detail in a minute.

Number two is the fact that we can foster compassion for our nervous system.

By taking time to be still,

We're giving some goodness back to our nervous system.

The third one is that we learn to find comfort in stillness.

That might seem really obvious to many of us,

But when I'm watching people practice Yin,

Whether that be online or in person,

Not everyone's comfortable with stillness.

We can practice that as a skill.

Number four is the promotion of mindfulness,

So that idea of it being a mindfulness moment or a mindfulness practice in the entirety of a class.

Number five,

I like to think of it as a meditation for beginners.

I'll explain a bit more about that when I get to that particular point.

Then there's an added benefit that I'm going to talk about at the end as well.

Let me come back around to the beginning.

Number one is this idea that we complement our Yang practice.

Whatever our Yang activity,

Whether it's a yoga practice or not,

Whether it's cycling or running or hiking,

Whatever it is you do to move your body,

Yin will complement that.

We have different types of tissues physically in the body.

We have what we consider Yang tissues,

Which are muscles.

The muscles have this wealth and richness of blood governing them.

Blood is all the way through them.

When you see a muscle or an image of a muscle,

It's red and vibrant and juicy.

It's something that can stretch and strengthen.

It can stretch and then come back to its normal size.

You can lengthen it and bring it back to center.

In fact,

With muscles,

How they get stronger is by tearing and repairing them,

So using the muscle,

Putting it through its maximum range,

Which then creates these little micro-tears in it.

It gets stronger in the healing process.

We have to have moments of pausing for that healing to happen.

Ultimately,

That muscle is rich in blood.

It can get stronger from intense,

Fast,

Pressurized workouts.

On the other side of that,

We've got what we call yin tissues.

Yin tissues are what we think of as the connections between the bones.

We've got ligaments and tendons.

Ligaments are what connect the bones together.

Tendons are what connect the muscle to the bone.

We don't want those things to be stretchy and flexible,

Really.

We want them to be doing the job,

Which is stability,

Holding everything together.

In fact,

When ligaments and tendons are pulled to their extreme,

Oftentimes it's going to be surgery that's going to need to take place to bring them back together.

Once you lengthen those tendons,

Which is quite difficult to do,

It's not really going to come back to where it was.

It's not a thing that you can strengthen again,

Like a muscle,

That will bring it back to a stronger place.

Tearing it won't repair it.

Tearing it is going to be very,

Very painful and take a lot of time of surgery or recovery and physiotherapy work to get back to where it was.

Those two extremes then are holding the body together and moving the body.

Then wrapped around the body of the muscle and around all of our nerves and our blood vessels and everything else inside of us is this connective tissue called fascia.

Fascia is literally wrapped around the belly of the muscle.

If you think about the fibers that make up a muscle,

If I use my finger as an example,

It's a little stick,

Let's say,

And wrapped around that fiber of muscle is fascia.

Then here's a second little fiber of muscle and that's got fascia wrapped around it as well.

When I put those two fibers together,

There's also fascia wrapped around each of those.

You get the idea.

If this is the third fiber of muscle,

It's got fascia wrapped around it,

I bring the three together,

Then there's fascia wrapped around it.

Fascia is really an integral part of the body.

If we are not doing a practice of moving and mobilizing our yin tissues,

Of which fascia is one,

And only working on muscle work and strength,

We're going to reach a point where we're not going to have optimal range of motion or mobility in our body.

We can get really strong in the muscles,

But if we're not doing any work that mobilizes the fascia that's wrapped around everything else inside of the body,

Including the muscles,

We're not going to have the range of motion around the hip socket or around the shoulders or in between the vertebrae of the spine.

If we're not moving this fascia every single day to a certain extent through movement but also through the yin practice of stillness,

Which is where it hydrates and gets healthier,

We're going to lose our range of motion properly.

Actually,

We need to be doing a movement practice,

Which is great for the muscles and moving the fascia,

But we also want to have that stillness practice so that we can create the space for the muscles to relax,

And then we can get into the deeper layers of fascia and connective tissue and the ligaments and tendons as well,

To a healthy extent.

We need a balance of things.

We want to think about it as a set of scales,

And if we only do muscle work,

We're going to be really,

Really tight in the fascia and the range of motion.

If we're only doing fascia work,

The muscles are going to get really weak,

And the muscles' job is to engage and move the bones.

If the muscles are weak,

We've not got the stability around the joints to make the movements that we do in everyday life.

I hope that that makes sense.

We need both,

Basically.

Yin complements yang.

I have to admit to being guilty of this in my younger years.

I would have limited spare time around my office job back in the days when I was in the corporate world full-time.

In all of my spare moments,

I would fit things in like boxing,

Running,

Track work.

I'd go to the gym.

I'd go to spin classes.

What else did I do?

Endless activities,

Which all focused on my yang tissues and created this fire and energy in my body and my mind.

I was limiting myself by not having moments of stillness.

I felt like stillness was something that made me lazy.

I didn't recognize back then that actually it was incredibly valuable.

All of the running activities and competitions that I used to do would have been enriched by these moments of stillness for my fascia and connective tissue.

The two things really,

Really go together.

Now I'm back to running.

I have a little bit of stillness,

And I have a little bit of movement in my practice.

I have much more balance,

And I'm much healthier in my body and my state of mind as a result of that.

That's a big one.

And then it's fostering compassion for our nervous system.

This kind of links into the first one a little bit.

If we go,

Go,

Go all the time,

We are predominantly living in our sympathetic nervous system.

That means we're predominantly living in fight or flight mode,

Which means then from a chemical level in the body that stress hormones are predominantly running through our body.

We've got cortisol and adrenaline running through the body when we're in that stress fight or flight mode.

When we take time to be still,

Which is absolutely what Yin is about,

We come into a shape,

We put ourselves into it where we can get to,

And we're still for five minutes for each shape.

We are moving ourselves into the parasympathetic nervous system,

Which is where we are in that rest and digest mode.

Our tissues have time to heal and repair.

Our nervous system has time to regulate.

We have time to slow down the breath.

We have time for the organs to start to heal.

More importantly,

We have time just generally for the nervous system to kind of steady itself and for our mindset to calm down as well.

Blood pressure to lower,

All of these important things that need to happen for optimal health.

We're fostering compassion for the nervous system in the stillness that Yin brings to our lives.

It's a gentle reminder for us that we need to be still sometimes.

If we go,

Go,

Go all the time,

Apart from the fact that we're spending too much time in fight or flight mode,

We are never going to have optimal health because we just won't have enough rest for organs to heal,

For tissues to heal,

And for our brain to regenerate as well.

All of these lead into each other.

Number three is finding comfort in stillness.

I alluded to the fact in my first point that I used to be very,

Very active.

I had to be doing things all the time.

I used to think that sitting still was for people that were a little bit lazy or were older.

I felt like in all of the moments that I had free to me away from my desk job,

I had to fill them with activities and excitement.

Perhaps actually,

Looking back on it now,

And hindsight is a beautiful thing,

I was not comfortable sitting still with myself.

I kept myself busy.

Often when I ask people to sit still,

They'll start to fidget.

They might subconsciously play with their hair.

They might play with their fingers.

Often in Yin,

I've had to walk up to people who are tapping their fingers repeatedly on the floor without realizing it.

Some people,

Let's take it out of the context of Yin,

When they're asked to sit still,

It's when the mind gets busy.

It's when different memories or things that perhaps we don't want to think about start to appear.

Suddenly,

We give them a space in which to appear.

Our to-do list presents itself.

We think back on things that didn't work out so well for us.

Whatever it might be,

Stuff comes up.

It makes us uncomfortable to sit still.

If we start to practice for three minutes at a time in each shape,

Three to five minutes in each shape,

Being still,

We start to recognize that moment when we drop into that calmer part of our nervous system,

Which clears all of that chaotic energy from sympathetic nervous system.

We start to drop into this place of feeling calmer.

The heart rate slows down.

The breath deepens.

The mind calms down.

The physical tissues release because we're no longer in that tense state of being.

Then we start to recognize that it's safe to be still.

We can tune in and notice what's coming up in our mind.

We can sit with it.

It's too easy in life sometimes to run away from the things that we're not comfortable with.

It's very easy to change jobs,

To change city,

To move house.

A little less easy to be fair in the last year,

But it still has been possible for many.

It gives us this opportunity to practice being comfortable with ourselves,

Everything that there is to see,

Which leads me into number four,

Which is promoting mindfulness.

What is mindfulness?

Mindfulness is where we're asked to sit with ourself,

A little bit like I was describing before,

And notice and be aware of everything that's happening,

Either physically in the body or around us,

Or things that are popping up in our mind,

And being accepting of them.

Being accepting of them without any judgment,

Without any extra thinking,

Without adding any extra stories or layers of drama or judgment around it.

We're just noticing.

A good teacher in Yin is going to invite you to come into the shape.

They're going to invite you to find your version of the shape.

That's the important part,

Your version of the shape,

Where you can find a level of comfort to then go deeper and deeper into the practice.

Then they're going to ask you,

First of all,

To notice what there is to notice in your body.

We start with physical sensation.

What do you notice in your body?

Where do you notice it?

What kind of level of intensity is it?

Where are the areas that feel like they're releasing,

And where are the areas that are resisting?

Then several minutes into the practice,

They might ask you if you need to be supported in the same way as when you started.

It's noticing that there's been a progression through the practice that has allowed things to release that allows you to go deeper into your shape potentially.

Or notice that that hasn't happened,

With no judgment,

Just awareness of it.

They ask you to notice the difference,

Perhaps,

Between one side and the other.

Again,

With no judgment,

Just awareness.

In doing this practice regularly,

You start to tune in to the physical sensation in your body,

But also how you feel noticing what's happening in your body.

Then you're also going to tune in to what pops up in your mind when shapes are comfortable versus not so comfortable.

Again,

How do you respond to that?

When you notice your reaction to a shape that really you don't like very much,

Is it the shape that's making you not like it,

Or is it your state of mind that's uncomfortable with being in a shape that doesn't feel great in the body,

And so on and so forth?

All these different things that can appear.

You're being asked to sit still and notice it and find comfort in the stillness,

Which was the point before.

Welcome a calmer state of mind and nervous system,

Which was the point before,

And just sit there.

Be aware of it.

When we start to build this mindfulness practice within the Yin practice,

It becomes easier to take that mindfulness practice into our movements.

We might start to be aware,

Then,

That we sit with one leg crossed over more than the other.

That might explain why,

When you're in double pigeon,

Or as we call it,

Square in Yin pose,

It's more comfortable in one direction than the other.

It's more familiar.

It might then suggest why it's less comfortable on the other side.

You might notice when you're walking something that is out of balance or feels really good as you have practiced Yin for longer.

You start to take the awareness practice into the rest of your day.

You might notice how you react to different things that happen repeatedly in your day or over the course of your week or month or something.

You're enhancing your mindfulness practice on and off the yoga mat.

The fifth one,

Which I really like as well,

Is meditation for beginners.

If I were to say to new people,

And this happens when my shala was open,

If I invited new people to try Yin and they asked me what it's about,

And I told them for 60 minutes or 90 minutes in my public classes,

We're going to sit in a series of shapes for five minutes and not move.

You're going to sit with your eyes closed in stillness for 90 minutes through a series of shapes,

And every shape is going to be five minutes long.

You're just going to notice how you feel.

Most people will think that that's really strange,

Sounds really boring,

Really uncomfortable,

And they want to move their bodies.

Then another thing,

If I say to them it's a bit like meditation,

Or if I advertise the class as being a 60-minute meditation class,

Most people will not attend because 60 minutes of meditation sounds like hard work or too long.

Really,

I want you to think about each of the shapes that we come into,

Whether they be three minutes or five,

As a mini meditation.

It's a mini meditation.

You're sitting still.

You're finding your comfort within the shape.

You're getting comfortable with yourself within the shape.

You're noticing what's happening on the inside and the world around you,

But you're not judging it or affecting it in any way.

Effectively,

That brings us into a meditation and an awareness practice,

A self-awareness practice.

You're in the shape in stillness for three to five minutes,

And then you come to a next shape,

And a next shape,

And a next shape.

Maybe there's six or seven or eight shapes in your practice.

Maybe there's just two,

But it becomes a meditation in its own right.

For people who are newer to a meditation practice,

This can be a really nice way to introduce that.

You'll get more comfortable with mindfulness.

You'll get more comfortable with stillness.

You'll get familiar with that wonderful feeling of moving from sympathetic to parasympathetic nervous system.

With time,

Sitting still in these shapes will feel more comfortable because your yin and yang tissues get used to it as well.

Then you're going to be able to sit still in a meditation practice.

Suddenly,

Meditating doesn't feel quite so daunting or so crazy.

An idea is if we first expected it to be 60 minutes,

Right?

Then the bonus thing,

Which I really love,

Is this idea of when we go deeper into learning about yin yoga,

Some classes that you might attend,

The teacher might talk about Chinese medicine.

That gives us another context in which to learn about ourselves.

Sometimes the teacher might talk about the emotions that are connected to different areas of the body that link into meridian lines,

For example.

They might talk about the season in which you're in and how practicing certain shapes at certain times of year will prepare your body and your state of mind and your organ health for the next season.

They might talk to you about different emotions that pop up or all sorts of different things that can appear within the Chinese medicine system.

That adds another layer of knowledge to the practice as well.

Then that is something that I see as a benefit as well.

Now,

If I were to put all of those benefits together,

One of the biggest things for me and many people I teach is the idea of stress relief.

We live in this crazy world at the moment and we don't really know what's coming next in so many places and so many shapes and forms.

We take a step forward and then we take three steps back.

That's how it feels for many of us.

This idea of a yin practice from a mental wellness being a state of mind is we're releasing stress.

We're teaching our body through sitting still,

Through dropping into parasympathetic nervous systems,

Through being mindful,

Noticing how we feel,

Meditating and recognizing the value of stillness.

All of those bits come together to help us manage our state of mind better.

We're able to better manage stress through the practice of yin when we come to it regularly.

We can achieve a calmer state of mind when something unexpected throws its way.

I can't speak very well today.

When something unexpected comes our way,

We've got a coping mechanism.

We're better prepared to be able to choose calmness as a response to the craziness of the life around us as opposed to always reacting from this place of fear or uncertainty or anger or frustration.

All of these pieces come together for me to create a flexible body but also a flexible state of mind,

A calmer state of mind as well.

There are many,

Many more benefits of it.

You'll notice today most of what I talked about was not physical benefits but mental benefits.

There are physical benefits as well but today I really wanted to focus on the mental benefits because I think this is what so many of us are needing a little bit more guidance with at the moment.

I hope that that's helpful for you.

If there's any questions about any of that,

Send me a message and I will be happy to give you my thoughts or answer any questions there as well.

Okay,

Thank you so much for tuning in and I will see you guys again soon.

Lots of love from me.