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Tuesday, February 12, 2013

Yoga Exercises for Posture


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By Kimaya Singh

Many people ask, "how can I improve my posture?" Having good posture has a variety of benefits, some social and others having to do with health. Our posture affects the way we breathe, think and feel. Bad posture can make people ill and even take years off of their lives.

People are sometimes willing to go to great extremes to achieve good posture. Walking around with books or glasses of water on your head is neither necessary nor useful. The human body actually wants good posture; the trick is listening to it.

One way to improve posture is through practicing yoga. Yoga stretches and shapes each region of the body strengthening muscles, bones and joints. Lifelong yoga practitioners display perfect posture even when they are well into old age.




The mountain pose is a yoga position that is particularly good for your posture. The mountain pose helps with balance. While this is considered to be a basic pose, it prepares the body for still more complex yoga positions. The mountain pose is also known as Tadasana (or Samasthiti).

Uttanasana or the forward stretch supports good posture by stretching the spine and hamstrings. The forward stretch has a number of other benefits, including that of improving organ function. Like most yoga positions, the forward stretch prepares the body for the next position.

Most people who practice any form of yoga training know the downward facing dog position. This iconic position is also one of the yoga positions that most supports perfect posture. From head to toes, downward facing dog stretches and molds the entire body.




After downward facing dog, the next yoga position is upward facing dog. Not to be outdone by its predecessor, upward facing dog also provides powerful posture benefits. Upward facing dog is particularly good for the spine. Spinal health and strength are integral to good posture.

Expanding this basic routine to more complicated ones will continue to train the body until good posture becomes second nature. In very real sense yoga itself is good posture. Each pose brings the body to a properly postured position and holds it there. Bodies trained by yoga find it hard to have bad posture.

Yoga teaches people to understand the way their bodies work as well as their spirits and minds. Ultimately, what yoga recognizes is that the body is interconnected and interdependent. Every system in the body relies on every other system. In this way, every yoga pose is good for posture.

© Copyright – Aura Wellness Center – Publications Division
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4 comments:

Naheed said...

I witness the benefits of upward and downward dog poses. Apart from my yoga practice, I try to make lives of street animals better on streets and in this I have learned a lot from them. I have noticed in dogs that when they stretch their bodies downward, they stretch it upward also and that's what keep them active and muscular.

kalaiselvan said...

good article about postures, thanks

parvezbdjsr said...

Through regular yoga practice postures can be improved, because Yoga stretches and shapes each region of the body strengthening muscles, bones and joints.

Unknown said...

Expanding the basic yoga routine to more complicated ones will continue to train the body until good posture becomes second nature. Thanks for sharing this useful article.

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