Using Yoga To Make Children Happy

By Faye Martins

Everyone wants their children to be happy and healthy; it’s a parent’s top desire and researchers now show this can be done through yoga training. Yoga has been used for centuries to help people find their center and to calm themselves.

Yoga has actually been known to increase the overall quality of life. Professionals are now realizing that this type of deep relaxation is an untapped resource and it can be a powerful tool for children. Typically, yoga has been something that has been enjoyed by adults, but now the benefits of using it for those of school ages are becoming apparent. It is during the formative years that yoga has shown to have the best benefits. Its benefits build self-awareness and also allows children to strengthen their bodies and develop their minds. Although not thoroughly noted, children experience just as much stress and aggravation in their daily lives as adults do.

Children are mostly interested in having a good time and playing. Fun and games is what it is all about. While instructing adult classes in Hatha yoga is more serious in nature, children learn and relax best through fun mental and physical exercises. For a child their mental alertness is key and this form of recreation is something that they can utilize both in school and at home.

Parents that have put their children into yoga classes have found that their children’s self-discipline levels increase as well as their ability to calm themselves in stressful situations. The benefits seem from practicing yoga can also be observed through other sports, like martial arts. Parents with children who are easily stressed and require high maintenance are finding that by enrolling them in yoga classes reduces a parent's stress load.

Yoga training is a practice that must be observed on a constant basis to be of value. Some find that doing a short yoga session, with the children before school, will help to release tensions, anxieties, and mental fog from the night before. Children will learn to calmly inhale and exhale during hectic times, which allows them to lower their stress levels. Children learn valuable stress and anxiety reducing skills that can be utilized all through life. Yoga doesn’t have to demand a long period of time, just 15-20 minutes is all it takes to reduce stress and induce happiness.

One of the biggest hurdles for children during their formative years is trouble getting to sleep. This can be anything from worrying about bedwetting to anxiety at night due to the darkness. Yoga can release the anxieties and allow for a peaceful night’s sleep. A child that has less stress is happier and healthier.

© Copyright – Aura Wellness Center – Publications Division



To see find out more about yoga or to see our selection of affordable courses, including our online hatha yoga teacher training intensive courses, please use the yoga resources on the right side of this page.

If you are a teacher, yoga studio manager, blogger, e-zine, or website publisher, and are in need of quality content, please feel free to use my blog entries (articles). Please be sure to reprint each article, as is. Namaste!

Yoga Poses for Tennis Players: Dolphin Pose

By: Virginia Iversen, M.Ed

Practicing Yoga poses on a regular basis is a very effective way to keep your body strong, toned and limber. If you actively participate in a sport or athletic activity that utilizes a certain group of muscles on a repetitive basis, practicing Yoga asanas will keep those muscles strong, flexible and in correct alignment with the rest of your body. This will help to prevent sports-related injuries. For instance, if you are an avid tennis player, you may find that your shoulders, neck, legs, and even your elbows (hence the proverbial tennis elbow problem) begin to become tight and strained due to over use. 

Dolphin Pose is a very effective Yoga pose for releasing tension throughout the shoulders, neck and upper arms. This pose also gives the back of your legs a nice stretch, helping to alleviate muscular tension in the hamstrings and calf areas. The practice of Dolphin Pose is quite accessible, even to beginning Yoga practitioners.  Dolphin Pose is also an inversion, so it helps to circulate fresh oxygen and nutrients to many areas of your body, including your brain. Increasing the circulation of fresh oxygen and blood throughout your body and mind will energize you and clear away any mental cobwebs. 

* Dolphin Pose

To practice Dolphin Pose: warm-up first with a series of Sun Salutations. If you have the time, you may also wish to practice some standing and balancing Yoga postures prior to practicing Dolphin Pose. When you are adequately warmed up, come to Mountain Pose at the front of your Yoga mat. Take a few deep, full breaths, and then, with your next inhale, move through the beginning poses of Sun Salutation A and pause in Downward Facing Dog.

From Downward Facing Dog, move into Child’s Pose and rest for a moment before moving into Dolphin Pose. When you are ready, place your forearms in front of you on the Yoga mat approximately shoulders’ distance apart with your hands gently clasped together. You will form a triangle with your forearms and hands. Your hands should rest on the mat with the outside of your little fingers flush against the mat. With your next inhale; push up into a modified Downward Facing Dog Pose. Your weight will be resting on your forearms and on your feet.  

This modified Downward Facing Dog is Dolphin Pose. Equally distribute your weight on both forearms and remember not to ‘hunch’ your shoulders by keep your shoulder blades moving down your back. To release muscular tension in your neck and shoulders more fully, push against the Yoga mat with your forearms. Breathe deeply and exhale completely. Hold Dolphin Pose for three to five breaths, and then release the pose and rest in Extended Child’s Pose for several breaths. For optimal benefit, repeat Dolphin Pose two more times before continuing on with the rest of your Yoga practice. 

© Copyright – Virginia Iversen / Aura Wellness Center – Publications Division

To see find out more about yoga or to see our selection of affordable courses, including our online hatha yoga teacher training intensive courses, please use the yoga resources on the right side of this page.

If you are a teacher, yoga studio manager, blogger, e-zine, or website publisher, and are in need of quality content, please feel free to use my blog entries (articles). Please be sure to reprint each article, as is. Namaste!