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Yoga for a Happy Skeleton

Ahimsa
Sep 3, 2015
4 min read

We tend to think of skeletons as dead things, but each of you has a living skeleton which is a wonder of creation. This invisible structure is the inner architecture of your remarkable body. In yoga the physical body is called the annamaya kosha, which simply means the dimension composed of food (anna = food; maya = composed of; kosha = sheath). Your skeleton holds the rest of the annamaya kosha together and when it suffers, you suffer. Yoga helps keep your skeleton happy so that you can enjoy life to the full.

This term at Ganges Yoga the classes will help you understand how and why yoga is so very very good at keeping the skeleton happy and healthy. Practices will vary according to the level of the class. Each class is planned according to the level and the needs of individual members.

I’ll be drawing on the writings of Sarah Key, a renowned physiotherapist based in Sydney. Sarah loves yoga and says, “Yoga is the most simple and effective way of keeping the joints apart, of keeping them young.” [1]

I highly recommend her books, websites and other resources. For those wanting to know more take a look at www.sarahkey.com and www.simplebackpain.com “To my mind, there are few things cleverer than yoga – it has all the answers.” from The Body in Action by Sarah Key.

Why yoga is so good for your bones

As we go through life we tend to develop routines of physical activity that

don’t vary much from day to day. These routines are based around your type of work, your stage in life, the layout of your home, which sport or exercise program you perform, how much TV you watch, etc. Your body adjusts to these routines and becomes habituated to a limited range of movement patterns. This is not ideal for your skeleton, especially if you spend a lot of time sitting or have poor posture. One result is loss of suppleness.

Suppleness is important! This is often overlooked in the quest for strength and aerobic fitness. According to Sarah Key, “Suppleness is what you want – or at least what you need. This means releasing your skeleton in myriad different directions to unhitch it from its habitual crimps and kinks.” [2]

Yoga does this, because yoga includes unusual positions and movements – things we don’t do in daily life, if ever. This makes it the perfect antidote to the limited, repetitive movement (or lack thereof) patterns of our lifestyle routines. Sarah says,

“The superiority of yoga is that it undoes our complex and often-used patterns of movement. None of the postures reinforces habitual actions and all of them reclaim forgotten territory. Unlike other forms of body stretching, yoga will undo the pattern rather than a single movement.”[3]

Extremes and rest are a good combination

Yoga takes your body to its movement extremes, then you rest in a relaxation pose. Both these are good for your skeleton and your soft tissues as the blood flow is powerfully stimulated by the extreme stretch, flushing out the old and introducing a rush of fresh, nourishing, oxygenated blood. While you rest, the healing happens.

Here are the main points for this week:

Point 1: Yoga asanas (postures) are a brilliant and quite unique system for developing and maintaining suppleness.

Point 2: Yoga takes your spine and joints through their range of movement.

Point 3: Taking range of movement to its extreme generates a rush of blood to the area, flushing out the joints and tissues, thereby cleansing and nourishing your skeleton.

Point 4: Yoga includes relaxation after postures. While you rest, the body has time to peacefully make use of the stimulated circulation and other effects of the movements you’ve done.

Point 5: Yoga is low impact. All of the above happen without any aggressive or jarring movements, making it extremely safe.

Sadhana (yoga routine)

All asanas are named according to Asana Pranayama Mudra Bandha by Swami Satyananda Saraswati, Bihar Yoga Publications. Buy here

The principle of this week’s sadana was to take the spine through its range of movement. To do this, you need to include:

An asana that gives traction to the spine e.g. tadasana (the palm tree pose)
A lateral stretch e.g. tiryaka tadasana (the swaying palm tree), trikonasana (the triangle pose)
A spinal twist e.g. kati chakrasana (the waist rotation pose), supta udarakarshanasana (the sleeping abdominal stretch pose), shava udarakarshanasana (the universal spinal twist), ardha matsyendrasana (the half spinal twist).
A forward bend e.g. pada hastasana (the hand to foot pose), paschimottanasana (the spinal stretch pose), shashankasana (pose of the child).
A backward bend e.g. makarasana (crocodile pose), bhujangasana (cobra pose), kandharasana (the shoulder pose).
Surya Namaskara (Salute to the Sun) is a sequence of forward and backward bends.