Yoga that’s actually enjoyable and meditative will be surprisingly arduous to seek out as of late. (In the event you’ve ever discovered your self doing biceps curls in a “yoga” class, you understand what I’m speaking about.) And whereas there’s a spot for yoga lessons that really feel extra like interval exercises, typically you want a apply that lets you decelerate and reset.

One antidote to the yoga traits that make your coronary heart race (like “snake yoga”—sure, you learn that proper) is somatic yoga, a apply that mixes somatic actions—the place you give attention to how an train makes you are feeling by transferring your physique as gently and compassionately as attainable—and yoga postures and that emphasizes the mind-body connection.

However what, precisely, is somatic yoga, and what makes it so totally different from the sorts of lessons you’re in all probability extra acquainted with? We requested two veteran academics to elucidate, and to share the advantages of this distinctive apply.

Okay, critically, what’s somatic yoga?

Somatic yoga lessons sometimes embrace yoga poses you already know, plus somatic workout routines, that are sometimes easy, small actions aimed toward selling extra consciousness inside the physique.

However in somatic yoga, it’s usually not a lot what you’re doing that’s distinctive, however how you’re doing it. “We’re training holding our consideration on what we’re doing all through all the apply,” says Lisa Tatham Flynn, a New York Metropolis-based instructor licensed in Hanna Somatic Training and trauma-informed yoga remedy. “It’s a first-person, inside, lived-experience apply,” in contrast to in another sorts of yoga, the place you might be centered in your physique from the skin in.

Not all somatic yoga lessons look precisely the identical, and totally different academics could have totally different approaches (some could incorporate components of yoga remedy, for example, or Feldenkrais Technique). However listed here are some ways in which a somatic yoga class may feel and look totally different from different types of yoga.

1. It’s about how you are feeling, not reaching a posture

In contrast to in different types of yoga, the place the main focus could also be on reaching a posture or a motion with the right kind or to the fullest extent, in somatic yoga, the precise shapes that the physique is making aren’t so related, says Armen Menechyan, a Los Angeles-based instructor specializing in yoga remedy and somatic practices and founding father of Pür Pleasure.

“There’s no proper approach {that a} posture must look,” Menechyan says. As an alternative, somatic yoga encourages transferring inside a variety that’s comfy to your physique, and approaching the motion with a way of playfulness and exploration.

2. You’ll in all probability spend a lot of time on the ground

The primary thirty to forty minutes of Menechyan’s lessons are sometimes spent on the ground, transferring from a relaxed, mendacity down place. Within the Hanna Somatic Yoga that Flynn teaches, college students calm down on the ground between postures, taking a minute to “discover the sensory suggestions that the motion generated,” she says. “There’s data coming from the pores and skin, muscular tissues, joints, bones, and your peripheral nervous system as much as your sensory cortex, and your motor cortex makes use of it that will help you do no matter motion comes subsequent.”

3. It’s not centered on stretching

For some folks, yoga is mainly synonymous with stretching. However in somatic yoga, “we don’t stretch,” Flynn says. In actual fact, as an alternative of specializing in the lengthening facet of a motion (for instance, your again throughout cow pose), in somatic yoga, the main focus is on the contracting facet of the motion (so the abdominals in cow pose).

The thought is that “by placing our consideration on the contracting facet of the motion, we’re utilizing our nervous system to inhibit the lengthening facet from contracting, and it will get to elongate with out being stretched,” Flynn says.

4. A lot of the apply occurs in your thoughts

Hanna Somatic Yoga teaches that college students ought to visualize doing a posture earlier than really doing it. “Whenever you do a visualization, your premotor cortex sends what’s known as a motor plan to your physique, letting your muscular tissues know what they will have to do,” Flynn says. And if there’s a posture that you just’re not capable of do, or that simply isn’t in your apply that day? “Do it in your creativeness,” she says.

“Somatic yoga encourages transferring inside a variety that’s comfy to your physique.” —Armen Menechyan, somatic yoga instructor

The advantages of somatic yoga that’ll persuade you to offer it a shot

1. Reengaging dormant muscular tissues

“Most of us have locations the place we supply sensory motor amnesia,” Flynn says. “You lose the sense of what a muscle seems like or what it does.” She says we would expertise this as a variety of movement that’s restricted and doesn’t appear to enhance irrespective of how a lot we stretch it. Somatic yoga helps to reengage and reset these muscular tissues, she says.

2. Managing tightness

Flynn says somatic yoga might help train your physique to assist launch muscular tissues that it’s contracting habitually. “Your nervous system is working 24/7 to keep up these contractions, so if you concentrate on your mind as a pc, you could have much less bandwidth obtainable,” she says. “Sleep is affected, and for those who’re holding tight stomach muscular tissues, as many people are, digestion and respiration are in all probability affected.”

3. Higher mind-body connection

“I believe the largest profit that my head and my coronary heart are aligned, and I’m not neglecting my physique,” Menechyan says. Flynn likens the thought of integrating your thoughts and physique to having a sixth sense. “You’re tuning in, you’re creating that sixth sense, which provides you a way of how you’re in any second,” she says. “When you could have the flexibility to internally monitor, you could have the flexibility to self-regulate and self-heal.”

4. Shifting out of the sympathetic nervous system

Flynn says somatic yoga might help practitioners shift from the sympathetic nervous system, the place your physique is activated and pressured, to the parasympathetic nervous system, the place your physique is relaxed and conserving power. “You’re not going to stay there on a regular basis—life means there’s moments when it’s good to turn into activated,” she says. “However you gained’t keep activated—you’ll reset.”

5. Psychological and bodily reduction

“If I’ve had a anxious day, the category will carry me again residence to my physique,” Menechyan says. “If there’s any type of signs of hysteria or melancholy, it will give me area round that to see extra clearly. Relating to persistent ache and fatigue, it supplies much less neural irritation and fewer physique irritation, so ache goes down a whole lot of instances.” (Take a look at these somatic workout routines for melancholy.)

5 somatic yoga poses to attempt

Flynn emphasizes that the rules of somatic yoga will be utilized to any yoga pose and any fashion of yoga. Right here, she shares some somatic workout routines, plus easy methods to method a number of frequent poses from a somatic yoga perspective.

1. Shoulder carry

1. Kneel on the ground together with your palms on the tops of your thighs, or sit able that is most comfy for you.
2. Slowly draw your shoulders up, tilting your head again barely.
3. Then, much more slowly and with management, enable your shoulders to launch to gravity and your head to come back ahead to impartial.
4. Repeat 3 times.

2. Mendacity twist

1. Lie in your again together with your knees bent and your ft flat on the ground, a snug distance aside. (In the event you expertise any decrease again ache, attempt widening your ft.)
2. Have your arms out to your sides in a T-shape, and gently roll your arms in order that one palm is dealing with the ground and the opposite is dealing with the ceiling.
3. Slowly roll your head so that you just’re dealing with the palm that’s up, and shift your knees in direction of the palm dealing with the ground, leaving your ft grounded and solely going so far as is comfy.
4. Fastidiously, reverse the train.
5. Proceed slowly alternating backward and forward for about three cycles, then come again to a impartial place.

3. Tree pose (Vrikshasana)

1. Start standing together with your ft hip-width distance aside and your arms down by your sides.
2. Inhale to elongate your backbone, then exhale to shift your weight onto your left foot.
3. Place the only of your proper foot in opposition to the within of your left ankle, then slide the only of your proper foot up the within of your left leg so far as you may comfortably go.
4. Inhale and gently open your chest. As you exhale, press your foot and interior leg collectively to remain centered and powerful.
5. Carry your palms collectively in entrance of your coronary heart in prayer place. (You possibly can maintain onto one thing for extra stability if wanted.)
6. Keep right here for a number of rounds of breath, then repeat on the opposite facet.
7. After working with either side, come again right down to the ground to a leisure place and do a physique scan, noticing how the posture has affected you.

4. Cobra pose (Bhujangasana)

1. Mendacity in your abdomen, first visualize doing cobra.
2. Then, bend your elbows so your fingers are dealing with ahead by your facet.
3. Lengthen your backbone as you inhale, utilizing your again fairly than your arms.
4. Rely to 3, then exhale as you slowly launch again to the ground.
5. Repeat 3 times.
6. Then, stack your fingers beneath your brow and relaxation, respiration deeply and noticing how you might really feel totally different.

5. Legs up

1. Lie in your again, and visualize doing the next posture earlier than doing it.
2. Bend your knees to plant your ft on the ground.
3. Utilizing the flexor muscular tissues in your abs and hips, carry your knees towards your chest.
4. Slowly, prolong your legs in direction of the ceiling, drawing your consideration to the entrance facet of your physique.
5. Keep there for eight cycles of breath, counting “ohm one, ohm two, ohm three, ohm 4” on the inhale and the identical on the exhale.
6. Slowly and with management, bend your knees to plant your ft again on the bottom, then slide your legs out.
7. Take a minute to calm down and spot any sensory suggestions the posture generated.

How you can know if somatic yoga is best for you

Everybody can profit from somatic yoga, Flynn says, however she recommends it particularly for anybody who feels caught of their yoga apply or has gotten injured making an attempt different types of yoga. “This can be a apply that you are able to do, and you’re in management,” she says. “You get to find out what’s the precise model for you.” She additionally suggests it for these focused on exploring their brain-body connection, and people who discover different types of yoga too regimented.

These affected by burnout or have bother concentrating or regulating their feelings may need to give somatic yoga a attempt, Menechyan says. “Or anybody who wants slowing down,” he says. “And I believe that’s lots of people proper now.”