Yoga at Home for Beginners: Practice in Silence If You Get an Injury

In my last post I discussed the benefits of using music to enhance your yoga at home practice.  Everyone's tastes and needs differ but music can definitely give your practice an energizing boost.  That said, however, I also recommend that you practice yoga at home in silence if you get injured.

Why, you ask?  Because practicing to the "sounds of silence" enables you to listen to and "hear" your body more readily as you stretch and hold your poses.  When you can "hear" your body, you notice what is going on with it and can adapt your movements more readily so you can heal from an injury. Ten days ago while on vacation with my son, I apparently pulled a muscle in my lower back after spending hours at a waterpark, walking barefoot on concrete for almost 5 hours, and slipping and falling on my butt as I tried to get up after going down one of the slides.  

I didn't realize that pulling a muscle can create enormous constraints on one's body and in this case, my lower back - the sacrum area became a field of stiffness and pain.  In previous times when I have felt stiffness after sleeping in an awkward position or sitting too long, doing yoga would usually alleviate the problem right away.  This time, my pulled muscle created such constriction and tightness that I could not get into the plough, shoulder stand, half-lotus or even the child pose (which I had considered to be one of the easiest poses that I present in my book) without feeling like my lower back was in a vise!  

As a result, I had to substantially adapt my yoga poses over the next few days as well as trek over to a chiropractor whose office is a short walk from my house.  Because my lower back was so constricted, I practiced yoga in silence.  I found this most helpful to better "read" my body in its temporary injured state.  And, I discovered this to be an excellent practice because I could hear my vertebrae adjust as I did poses such as the cobra that target the lower back.

Practicing in silence once a month or so is a useful habit to make sure you are attuned to your body as you do yoga.  It's especially important if you have an injury of any kind.

Yours for listening to your body with the "sounds of silence."

Laura Venecia Rodriguez

 

 

Comments

[Laura Rodriguez]

Thank you! Keep on visiting this blog!

Laura

[Auto transport]

I am feeling relaxed by just reading this..lol thanks for sharing this..

Auto Transport in USA offering best auto transport rates for open and enclosed door to door auto transport & car shipping services. Auto transport in USA currently giving best auto transport rates all around the Country. We have reasonable auto transport rates for door to door car Transportation services every state and every city in the US.For more details please visit: Auto transport

[Tina]

Still. that is an amazing track record—nearly 40 years injury-free ...

I found that music or lack of it made very little difference in my case. The worst injury I'd ever got from yoga (and I mean that it has healed by itself but it's been over a year) actually happened in a yoga class ... with extremely unobtrusive soft spiritual music playing barely audibly in the background ...

The teacher is actually a nice one; and the style fairly mild, but she runs off at the mouth sometimes ... and is pretty talky for that mild style of yoga ... I just had done one stupid thing, ONCE ...

Which reminds me, that if I have a Hurricane Day off from work tomorrow, I should get myself on my mat ... with or without music ...