When you are into something as healing as yoga, you must follow a certain sequence. If you do not follow a sequence, for any fitness regime as such, it can lead to health issues and injuries. Moreover, it is important that you prepare the body at first, warm it up a bit and then proceed with any kind of physical activity. No matter, which form of yoga you are practicing, you must follow an order. That is what the whole thing is all about.
You may have all the knowledge in the world, regarding an ancient science such as yoga, but if you do not follow an order, things will not work out. Your personal goal, is important, if you are into self-practice. Additionally, your professional goal is important, if you are a teacher of yoga. Furthermore, your professional goals and your student’s professional goals must sync.
Sequencing Principles That You Must Follow
You must understand at the very beginning, that there are various kinds of poses in yoga. You will find standing ones, seated ones, lying down ones, forward bends, twists, floating ones and more. Every asana is not for every body type. You must analyse the features of each type of posture, only then can you get the intricacies. Some sequences are very energizing, while some are relaxing in nature. You have to keep a balance between the two.
- Yoga Sequence to Energize – If you want to gain more energy, then it is apt that you practice stimulating poses. Surya Namaskara is one of the initial warm up poses, that helps one to initiate the practice. After you are done with this sun salutation, you can move into standing poses. Proceed with forward bends thereafter, and slowly get into inverted ones. If you have certain chronic illnesses, then you can start with the targeted poses. They aim to treat a certain ailment in the body. So, you may break the correct order at times. As with everything, you must find exceptions in this sequencing as well.
- Yoga Sequence to Relax – If you are dealing with mental problems, like anxiety, tension, and stress, it is always better to start with relaxing poses. Then, slowly as you gain momentum, you can navigate to the energizing ones. If you are looking for relaxation, you can increase the hold time, for your poses. Take the example of Yin yoga, as it is one of the styles in which the poses are held for 5-10 minutes. Through such practice, you will be able to impact the deep tissues of the body.
It is important, in your yoga classes, to aim for balance in relaxing and energizing poses. It will be sensible for you to note that there is no stringent order, wherein you will be able to maintain balance. You can alternate the poses. There are many poses and variations, that you can avail yourself of. You just have to develop some awareness to understand, what is working for you, and what is not.
Yin Yoga Sequencing
For the Hips – Even you are flexible overall, you may sometimes find that the area around the hips is not that flexible. Despite a lot of yoga practice, some people have such problems. In such cases, you can start with Yin Yoga practice. It can help you to create more space and open up. As you hold the poses for a longer time, the benefits do not just reach the muscles and tendons, but they go deeper than that. The excessive stretching of the tissues helps to reduce stiffness and tightness. When you are doing yoga, opening of hip joints assume a lot of importance. It culminates into a lot of flexibility, as you can do many poses through the lower part of the body. You use them in certain standing asanas, seated ones, inverted ones and so on. You can start with the hip poses first in a certain order.
Include external hip rotations, with the help of supine poses and standing poses. After that, you can go for internal hip rotations. You can do the latter in supine pose. Breath awareness is also important, so you can add some Pranayama and meditation in between as well. You should note that, in Yin style, there is no need of specific warm up. However, you can still start with a few yang poses.
So, this is basically just an example of a Yin style sequence. There are plenty of others, that rely on what body part, you want to activate.
Here are a few points that you should remember about Yin Yoga Sequencing.
- Most Yin form sequences or classes last for an hour, 75 minutes or 90 minutes.
- You have to set a goal for the session, or if you are conducting a class, for the class as a whole.
- Soothing breathing exercises also have to be included in the sessions. It will help you to relax the mind.
- You have to ensure to balance the number of front-bends and back-bends.
- You can start the yoga classes with gentle Yin poses and then navigate into the deeper ones, that include hip openers.
- You should also see to it that the flow in the poses is maintained, without too many or too much changes in the body positions.
- Additionally, you have to hold the poses on both sides of the body, to create balance.
- Allow transition time and also use props.
For the Legs and Spine, please find the sequence are given here:
Cat pulling the tail – half butterfly – caterpillar pose – corpse pose – sphinx pose – seal pose – dragonfly pose – snail pose – relaxation.
For Stress release, there is a specific sequence too.
Child pose – butterfly – cat pulling the tail – caterpillar – bridge – dragonfly – deer – sphinx – relaxation.
You can try this sequence for a period of 60 minutes – 90 minutes. As a part of Yin style, you have to take things slowly. So, you can get the maximum benefits from it. Always have patience, while practicing this style, so as to gain the maximum benefits.