I was reading through comments on a Yoga Instagram post the other day, and a question that kept on popping up was "Does yoga improve balance?"
Yoga improves your balance by strengthening and toning your core muscles, your pelvic floor, and your gluttes, along with the muscles that wrap around your spine.
It also aids in strengthening your postural muscles (deep muscles in your abdomen, pelvis and back), which, as the name indicates, help you improve your body posture.
Having a good balance is essential, whether it is to avoid falls or to be more comfortable in our daily life.
In this article we dive deep into how practicing yoga actually helps you improve your balance, and why it may be one of the best holistic ways to do it.
Read on to find out…
How does Yoga improve balance?
Yoga offers a wide range of health benefits and each position, in turn, offers different benefits; both for the mind, as well as for the body and spirit.
The balance positions do not work only on a physical level by strengthening the muscles necessary to keep us in position, but also work strongly on our mind, gradually bringing us into a state of inner calm.
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IMPROVES YOUR PHYSICAL BALANCE
On a physical level, Yoga helps you improve coordination, increase strength, and develop stability.
With regular practice, you will be more coordinated and benefit from improvements in your stamina and stability, both during yoga practice, as well as in daily life.
For older people, improved stability and balance help reduce injuries due to falls, which are so common as you age.
Each Yoga balance position strengthens the muscles and joints of your body differently.
The standing positions work mainly by strengthening your leg muscles and knee joints; while balancing positions on the arms strengthen your wrists, arms, and shoulder muscles.
For this reason, you must vary your balance positions to obtain the maximum benefit.
IMPROVES YOUR BREATHING
In yoga, improving balance means working on stability, but also on calm and concentration.
Much of it involves abdominal breathing, as Daniel Lacerda writes in his book 2100 Asanas, the encyclopedia of yoga postures (ed. Marabout):
"Breathing promotes stability. If your breathing is racing, it is probably because you are going too forcefully. Release the posture a bit and let your breath settle."
HELP YOU ATTAIN INNER BALANCE
The most exciting part of yoga for balance is that the positions also provide emotional benefits.
They are useful for relieving stress, reducing tension, and fatigue.
These Yoga postures also help improve your focus, concentration, and memory.
Indeed, balance is not only physical but also emotional.
Sometimes life seems so hectic and out of control that the result is to be "out of balance".
The relaxation you experience during and after yoga classes helps bring awareness and balance to your life off the mat.
For this reason, it is very important that you observe what happens in your mind during a balance position: if your mind is calm, the practice will also be calm and stable; if your mind is turbulent, the practice will also suffer the swings of the mind.
