Bristol YogaSpace
  • Home
  • Classes
    • Yoga timetable & booking
    • On-Demand Yoga
    • Fees
    • Pregnancy yoga
    • Getting started
    • In-Studio guidelines
    • Online class guidelines
    • Yoga style
    • YogaSpace Blog
    • Our Teachers
  • Private Lessons
  • Yoga Therapy
  • Home Yoga Course
  • Location
  • Contact

Bristol YogaSpace blog

Yoga's brilliance is also its sticking point

12/2/2022

0 Comments

 
Online yoga at Bristol YogaSpace - valuing the yoga teacher
Online yoga has firmly established itself in our lives. It offers brilliant benefits and enables more people than ever to discover yoga practice.

Yoga is so good, that even a a few asanas (postures) can quickly improve how you feel - as can other straightforward exercise forms. Anything is generally better than nothing, no matter what it is. The body likes to move.

So having an in-person yoga teacher isn't a pre-requisite to get started. 'Yoga with Adrienne' and those like her have a valuable and worthwhile place in a yoga practitioners tool kit. 

Is in-person yoga different?

I teach a handful of people who I've never met in person, just via the screen. I know most of my online students from before we all went online, but a few have joined me along the way. Some of these have since met me for 121s or come to my studio for class from time to time so that I can get to know them and their practice further.

This is immensely helpful. Seeing them in-person helps the guidance be more tailored to them, and also helps me then picture what they are likely to be doing when they appear in their little box on the screen. I can anticipate the habits they are likely to accumulate if I see them from time to time.

​If I haven't seen you in two years, I have very little to go on except where you were 2 years ago, and what you have fed back to me along the way. When I see you practice in your little box, I'm able to see if you have got the right end of the stick, I can pick up on a few cues, and so can trust that the basic benefits will be coming your way. 
​

Then there are people I see regularly in-person. We chat, I see them practice and see the response in them, I see how they breathe, and hear the quality of their breath, which can be the most revealing part of someone's yoga practice and helps me provide more nuanced guidance. I can see where they benefit and where they struggle, notice their expressions or tension signs during practice, and help them practice with increasing skill.

Deepening a yoga pose

Yoga practice isn't just about accessing a posture, going 'further' in a pose, or developing physical prowess. The health benefits and physical development are rather wonderful and compelling side effects.

Often we aim to do 'more' with a pose or with the breath than is necessary. We continually 'try' and 'strive' in our practice. We want to go further, deeper, stronger, and so on. If we aren't trying, then what is the point?


Trying too hard

This accumulative 'trying' is perpetuated from the rest of our life, and seems to be an expectation of all our pursuits. If we aren't 'getting anywhere' then why bother? We 'try' all day long, pushing, striving, grasping, wanting in sometimes very subtle ways.

Our yoga practice doesn't have to be that. It can be a counter point to how we habitually find ourselves in the rest our life. It can become a place of skillfully noticing our habits and attitudes and then finding ways of 'letting go', of shedding and removing blocks, tensions, excess efforts. These are commonly blind spots that you can't see on your own, or at least it will likely take you much longer.

Yoga is as much about 'doing' something as it is about 'un-doing'. Offering ways of moving, breathing and sitting which are beyond a place of struggle and striving.
Helping to find a place of greater freedom which might not be realised when you are seemingly getting along fine on their own with their screen as the guide. Finding qualities of space and freedom in your yoga practice can be revelatory.
​

Discover more

Here's the thing with yoga... you can take practice for years and enjoy the immediate benefits of it helping you feel great. It provides so much - bringing us a comfort in our body, breath and mind so quickly. It provides so much strength, health and suppleness over time too. This is its power but also its sticking point. As we then might overlook its greatest potential. The developmental discipline, subtlety and insightful power of intimate yoga (in a space that doesn't involve a screen).
​

It awaits discovery for those who are curious.
0 Comments

Your comment will be posted after it is approved.


Leave a Reply.

    More blog articles >

    Picture
    Yoga student
    Yoga teacher
    Founded YogaSpace in 2009
    More about Clara >
    ​

    Categories

    All
    Anxiety
    Asana
    Ashtanga Yoga
    Association For Yoga Studies
    Backache
    Beginners
    Bikram
    Bikram Yoga
    Breathing
    Bristol
    Chant
    Children
    Competition
    Concentration
    Conference
    Discipline
    Energy
    Event
    Fatigue
    Fitness
    Football
    France
    Hatha Yoga
    Health
    High Blood Pressure
    History
    Home Practice
    Hot Yoga
    Injury
    Inspiration
    Iyengar
    Mantra
    Meditation
    Olympics
    Online Yoga
    Over 55s
    Paul Harvey
    Pilates
    Posture
    Pranayama
    Pregnancy
    Relaxation
    Research
    Running
    Schools
    Sleep
    Sound
    Sport
    Stress
    Try This
    Viniyoga
    Vinyasa Flow Yoga
    Women
    Yoga
    Yogaspace
    Yoga Space
    Yoga Therapy

    Archives

    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    November 2021
    January 2021
    November 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    March 2020
    October 2019
    August 2019
    June 2019
    December 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    June 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    November 2017
    October 2017
    August 2017
    May 2017
    March 2017
    January 2017
    October 2016
    September 2016
    May 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    June 2015
    March 2015
    December 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013
    June 2013
    May 2013
    April 2013
    January 2013
    December 2012
    October 2012
    September 2012
    August 2012
    July 2012
    June 2012
    May 2012
    April 2012
    February 2012
    January 2012
    December 2011
    November 2011
    October 2011
    September 2011
    July 2011
    June 2011
    May 2011
    April 2011
    March 2011
    February 2011
    January 2011
    December 2010
    November 2010
    October 2010
    September 2010
    August 2010
    July 2010
    June 2010
    May 2010
    March 2010

    RSS Feed

Bristol YogaSpace Ltd
Princes Place
Bishopston
Just off Gloucester Road
Bristol BS7 8NP
​Email: 
bristolyogaspace@gmail.com
​

​Call:
07530 053 543
About Us >
Blog & Latest News
Privacy Policy
Terms & Conditions
Best for Yoga Therapy Bristol 2018
Award winner Yoga Therapy
Back to
Bristol YogaSpace home
© copyright 2022. All rights reserved.
  • Home
  • Classes
    • Yoga timetable & booking
    • On-Demand Yoga
    • Fees
    • Pregnancy yoga
    • Getting started
    • In-Studio guidelines
    • Online class guidelines
    • Yoga style
    • YogaSpace Blog
    • Our Teachers
  • Private Lessons
  • Yoga Therapy
  • Home Yoga Course
  • Location
  • Contact