We all know the benefits of yoga and the ones who have adopted it fully have transformed their lives.But not many, including those who practice it regularly, gravity can affect your yoga practice! If you have never heard this before, you sure have hit the nail right.
It is indeed true that from exercises like weightlifting to slumping down on your bed to even walking on the ground- everything we do, is governed by gravitational forces of the Earth. This includes our Yoga practices too. so, if you well versed with how gravity impact your yoga mat, you would perhaps be able to alter your moves to get the maximum benefit of your yoga session !
Gravitational forces of the earth give us the base and context to work with. So, imagine, in space, when there is no gravity, you cannot move or do any of the poses because there is absolutely no gravity. You cannot even support your own body weight. This has the pull gravity has on us. When one is dancing, gravity is affecting their pose and their movement.
Yoga does that by first helping us find our centre. Gravity basically picks the muscles that will be at work, and which will not. In Yoga too, this movement literacy certainly gets impacted against gravity. When you have the knowledge of how the specific movements and muscles get impacted with gravity- you become at practice, help eliminate pains and create more flexibility in the body.
For instance, in many poses, raising your leg up uses hip flexor muscles that are found on the front of the body. When one lifts their legs against gravity, muscles will see a shortening contraction. Therefore, the more metabolically efficient your body is, the lesser energy you require to move with gravity, than against it. This means during any yoga pose, your centre of gravity affects the pose, and the move for any practioner.
Another example is the Tree Pose, where the pelvis shift occurs naturally to balance ourselves on a straight body. The leg and spine muscles automatically adjust themselves to the power of gravity. These kinds of poses which take benefits of gravity help in muscle extensions and flexions.
In the same way, inverted poses like Shoulder Stand or Legs Up the Wall go against gravity and have their own benefits too. These kinds of poses have long term effects on skin, improve circulation amongst other. When we do asanas against gravity, the forces exert a pull on your muscles, spine and skin. The poses that go against gravity benefit our health as it prevents sagging of our skin, and make our skin look younger and vibrant for a longer time.
Practicing aerial yoga, is another example where we work against gravity. Though a much recent phenomenon. Aerial yoga or Fly Yoga is an activity which is counter gravity based and allows the muscles to relax and joints to have more space and be flexible, making them stronger in turn. So, whether we are practing a dance routine, playing a sport or doing yoga – any of these physical activities, gravity has an indispensable role to play. Coming back to the zero-gravity scenario – we can understand the role it plays in our lives and our spiritual journey. It is time we understand the purpose and use it to our full advantage and improve our health.
Nida Zakaria