Ashtanga Vinyasa Yoga popularly known as Ashtanga yoga is a style of yoga that was found by K.Pattbhi Jois. The name of this yoga is obtained from the eight limbs of yoga mentioned in the Yoga sutras. The style puts great emphasis on relaxation, flexibility, and breathing.
Steps of Ashtanga Yoga
To achieve the desired results, you need to follow a series of steps. The steps include:
• Sun salutation: this is the first step. Here you need to stretch your body to ensure that every nerve in the body is stretched and you are active. Sun salutation has various levels of stretching that depend on your ability and experience. For maximum effect, it's recommended that you inhale properly tree pose variations.
• Tadasana: this is documented as the second step of Ashtanga. After you have mastered sun salutation stretches, you can go ahead and engage in Tadasana. Tadasana is almost similar to sun salutation only that you need to stretch further. Here, you need to stand straight with your feet together. Holding your arms in prayer position, you need to slowly lift your toes until you stretch to your maximum. After this, you need to lift your hands up and try to stretch further. When you stretch to the maximum, you need to hold in this position for sometime while counting your breath.
• Asana: this is the second stage of Tadasana. Here you need to lie on your back and ensure that your toes are together. You should take a deep breath and hold it while you raise your hands above your head. When your hands are at the maximum position above your head, you should slowly lift your legs as high as possible. You should hold in this position for sometime then exhale and bring your hands down. For better results, you should repeat this stage for at least 10 times.
Benefits of Ashtanga yoga
There are many benefits that come with Ashtanga yoga. The benefits can be broadly categorized into: mental, emotional, physical, and intellectual. Mental benefits include increased sensitivity and consciousness. Emotional benefits include reduced stress levels (due to removal of old conditioning). Physical benefits include: increased strength and increased immunity. Due to increased levels of immunity you become disease free. Finally, intellectual benefits include increased levels of intelligence; therefore, it becomes easy for you to intelligently analyze life occurrences.