When we think about yoga, it’s easy to assume that certain holds and poses are reserved for those of us with a good dose of flexibility, strength, and balance. But the truth is, that yoga is for everyone, and perceived limitations shouldn’t get in the way of a healthy, sustainable practice.
Instead, using props like yoga straps, yoga blocks, bolsters, wall ropes, or chairs is a great way to safely practice more difficult poses as a beginner, or deepen your practice if you’re more advanced.
Although yoga props are often (wrongly) perceived as a way to “dumb down” advanced poses, the reality is that they are liberating and useful tools that can enhance and advance your practice by:
- Making your yoga practice more sustainable
- Helping you build your skill level
- Helping you stay in poses for longer
Let’s explore each of these benefits in more detail …
Using Yoga Props Makes Your Practice More Sustainable
We encourage our students to reach for yoga props as a temporary or permanent solution to safely practice yoga without limitations. Props allow you to strengthen different muscles, while simultaneously creating the flexibility needed to stay in a pose.
Using a prop is often the difference between being able to get into a pose, even if heavily assisted, and that pose being entirely out of reach. By starting with props, you guide your body into the pose. And, over time, you will gain the necessary strength and flexibility.
Your reliance on the props will decrease until you are able to hold the pose completely unassisted. Your practise becomes more sustainable through the use of props because they allow you to advance the range of poses that are possible, which we have found to be a huge factor in students’ motivation.
A good example of using props to enable a pose is the backbend.
A typical backbend improves both your willpower and your mental attitude. However, a good backbend needs to be learned as a graduated approach to achieve all the benefits. Using the right props to learn and master a proper backbend increases the safety of the pose and helps the body develop the necessary strength and flexibility. This makes your practice more sustainable, as it allows you to achieve all the benefits of the posture without risking injury or creating unnecessary (and unbeneficial!) stress on the body.
Other props we can use to make our practice safer and more sustainable are chairs to lift our poses, straps to brace limbs, blocks to account for different body lengths, ropes to help our bodyweight act as a cantilever, and walls to help us to find our personal edges.
Tools and Props can Help You Build Your Skill Level
Yoga classes include a number of diverse poses, usually ranging from reasonably simple to quite complex. Many students, even the most experienced, struggle with certain poses. This is perfectly natural. It’s why we call it ‘practise’.
We help our students deepen their practise through the use of props, so they know how to modify a class to reap the full benefit of each pose. That way, students can improve their strength, confidence, and skill level, giving them more opportunities for a potent personal practice.
This self-awareness leads to better-improved ranges of motion and continued ability to find youthfulness within the class.
We understand the frustration many beginners – but also more advanced students – feel at not being able to get into certain poses. The sense of achievement our students experience through the use of props is palpable. Yet some still believe that using props in some way diminishes the benefit of the pose or their ability.
We want to put an end to this – unfortunately very common – misconception. Using the right props can help all students discover the true experience of poses that they’re not quite able to achieve unassisted. It helps you feel and breathe into each posture and slowly build your strength, stamina, flexibility, and fortitude over time.
Tools and Props can Help you Stay in Poses Longer
Getting into a pose is one thing, but holding it unwaveringly is quite another. In fact, that’s often where we need to muster the most strength. This can be incredibly difficult, especially for those just starting out, recovering from an injury, or still building the strength in all the many small muscles involved in yoga that don’t get much attention in daily life.
But a block, a bolster, or a chair might be all you need to hold a pose for longer.
You might find that something as minor as reaching for a block or strap from time to time is all you need to smash through your limitations and perceived boundaries to growth and development. We often see these limitations as being the result of our inherent flaws or shortcoming when, in fact, we’re usually just not applying the right tools to help us improve.
The benefits can far surpass the improved physical strength, flexibility, and appearance. They can also spill over into all aspects of daily life through improved confidence, sense of achievement, willpower, and mental fortitude.
Summary
Don’t let your limitations get in the way. All of us, even the most advanced students, have used props throughout our journey and practise. If you see props as a tool to advance your practise – rather than as a sign of weakness – you’ve paved the way for immense improvement.
Props are available in all our classes except for the ‘flow yoga’ class, where the focus is on flowing movements and transitions between poses.
Yoga is for everyone and can be individualised to suit your own skill level, flexibility, and strength while you still get all the benefits.
If you’d like to learn more, and try yoga using wall ropes, with Hayley and I when we are back to level one. Yoga using wall ropes is a great way to achieve inversions and stamina while having fun in a relaxed and supportive atmosphere.
