Yin Yoga is a school founded by American yoga instructor Paul Grilley on 1979, with many practitioners. Combining his own yoga practice experience and medical advantages, he carefully studied the connective tissue of human body with several Japanese scholars, and combined the essence of China Taoism and martial arts with the essence of yoga, forming a novel school.
Yin yoga can balance yin and yang, dredge the whole body meridians, promote blood circulation and benefit qi, and make people adjust their physique and listen to the body in practice. You need to keep a posture for at least three minutes, even longer, to five minutes or 10 minutes of Yin yoga practice. In addition, there is no need for muscle strength when maintaining the posture of Yin Yoga. With the accumulation of time, its own weight acts on fascia and connective tissue, which can accelerate the operation of qi and blood.
Commonly used Yin yoga poses are:
Dragonfly style: sit on the mat, open your feet to both sides, inhale and stretch your spine, exhale and bend forward to your own range and keep it;
Sleeping swan style: the front legs are bent and the heels are placed at the root of the thighs. Inhale and stretch the spine, straighten your hind legs and press your feet to the ground, and exhale and bend forward, which requires reverse practice;
Hairstyle: Sit on the mat, separate your feet from the pelvic width, inhale and stretch your spine, exhale and bend forward and keep it;
Yoga prone position hero style: Kneel on the mat with knees together, feet open to both sides, hips sitting between legs. Inhale and stretch your spine. Exhale and lie on your back, keep it.
Yin yoga emphasizes the relaxation of the whole body, clearing all other thoughts and combining slow and natural breathing. Persist in exercise for a long time, exercise bones and their connecting tissues, adjust the nervous system and enhance endurance in a state of complete muscle relaxation, so as to achieve the realm of physical and mental unity.
Our fascia is a special connective tissue layer, which wraps muscles, bones and joints and provides protection and support for the body. ) and connective tissue will become more and more compact with age. Exercise and stretching fascia help to delay aging.
Stretching very tense tissues may be uncomfortable, but using this time to focus on breathing is an important part of Yin Yoga and one of its benefits.
Usually when we feel uncomfortable, our bodies naturally become nervous and use us to make evasive reactions. Yin yoga teaches us to make changes. During the whole exercise, your mind will stay relaxed, and you will be able to release tension and stretch your connective tissue more easily.
Yin yoga is slow in breathing and slow in movement, so we need to be able to cooperate with the movements in the breathing process, which belongs to abdominal breathing. When we finish Yin Yoga, we can't be impatient. Slow and relaxed, very suitable for friends who don't like big sports.
As we get older, our bones begin to degenerate, our joints lose their mobility and our fascia tightens. However, Yin yoga practice helps to restore activities and relieve physical pain. This is because it exerts gentle and healthy pressure on our joints and gently stretches our connective tissue.
This deep stretching is the perfect follow-up to strength yoga or other physical activities, which can maintain balance and flexibility to help avoid injury.