Rising Tide Yoga

I believe in making yoga available to every body. But, way before I started teaching, there were trail blazers who were making yoga available to people who never thought they could OM with the skinny girls. Meera is one of those yoga teacher.

Meera has been teaching yoga for over twenty years. She was trained at Satchidanada Ashram (also known as Yogaville–she thinks it’s a whimsical name, I am not fond of it!) She was lucky enough to be there when the guru Sri Swami Satchidanada was alive, I went there much later.

Meera has graciously offered to do a guest blog for me and I am so honored, truly honored. I’ll let her words introduce Big Yoga to you, then I’ll tell you how really wonderful she is.

Meera’s groundbreaking book, Big Yoga: A Simple Guide for Bigger Bodies, published by Square One publishers, won the Benjamin Franklin award for best book in Health and Wellness. It is the definitive book on the history, benefits and techniques of Yoga for the plus-size body. It includes images of Meera demonstrating over 40 asanas.

sun-salutation-modifications-for-plus-size-bodies

Sometimes “real life” changes your “planned life.” When I was in Yoga Teacher Training I was focused on becoming a YIN, Restorative Yoga and Yoga Nidra teacher. (Yes, Yuna and Kas I know you thought I was limiting myself.) I do teach those three styles of yoga, but as of late, I’ve been getting more frequent requests for Yoga for Bigger Bodies. It’s not something I planned on, but being an “older” woman with a variable size body, I know the struggle of keeping gravity and mush muscles at bay. I am a Weight Watcher and I hear other Weight Watchers say they’d never go into a yoga class. The reasons for their yoga-resistance are: I’m not flexible, I’m not going in there with those pretezel-bodies, I don’t want to make a fool of myself.

YUP, all of those reasons and more are legit.

Then comes me—not skinny, not young, not a Lulu model material—and maybe they can trust me. Maybe they know my sense of humor. Maybe, just maybe, they’ll take a step into the studio. Well, if you are one of those women, take a look at this yoga teacher’s video. She is a curvy lady and she addresses all those “forbidden” topics—like big boobs, hanging belly and forget touching your toes—forget SEEING your toes. It’s a good place to start the self-confidence meter soaring.

Click on the link under the photo of Amber. It’s Amber’s URL for Bigger Bodies. She has a great letter to young teens who are overweight, too. Just take a look. Just a peek! And let me know what you think.

Take a look at those photos. What was your gut reaction? I don’t mean the politically-correct supportive remarks, I mean the OMG exclaimations.

It doesn’t matter if you’re a size 3 or 3X, you may have the same response, “No way fat people can do that”

“Fat women in yoga pants!

“Breasts resting on bellies!” YUP, that’s exactly right.

We all know it takes guts to show up for the first day in a new school–whether it’s kindergarten, first day of college, or first day at a new gym. Now imagine doing that as an obese person. Imagine walking into a yoga class where most students weigh half your weight. It takes guts and there’s very little glory in it. I know I don’t have that kind of courage. I’d be looking for a yoga class with “people like me” where the teacher has the knowledge to understand the bodies of overweight people and I’m going to have some kind of success.

Well, there are classes of “Yoga for Round Bodies” “Heavy Weight Yoga” but they are few and far between. Even the world of anonymous TV Exercise on Demand has no such programs. And “Biggest Loser” doesn’t have yoga in its program.

If you are trying to develop a program at home I highly recommend Dr. Erdwinn’s article on Yoga at: http://www.expandinglight.org/free/yoga-teacher/round-bodies/introduction.htm It has practical suggestions for yoga teachers and yoga students. As a medical doctor, Dr. Erdwinn’s information begins with a premise of “first do no harm” and as an obese woman her suggestions are based on experience and common sense.

There are other programs and DVDs out there. Yoga: Just My Size With Megan Garcia is a good one. Megan is bright, young and overweight herself. She’s elegant, cheerful and motivating. There’s a New York studio, Buddha Body that has an informative blog. It’s at http://www.buddhabodyoga.com/blog/

If those sites don’t interest you, just do a search on “Yoga Overweight” on your search engine or Amazon to find other resources.

Yoga is a union of mind and body, it’s for every body. If you are timid about stepping into a yoga class, even one for overweight bodies, check out those websites and if you want to know about other websites, email me.

Ah, yoga!