What is Assisted Yoga?

Series Summary

The word "yoga" comes from the Sanskrit root “yuj” meaning "to bind, or join." Yoga is centrally the practice of union, whether you are joining the mind to the body, the human to the divine, or the individual to the infinite. The various styles of yoga that have made it to the West all share a common core: positioning the body into a particular posture while focusing mind and breath leads to physical and spiritual well-being. These arts of positioning the body have been passed on for thousands of years, and encompass one of the oldest cultural traditions known to exist. To practice yoga, then, is also to join with the ancient sages, drawing human history up into yourself and connecting with the past. In this free yoga video series, yoga instructor Cathie Ryder teaches you all about assisted yoga and assisted yoga poses. Assisted yoga involves the use of objects like straps, cushions, bolsters, or chairs to reach healthy poses taken from the traditional yoga poses. Cathie gives you tips for the plank pose, reverse plank pose, triangle pose, thread the needle, bridge, and downward facing dog. You will learn how to assist your yoga with popular tools of the trade.

Video Transcript

"The next set of videos we're going to work on is postures with assist, and these videos are to enjoy and receive. It's not about doing a right pose or a wrong pose. We'll be utilizing bolsters, straps, chairs, and blocks, so that we can put your body into a restful state, and get, with assist, you can allow the body to go deeper, which is sometimes not available to you without the assist. So, we're going to work on some kind of form, but mostly you're going to need to learn to relax the shoulders. You're really going to need to use your breath, so that we can see if we can make some changes in your poses. That's what the beauty of the blocks, straps, bolsters is going to be. So that you're going to change the focus; that the equipment becomes the brains to the pose. The blocks are going to teach the pose how it should feel. So it's not to make the pose easier, but it's to educate your body."