Restorative Yoga Benefits.

Just how important is a restorative yoga practice?

In our stressful, technology-based world, engaging in this physical practice, which truly allows your body and mind to recover from an accumulation of daily stresses, makes this type of practice that much more necessary. I would go even so far as to say even the very young could benefit from a restorative practice in this never ending world of more sports, more activities, and being told from a young age what to do and how to do it.

There is a lengthy list of benefits I, as well as my students, have experienced from engaging in a regular Restorative practice and seizing that opportunity to release in a safe environment. Some of those benefits are: mental clarity; a profound sense of calmness; openness to whatever thoughts may arise; being able to really feel the sensations in the body; being able to breath with more awareness and at a slower, deeper pace; better sleep; and, feeling deeply connected between body, earth and props.

A private school for teens hired me to teach yoga to their student body. I started out teaching a traditional asana practice but quickly realized the students needed a less active practice. I put myself in their shoes at that age and thought to myself, "What a gift this (restorative) practice would have been if I could have just been given the opportunity to just be a 'human being' and not a 'human doing.' Just be ... no one to call to, nowhere to be, nothing I had to listen to, just relying on the earth and props to support me."

My students loved the restorative practice! Whether it was just because they were tired at the end of a long day in school or they really noticed the nourishing benefits from actually restoring their bodies, either way they loved the fact that I provided them the elements of a restorative practice ... a warm, quiet, dark and still place to bask in. They didn't need music. They didn't need me directing them through a vinyasa practice. They just fell into the nothingness of Restorative Yoga.

When I teach Restorative to an adult class, I use the analogy of putting gas in the tank every week. If you run out of gas, your car is in trouble. The same is true of our bodies. We need time to fill our tank and restore our engine.

At the end of every restorative yoga class, I provide my students with a 20-minute closing savasana (or resting pose). For it takes 15 min for the “monkey mind” to settle in. This extended time of non-activity is truly a gift. In addition to all of the healing benefits that happen in the practice of restorative yoga, being able to truly let go in savasana without having to worry about being disturbed too soon gives students the opportunity to calm the nervous system. It is just icing on the cake, as I like to call it. The entire practice is pure bliss.