What Is Chair Yoga

As the name itself signifies chair yoga is a milder form of yoga where the main prop used is chair as opposed to the generally used yoga mat. Although chair yoga is not recognized officially as a distinct type of yoga, it is a kind often used by ailing, ageing people and people with some kind of disabilities. Chair yoga generally is adopted as a way to achieve mental and physical fitness. It is distinct from other yoga forms in the sense that it is not projected as a way of living. It helps the patients in the same way as other forms of yoga do, that is, to provide the people by helping them in health issues like arthritis, clinical depression, hypertension, chronic fatigue syndrome etc. Chair yoga is performed with the help of a chair because of the patient’s difficulty to getting up or sitting down on the floor.

How To Perform Chair Yoga

You can start either by joining chair yoga classes or buying DVD’ or books for guidance. You can also learn any number of yoga positions and exercises like meditation, relaxation exercises, breathing practices, etc with the assistance of a chair.
You can start by doing it once a week. However, this is such mild form of exercise that you can incorporate it in your daily life too.
Choose a chair, which is comfortable, sturdy, but not too bulky, as you may need to move it for some yoga positions. A regular four-legged chair works well.
Instead of starting with difficult exercises, start with simple stretching exercise to help you make your muscles flexible and learn balance.

Exercises For Chair Yoga

Shoulder Rolls

Sit up straight, with a deep inhalation of air take your shoulders up towards your ears, and squeeze them lightly. Now try pressing your shoulder blades towards each other, lift your heart, and feel the stretch across your chest also. Now get back to the normal position with exhaling and do five reps.

Side Stretch

Sit straight and raise your arm and lengthen yourself towards the fingertips. Now inhale deeply and exhale as you semicircle towards your left. With stretching keep, your shoulder blades flat on your back and try to lift the right side of the ribcage with each breathe in. Also, keep your arm extended and your back flat, take five deep breaths, and come back to the center. Now with a slow exhaling lower your arm back to the position. Repeat it with the left arm also.

Forward Bend

Take a deep breath in, bend in front of you with a breath out, and let your head and arms hang low towards your knee. Now relax in the same position and stay there for few seconds with normal breathing. Now take a breath in, slowly coming up in your seated position and repeats for five times.

Knee Squeeze

Take a deep breath and breathe it out. Now keep your both hands around the front of your knee, breathe in. Keep the breath in, and pull your knee to your chest. Now lower your head to your knee and release the hold slowly with breathe out. Repeat with the right side knee too. It helps in relaxing your lower back, improves respiration and digestion too.

How to Cite

Related Articles

See also

More in 'Health & Fitness'