Clueless Beginner With High Flexibility

by Lily
(Grand Junction, Colorado USA)

My name is Lily. I was a highly competitive gymnast for over ten years, a competitive figure skater for five years, and a body builder for three. I have quite a bit of flexibility, balance and coordination. I have never done yoga and am interested in starting but do not know where to start because I have looked at intermediate and advanced poses on the internet and can do all of them, no problem. Do I start as a beginner with little slow poses or should I jump into the intermediate and advanced poses right away?

Answer

Hello Lily

It is great to know that you have excellent qualities like flexibility, strength and balance required for yoga. Most of the beginners to yoga have to practice a lot for building required strength and flexibility.

Yoga poses are different from any other exercise. You need to follow the correct technique of doing the asana. Performance of asanas are done slowly following the correct technique. You will be required to learn the correct breathing along with yoga poses. In addition, also learn yoga breathing and meditation.

I will suggest that in order to use your strengths, learn yoga from a yoga teacher. Start with beginners positions and proceed to advanced poses.

This way you will learn the correct techniques and you can progress in no time from basic poses to advanced poses.

If you do the advanced yoga poses with improper techniques, it may turn out to be harmful in the long run.

You can also read about starting yoga and yoga for spirutal and mental progress.

Hope this helps.
Daljit