Yoga for Older Women The 10 most Effective Asanas
Yoga is an amazing exercise for the stability of body and mind. Trying or joining a yoga class after the age of 50 can be a daunting task. It means putting yourself out there in a way a lot of people aren’t comfortable with. Body shaming is not a new thing in any culture or age group and its worse when you may be surrounded by younger more agile bodies.
Yoga at any age is a way to keep yourself limber and connected to your community. By adding yoga to your life you are adding balance and health benefits. It also means greater strength and stress reduction.
The health benefits of starting yoga are mental as well as physical and are as follows:
• Increased or maintained flexibility:
As we age, our muscles lose their natural elasticity and yoga can help the muscles lose and limber. It also increases blood flow to the muscles keeping them healthy and strong.
• Bone health:
Humans naturally start losing the strength and durability of their bones over time. Adding yoga to your routine means delaying brittle bones and, later osteoporosis for women. Yoga can help slow down the bone loss and muscle decay. It also reduces inflammation associated with aging bones.
• Your mind will stay sharp
Focusing on yoga poses and maintaining your balance keeps a person focused and in tune with their overall health. Keeping the mind active and helping to improve your memory and prevent age-related cognitive issues.
The Best Yoga Poses for Older Women- The 10 most Effective Asanas are as follows:
1. Tadasana – Mountain Pose:
This is one of the most basic asanas, it is good as a basic balancing pose which helps with posture. It also helps you focus on your breathing as you go through the movements. It is recommended it gets repeated five times without taking breaks.
2. Uttanasana – Standing Forward Bending Pose:
This a position that uses mild inversion. It is commonly used to combat osteoporosis as it gently stretches the hamstrings and hips. It also reduces your blood pressure levels.
3. Vrksasana – Tree Pose
This asana is excellent for leg and abdominal strength. It is terrific for concentration and focus. It is also good for focusing on hip placement as there are numerous hip problems that occur as we age.
4. Paschimottanasana – Seated forward fold pose.
This asana helps calms you down and relieve stress. It stretches the spine, shoulders and hamstrings. It helps stimulate blood flow to the liver, kidneys, ovaries, and uterus and improves digestion. It also helps relieve symptoms of menopause and menstrual discomfort. This is also a good pose for burning belly fat.
5. Adho Mukha Svanasana – Downward Facing Dog
Downward facing dog is a strengthening and stretching asana. It provides balance for your body and for your mind. It targets both the upper and lower body at the same time to actively using a lot of your body at the same time. This is a pose you will be feeling in your hands, arms, shoulders, back, calves and hamstrings. It helps increase blood flow all over your body and relieves anxiety and stress
6. Setu Bandha Sarvangasana – Bridge Pose
Realigns the spine and helps to straighten out rounded shoulders. It also helps to relieve backache and strain. It strengthens the arms, shoulders, hip flexors. The blood increases to the pituitary, thyroid and adrenal glands and helps work more efficiently. It also stretches the abdominal muscles and organs which improves digestion. It opens your lungs and relieves respiratory conditions.
7. Bhujangasana — Cobra Pose
Cobra poses is terrific for the back. It can ease the discomfort of an impacted spine and improve the flexibility to keep you feeling more limber. This invigorating backbend stretches the muscle
8. Marjaryasana — Cat/Cow Pose
Cat/cow poses are interconnected. Together they allow for more coordinated physical movement and improve the flexibility of the spine. It works all the muscles in your back to increase blood flow which helps improve your posture and your walk. It actively stretches all the muscles in your back, torso and neck and works to improve the flexibility and conditioning of all the muscles of your back and abdomen. It helps to regulate your breathing while stimulating your kidney and adrenal glands. This is great exercise for stress reduction and for relieving back pain.
9. Ardha Matsyendrasana — Seated Twist Pose
This half seated spinal twist is effective for controlling diabetes, losing weight, and relieving back pain. This is a terrific pose for working with spinal troubles such as slipped discs. It also tones your abdomen muscles and organs, and increases the elasticity in your spine. It is also good for controlling high blood sugar and relieves back pain. The muscles of your waist and abdomen get good stretches and it help to burn fat around your waist and hips.
10. Savasana – Lying flat on floor pose
Savasana or corpse pose has you lay flat on your back on the floor. It has terrific mental benefits of helping your mind relax. It also helps to reduce high blood pressure, insomnia, anxiety, and pressure while increasing your energy levels, memory, focus and concentration. As with a lot of yoga poses, it helps stimulate blood circulation and exercises the internal organs by just allowing blood to flow in a neutral way around your body. It is a calming and rejuvenating way to end your yoga session. It can give the practitioner a deep meditative state which helps repair cellular damage while being a great reliever of stress.
Yoga at any age is a great choice for anyone of any body or exercise type. It has mind/body balances which helps realigns your energies and control the functioning of your organs. It is also great for blood flow which in itself is good for your physical and mental health. Adding yoga to your routine as an older woman is a good choice to help you stay healthy and in top physical and mental form and maintain that as you age. It is never too late to add this to your life style. It is also a great way to reduce life stress and strain while finding a new joy and balance in your life.
