Examining the recent trend of painful side effects stemming from the peaceful exercise
Ann Gill
Contributor
A growing number of North Americans are getting hurt doing yoga. It is an unexpected and unfortunate trend apparent through several news articles, and is stirring debate between devotees and those who question the Westernization of the practice.
Many people take up yoga specifically to heal injuries, so it’s surprising to hear about its risk of injury. The practice is attracting people who are used to being inactive, and often they push themselves too far and get hurt. Injuries range from torn cartilage in the knees to joint problems from overly aggressive adjustments. They include sprained necks caused from frequent accidents such as “the domino effect:” getting knocked over by other classmates while maintaining a pose. As a practice meant to heal the human body and soul, how are these injuries possible?
One reason for the growing number of injuries is the record number of followers, counting almost 20 million in the United States alone last year. Physicians are increasingly recommending yoga to patients with physical injuries, leading to new yoga practitioners with pre-existing ailments and in most cases, low fitness levels.
“We go from strollers to chairs to couches, so we have lost core postural muscles that surround the spine,” Leslie Bogart, a Viniyoga teacher in Los Angeles, explained in a 2003 interview with Yoga Journal. “People who sit all day have a lot of tension through the neck and shoulders. Then they go to flow classes with lots of repetitions of Chaturanga Dandasana, which can place even more stress on their upper body.”
William J. Broad, author of The Science of Yoga: The Risks and Rewards, publishing next month, gained temporary relief in yoga after rupturing a disc. Then disaster struck.
“In 2007, while doing the extended-side-angle pose, a posture hailed as a cure for many diseases, my back gave way,” he wrote in a blog entry this month. “With it went my belief, naïve in retrospect, that yoga was a source only of healing and never harm.”
He explained the shifting demographics behind the popularity of yoga: “Indian practitioners of yoga typically squatted and sat cross-legged in daily life, and yoga poses, or asanas, were an outgrowth of these postures. Now urbanites who sit in chairs all day walk into a studio a couple of times a week and strain to twist themselves into ever-more-difficult postures despite their lack of flexibility and other physical problems.”
Moreover, yoga’s extreme popularity has rapidly increased the demand for instructors, resulting in some teachers with inadequate training being hired. Even new graduates from highly reputable teacher-training programs often lack experience, leading to improper practice. The combination of overly packed studios and inexperienced instructors is disastrous.
Leslie Kaminoff is a New York yoga therapist and bodyworker who regularly treats yogis with both acute and chronic injuries linked to improper practice.
“Many classes now are so crowded that a single person out of control can take out any number of people,” he said in a 2003 interview with Yoga Journal. Kaminoff treated a client with a neck sprain that occurred when a neighbor fell out of an inversion and knocked her into another yogi.
“Teaching carries its own hazards,” he added, recalling a teacher who was kicked in the face by a student she was helping, resulting in a chipped tooth, bruised face, and bloody nose.
The willingness to get in touch with your body and accepting its limits is particularly important. One cannot expect to do too much too soon, pushing your body to new extremes will undoubtedly cause injury. Do not underestimate the importance of warming-up, proper sequencing, and having the right attitude.
