Yoga could very well be the most intimidating art of them all – the art of recreating the self. A traditional practice that originates from India, Yoga compels its participants to delve inside the self through both physical and mental exploration. YogaAntigua is a local group in La Antigua that offers instruction in this ancient discipline. Instructor Nancy Payne explains that Yoga encourages people to see themselves as a sort of blank canvas:
“Yoga makes you kind of go inside and look. It actually makes one think: ‘What can I create for my own self? How do I want to paint my life now? What color do I want to put in there?’”
Payne adds that Yoga is meant to be a tool that can help people advance in life.
“Whether it’s the better journalist, or the better caterer, or painter. Whatever. This is just something that can work inside to help you work to your potential.”
Even the techniques Payne and YogaAntigua’s two additional instructors use to help participants reach that potential are artistic. Payne explains that, like traditional ideas of art, Yoga teaches people to discover and embrace new perspectives in life:
“It’s for people to see the world from a different angle.”
Yet, unlike most traditional art forms, Yoga doesn’t just invoke new perspectives mentally, but also physically. Inversion Yoga poses such as the Downward Dog, the Feathered Peacock Pose, the Handstand and more all challenge participants to physically invert themselves, putting head below heart and feet above the chest. Basically, Yoga shows participants how to physically view the world upside down. The benefits of such exercises, Payne says, are both physical and mental:
“Blood is rushing the opposite way, bringing greater nutrition to these different organs and your brain and our gray matter. This helps people clean the mind and clear the mind.”
Instructor Liz Van Leeuwen adds that clearing the mind is integral to achieving one of the principal goals of Yoga: peace.
“If you can go inward, taking away all the outside distractions, then you can start to focus more and feel what your body is really trying to tell you. From there you find this sense of peace.”
Van Leeuwen says these exercises that train people to “clear their minds” are more valuable than one might think:
“Sometimes you’ll get a person that comes in and you can tell them four times to move their leg and they don’t move their leg. You know they really are so far out their bodies. And it’s astounding really.”
In other words, Van Leeuwen is saying that people are largely disconnected from themselves, too caught up in life’s daily distractions. Yoga, she says, is meant to help them reconnect. And, Van Leeuwen points out that a more relaxed environment helps people let go of life’s distractions. She says that’s why YogaAntigua offers its classes in the studio at Mesón de Panza Verde.
“What we have here is this amazing place. So you’re halfway there when you get here. You’re looking out the window and there’s a fountain, the birds are chirping. You can look at the volcano. The temperatures are always perfect. So we have this head start of getting into that mode before we even start class. We’re really lucky.”
No matter where you are though, Payne says deep, controlled breathing is an easy technique that will help all those distractions dissolve:
“The breath powers you. And you know it as soon as you start that deep breathing. It’s like the weight of the world can relax on your shoulders, or maybe go off of your shoulders. The mind just kind of melts away. You think: ‘Okay I’ll think clearer if I just calm here.’”
YogaAntigua offers classes daily. Find more complete information about class schedules by clicking here.
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