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The New Yoga

By G Harold

There is a new thought about how Yoga should be taught and practiced brewing. Mark Singleton discusses in his book Yoga Body: The Origins of Modern Posture Practice. Michaelle Edwards is also adamant about this subject and is creating a small movement, all devoted to getting the word out that "yoga, as it is practiced today, is causing a number of injuries because many of its positions are not natural positions." Michaelle is the founder of YogAlign and students from around the world are coming to her Kaua

i Hawaii, everyday to practice and learn more about her new concept.

Many believe that the physical practice of yoga today to be thousands of years old, when in fact it is less than 100 years old. The yoga practiced today, throughout most of the civilized world, is an adaptation of the original yoga. "This modern yoga includes intense styles which are physically grueling and not designed to allow the body to be in alignment without requiring the practitioner to contort in a number of uncomfortable and un-natural positions," Michaelle says.

An accredited Yoga teacher by Yoga Alliance, a national education and support organization for yoga in the U.S. and a licensed massage therapist, Edwards practiced yoga for over twenty years before deciding to obtain the necessary training to become an instructor, some twenty years ago. YogAlign is her response to yoga injuries she experienced. In search for a yoga practice and positions which did not require uncomfortable and un-natural positioning, she began to study anatomy and how muscles are controlled by the brain, in addition to closely observing how babies and young children move.

Her studies helped her determine that a lot of yoga systems put the body into positions that have nothing to do with functional movement. So she decided to design a system that relied on natural breathing and natural spine alignment so that the body would intrinsically be at ease. YogAlign eliminates any position that looks like you are sitting in a chair. Edwards explains the chair gives us dysfunctional positions because it places the legs at right angles to the trunk and the body is not designed to do this and does not want to do this.

Your body is the teacher, she continues and it knows more than I do. It has its own built in system designed to help itself so with YogAlign you start to fine tune your alignment by asking your body, "does this feel right?" It is all about the proper alignment and stretching of the psoas (pronounced so-az) muscles. The psoas muscles are the most important muscles of the body.

The psoas is the two guide wire muscles that attach at the base of the diaphragm, lumbar spinal vertebrae, and discs. They descend down through the groin to attach to the inside of the upper leg bones, she says. They are known mostly as a hip flexor, but they do much more as they connect your spine to your legs and provide a shelf for your internal organs. They are breathing muscles that support your organs and hold your emotions. If they are dysfunctional, your body is dysfunctional, she added.

Get your psoas in shape and you will learn how to move from the center of the body, which will keep you pain and injury free. YogAlign lengthens and tones the psoas, reversing the shortening effects that happen too many of us from sitting in chairs and /or doing controlled exercises that shorten and tighten this muscle group.

In her new book, The YogAlign Method: Pain-free Yoga from Your Inner Core, she describes the theories of the YogAlign method, discusses the importance of training the brain functional movement and self-massage and also includes case histories and experiential exercises. Due out around Christmas 2010, you can learn more about its release and YogAlign by visiting her web site at manayoga.com.

She has numerous stories by people who claim the YogAlign method has helped them heal when years of all other available therapies have failed. There is emotion in the muscles, and issues in the tissues, YogAlign brings them out through yoga, without pain method, that really works. I am sure you will be hearing more about the YogAlign, pain free yoga movement real soon.

Yoga is an Alternative medicine therapy that works. Learn how to use it and other holistic alternative medicine to therapies to improve your health. Sign up for the free e-course at holisticalternativemedicine.co.cc