If you love yoga, then you should think about trying out women-centred yoga. It’s such a great way to get in touch with your body and honour the cyclical nature of being a woman. Not only that, but women-centred yoga also helps to support your overall holistic wellness too.
In this article, we take a look at exactly what women’s wellness yoga is, and why you should think about incorporating it into your spiritual practice.
What Is Women-Centred Yoga and Yoga For Women’s Wellness?
Women-centred yoga is the art of applying holistic women’s wellness to yoga. During women-centred yoga, the focus is on tailoring your practice in tune with the cyclical changes of not only your menstrual cycle—but where you are in life and your individual health.
For example, your practice might look vastly different when you’re menstruating, ovulating, pregnant, postpartum, breastfeeding, or going through menopause.
When practising yoga for women’s wellness we take wider considerations into the practice to ensure that you’re supporting your broader overall needs, as opposed to viewing yoga as an exercise that has one unchangeable mode.
Practising yoga with your holistic wellness in mind allows you to enhance and deepen your practice according to the associated mental, physical, energetic and spiritual changes, or needs that can occur at different times throughout life.
Women’s wellness yoga takes into account that you have a unique and individual journey in a female body. And rather than assuming all women are the same, it uses your practice to enhance and play on your strengths, soothe your challenges, honour your changes, accept your differences, and improve your weaknesses.
For example, whether you choose to (or are able to) become a mother or not—your body will go through different stages not only throughout each month but also throughout different stages of your life due to hormones.
Developments and changes in your mind, body, and energy happen around your first menstruation (menarche), the beginning of—and continuation of—your sexual exploration and sexual expression, conception, childbirth, lactation, and also your last menstruation (menopause).
By taking into account the various aspects which accommodate your changing physical, mental and energetic needs you are able to incorporate your yoga practice to benefit and aid your overall holistic health and wellness in terms of mind, body and spirit. And yoga becomes a powerful tool to help you step into your highest self.
If you’d like to learn more about the seasonal nature of your menstruation cycle then check out my blog here on the inner seasons of the menstrual cycle.
How Do I Practice Women-Centred Yoga?
The easiest way to start practising women-centred yoga is with a yoga teacher who specialises in women’s wellness yoga—because not all yoga teachers take women’s wellness into account within their yoga classes.
Many yoga teachers have regular yoga classes in-person and online, courses, and workshops in which you can begin to learn how to tailor your own practice.
And once you become more familiar with women’s wellness yoga and what works for your own unique body (and mind), you will then also become a lot more confident in your ability to tailor your own practice properly.
General Quick Tips For Women’s Wellness Yoga
- Yoga doesn’t always have to be a physical activity in terms of a sequence of yoga postures (asana). Practising breathing exercises (pranayama) and meditation (dhyana) are also great ways to practice gentle yoga when you don’t feel like moving much.
- If you practice in your local yoga studio, then stop comparing yourself to others in your class. A yoga class is made up of a variety of different yoga practitioners and abilities. You might be comparing yourself to someone doing ‘advanced poses’ during a time of peak energy during their menstrual cycle, whilst you feel more comfortable building inner peace through gentle yoga in a lull of energy during your cycle.
- Don’t be afraid to try different yoga styles. Having a wider selection of yoga styles can help you to cater for different moods, emotions, and physical capacities during different times of your life. Hatha yoga, vinyasa yoga, restorative yoga, and yin yoga are great places to start.
- Yoga isn’t all about yoga poses, it’s about building inner peace, and you might need to use different yogic tools to attain inner peace at different points of the day, month, and during your life.
Benefits Of Women-Centred Yoga For Women’s Health
Women-centred yoga has benefits for physical, emotional, and mental health. Yoga in general is beneficial for the endocrine system and hormone regulation—which is great for women’s health because our hormones fluctuate a lot.
A medical study by the Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine on women with polycystic ovarian syndrome found that a regular and consistent yoga practice helped to improve menstrual cycles and balance hormones in comparison to regular exercise.²
Whilst another clinical study on post-menopausal women by Complementary Therapies in Medicine found that a consistent and regular yoga practice helped to reduce menopausal symptoms, depression, and stress, whilst balancing hormones and improving quality of life.³
The Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine also did another study on the effects of yoga nidra on menstrual irregularities and disorders.¹ They also found that a regular and consistent yoga practice was supportive in helping to balance hormones.
Your endocrine system is a circuit of glands that regulate hormones within your body. Quite often when we think about hormones we immediately relate them to the reproductive system. But did you know that your hormones and endocrine system are responsible for a whole lot more within your body?
In fact, hormones are responsible for nearly all of your body’s organs, functions, and cells. Pretty impressive hey? Hormones are highly important and often massively undervalued.
Hormones are chemical messengers which are responsible for coordinating intricate bodily functions like growth, mood, emotions, behaviour, organ function, development, metabolism, the immune system and sexual reproduction.
And key hormonal fluctuations and changes happen naturally for women at different stages of life such as during:
- First menstruation (menarche)
- Pregnancy
- Childbirth
- Lactation
- Cessation of menstruation (menopause)
A clinical journal on yoga by the International Journal of Yoga found that yoga improves flexibility, muscle strength, sleep cycles, quality of life, holistic well-being, and cardiovascular and respiratory function. Whilst also helping to manage addiction, and reduce stress, chronic pain, anxiety, and depression.⁴ Overall, yoga is just a great holistic wellness tool.
If you’re interested in learning more about holistic health and the pillars of wellness, then check out my blog article here.
Conclusion
Did you know that you can tailor yoga to women’s wellness in order to improve physical, mental, emotional, and energetic well-being?
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