Do you need more than Yoga

Yoga Discussion General Yoga
#1

I realize diet is important because for most of us no amount of physical exercise will counter a life of Cheeseburgers, French fries and milk shakes.

For your fitness do you need to do more than Yoga or is yoga capable of handling all your fitness needs?

I am a martial artist and I also do yoga and I workout on a total gym and use a treadmill and I work with a medicine ball and I don’t have enough time to do it all.

Marital arts will not stop but I am wondering if Yoga can’t cover the rest since I enjoy it more than the other stuff I do, or try and do.

Can you stay fit with proper diet and only yoga?

#2

I cut out the cheeseburgers, fries, et al and daily yoga is enough, more than enough. Of course it depends on the yoga, ie power/vinyasa or flowers and rainbow yoga.

#3

It’s not hard to even add in a few exercises like walking.

#4

Walking is a given, you have to walk to get from point A to point B. Besides I walk everyday at lunch when I’m at work.

#5

Case by case and year by year.

A couple years back I couldn’t get enough with just Yoga.

My body was needing more cross training, heavy cardio and weight training to fill my lungs and tighten my hyper mobile joints.

Oh the humanity.

There is a point when some bodies reach the limit of many trainings.

Recently I have reached that tipping point.

So put myself through a month of Mysore Style Ashtanga Yoga in India.

No cheesburgers or fries in town, no temptation, no option but the path.

I cut 10 pound of an already pretty lean physique, developed abs I never knew existed, and came out of India able to step into jeans I hadn’t worn since University decades ago.

Yoga may be able to handle all your fitness needs.

The sooner you step on the path and start taking care of yourself the sooner you put the burger fry eater behind you. You don’t have to…but if you want to, if you’re ready, Yoga is.

#6

I don’t eat cheeseburgers and fries, it was just used as an example. My diet is rather healthy, not quite a vegetarian but close.

I am considering a return to Power Yoga actually, that is the reason for my question

#7

Are you asking about fitness or wellness?

#8

Yes…

I am asking about fitness and wellness, I think

It would of course depend in what you mean by wellness

#9

So to you they are synonyms?

#10

Are they synonyms; one could argue yes because they are because you can say there is physical fitness and mental fitness but then those are, in reality, two types of fitness.

But you are asking me what I think and to me fitness and wellness is not the same thing. I do feel fitness, both physical and mental, are a subset of wellness. Wellness to me can include physical fitness and mental fitness and it could also be said that spiritual fitness is part of wellness as well but then it could be that spiritual fitness is just part of mental fitness. But I am not looking at this from a spiritual perspective and after typing this out I am thinking that I am asking more about fitness than wellness, but then one of the benefits from yoga has always been what I would call wellness. But is Yoga enough, by itself, to accomplish this is the question

Is this similar to your view of fitness and wellness or do you feel they are synonymous?

I am open to discussing both fitness and wellness whether or not that view is the same as mine because I may not be right and I am always willing to listen and learn

#11

I am likely about to give more info than anyone asked for, wants, needs or cares to read but I have been thinking about the question of fitness and wellness as well as my original question and part of what I should add to what I am looking for is some relief from pain (knees, hip and shoulder). I do not expect miracles but it would be nice to go through a day with less pain than I tend to deal with daily. I do not like talking about this because I feel I am whining but this is definitely part of what I am hoping Yoga can help me with, if I remove other things I am currently doing for exercise that seem to help, but it all takes a lot of time.

I am also working to change my view of things as well because I tend to do yoga in spurts, that is until I get to busy and it is the first thing dropped form my schedule and I have been the feeling, every time, that I should have kept it and dropped something else.

Like I said, I am a marital artist and that will not change, at least not completely. I am changing the focus there as well. I do not expect anyone here to know what all or any of these are but I was doing; Wing Chun, Xingyiquan and Taijiquan and when I got too busy I dropped Yoga and Wing Chun but almost immediately started training Baguazhang again. Add to that I was working out on a Total Gym and as well as working with Dumbbells and doing sit-ups and pushups?and don?t forget stretching. And from all that you would think I was in great shape, but I?m not. I did get kicked out of my Cardiologist (of many years) office because he said I?m too healthy to be there, but I need to lose weight to help reduce stress on the joints an d strength training as one ages is a good thing, and I am over half a century

Recently I added Yoga back it because I know it is good for me but once again I found myself pushing it to the back burner in favor of other things. So I stopped everything and sat and thought about it.

I now only do Taijiquan and I walk and get on the treadmill. I am trying to make a decision between Yoga and other exercises. I am leaning towards focusing more on yoga and letting the strength training stuff go for a change, but I am not sure it will work and I am trying to find out if it might, but from my current perspective, as much as I seem to realize I get so much more from Yoga than other exercises I can?t seem to completely convince myself that I am right, or at least close to right in my thinking on this.

OK, I?m done, I apologize for the verbosity

#12

Decision has been made, I’m going to give it a try, I will still go for my walks and the diet will stay pretty much the same (although I am considering giving up Gluten for a bit to see what happens) but beyond that it is Yoga and taijiquan. I am returning to Power Yoga, which I have come to the conclusion that it is what I need right now.

Maybe later I will return to the Kripalu I once did (although in all honesty I have done more power yoga), it is also possible that somewhere down the road my schedule will open up and so I will have the time to go work with a Viniyoga person, but for now it is back to Power for a bit. I will see how that goes as it applies to my health and go from there

Thanks for the imput

#13

I did this for about 2 weeks and then I just had to add in my totalgym workout, Not so much because I thought I needed it as much as I missed it.

Also I have been able to get back to what my last yoga teacher taught me (asanas with sun salutation), with a bit of discomfort, but it seems to be improving…slowly.

I know and remember more than I think I am willing to admit but I am not a teacher. However my last teacher was very big on proper alignment and I still remember her training

#14

Maybe it depends a lot on your ideals of fitness. It could be argued that, in general:

Yoga practice will ultimately make you a fit yogi;
Tennis practice will make you a fit tennis player;
Weightlifting will make you a fit weightlifter;
Martial arts will make you a fit martial artist, etc.

If your ideal of fitness is Arnold Schwarzenegger or Bruce Lee, then yoga, by itself is unlikely to get you there (though it may be able to help you along the way).

If you are particularly attracted to the mental and physical ‘fitness’ characteristics that are prominent in advanced yoga practitioners, then yoga, particularly the yoga system of the yoga practitioner that inspires you, may well lead you, all by itself, to a similar level of fitness.

#15

I actually do not doubt yoga could do exactly as you posted for the reasons you posted. And I absolutely enjoy what I am doing, but I missed the totalgym, I rather enjoy that.

#16

SCMT,
We are all here, in the pursuit of happiness. Yoga canvass is large enough to give you what you want to be happy. It may be fitness, wellness on one end up to nirvana and the ultimate truth on the other. Your definition of yoga will be ‘yoga for you’.

But it will be a mistake to fancy that my yoga is what yoga is all about. Yoga’s general framework consists of three gross to subtle levels. Physical is the gross and the smallest part of yoga. Do you need more yoga? No, not beyond what you ‘think’ yoga is.

It is a common experience that advancing age, disillusionment with material life, economic hardships or simple curiosity may drive one to seek beyond a perfect figure. Should this happen Yoga is one thing that you can revisit for any need.

#17

Suhas Tambe, thank you for your response

Yoga has never been just physical to me, however if it was I no not think I would refer to that as ?gross? and ?smallest? but that is besides the point.

Yoga has always been more to me that just physical, although I have not stayed with it continuously over the years I have been involved with it (about 20 years ago I took my first class but I do not have 20 years of experience because it is not contiguous) . I either did not have the confidence in myself to continue with it or I did not want to face what it was showing me or I simply did not have the patients to keep at it in order to progress, but it has always been more than simply physical. And I would not for a moment expect that Yoga is the same for everyone or for that matter exactly the same to 2 different people. As for perfect figure, that statement could not be further from what I am looking for, although based on my original posts here there would be no way of know that. At the moment it has much more to do with life with less physical pain (Knees, a hip and a shoulder), But even there I feel there is more to Yoga than the physical.

At this point, after much thinking about this topic, by my definition, I am likely looking more for wellness than fitness but even there I feel yoga has more to offer than just that, although I am admittedly not looking beyond that at the moment. The fact I am sticking with this and not really having to convince myself to continue I am rather happy about. The fact I am not judging what I am doing by the pictures of perfection you see on the Internet and in magazines I am also rather happy about.

But then the term happiness is rather subjective so take it for what it is worth.

However based on what I typed in my first post, after rereading it, I was asking about fitness. As for the TotalGym?.I like it, what else can I say

#18

[QUOTE=daves007;85133]I cut out the cheeseburgers, fries, et al and daily yoga is enough, more than enough. Of course it depends on the yoga, ie power/vinyasa or flowers and rainbow yoga.[/QUOTE]

Flowers and rainbow yoga? Where do they teach that, it sounds peachy?!
:smiley:

#19

I think its best to constantly evolve your fitness and try new things.

#20

Well losing weight is a lifestyle change, not just exercise. it has to be dietary, well everything.

Yoga can help lose weight, but don’t spend an hour in class, and then eat a KFC bucket afterwards, it makes little sense.