individual progresses at their own pace,” Amore explains. “It’s really a question of where you want this personal practice to take you and how you embrace it in your private life.” The bottom line is that everyone’s journey is different.
Mental Health Many experts concur that yoga can be effective in reducing stress. As students continue their practice, they feel less stress and an increased sense of peace and relaxation, along with other mental health benefits. “Yoga gives you what is often called a ‘witness conscious-
ness’,” says John Kepner, executive director of the International Association of Yoga Therapists, in Little Rock, Arkansas. “Being able to observe the external events around you, but not being caught up in the drama. In modern terms, it’s an increased abili- ty to stay cool, calm and collected. After a good yoga class, your troubles can appear further away.”
Improved Relationships
When stress is reduced, an increased sense of calm tends to permeate all areas of one’s life, observes Kepner. “Based on my experience, yoga also helps improve relationships.” He has taught the same group of students for 10 years and notes their special relationship: “If one goes to the same yoga class regularly, a friend- ship tends to develop with others in the class, called Songhai. After a while, practicing together becomes one of the most valuable parts of the practice,” he says. This beneficial, deeper sense of community—a major allure of a long-term yoga practice—develops mainly from the intangible sense of working together in terms of physi- cal, mental and spiritual support.
Spirituality and Connectedness “Even beginning students quickly realize how connecting with their bodies and their breath helps them in their everyday lives,” says Carmona. “It adds a transcendent dimension to everything you do in life.”
In addition to its more immediate tangible benefits, other long-term benefits experienced by students may be harder to define or quantify. Carmona observes, “People generally say that yoga has changed their life, physically, mentally and spiritually.”
Lynda Bassett is a freelance writer outside Boston, MA. Connect at
LyndaBassett@gmail.com.
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