One of the most popular reasons to start with yoga is back pain. You ask yourself why? Doctors and physiotherapists have been recommending yoga for years as a soft and gentle way to build muscles, to regain strength and to find your right posture without any sudden jerks that other sports give to your body.
Whether you have lower back pain or pain in your middle or upper back, there are yoga poses that relieve any back pain.
Yoga Helps your Posture
We have made an effort to list yoga poses that are beneficial for your spine as well as for your back muscles. The first step to relieve back pain is to sit, stand and walk in the right position, with your back straight, your chest out with your shoulders and your head straight. Slouching, humping or arching your back brings back pain just as walking with a hollow back can.
However correcting this posture can be quite difficult – you slip back into it without even noticing. This is where yoga can help you! If you keep up a regular practice of some simple yoga poses, you improve your posture with hardly any effort and without you really noticing! Your back gets used to being in its healthy position and adjusts itself automatically.
Listen to your back, it knows what is good for it!
Yoga for Slip Disc, Curvature and other Back Problems
Of course, if you suffer from slip disc, malposition or curvature of any part of your spine or other problems with your back, spine and vertebra, you need to take care which yoga poses you can perform and which you should avoid. In the yoga positions shown below we have explained in detail which ones should be performed to relieve which part of the spine by strengthening the muscles around it and which yoga exercises should be avoided if you have any of the above mentioned ailments.
If you have difficulties in the region of neck or shoulders, you should additionally have a look at the Yoga Poses for Neck and Shoulders.
One general piece of advice before you start practicing: whenever you have back pain, do not bend forward! Your body may tend to do that but it will only make it worse! Do not hang your head to the front but to the back! Try it, that really helps!
