You need to work at not becoming a petrified tree after your first yoga class.
The TV shows a close up of a tree. This tree has not moved in over 225 million years.
Alice is sitting at home in her bathrobe watching a documentary on the Petrified Forest National Park in northeastern Arizona by the National Geographic Society after her first yoga class.
Alice is glad that she listened to the advice of her yoga teacher after class otherwise her muscles would be as stiff as those petrified trees.
Her yoga teacher told her that there was two things for her to do and two observation for her to make after her first yoga class.
If she did these two things she would avoid becoming a petrified tree.
Two Things to do
1 – Have a Hot bath with Epsom Salts and a long soak
A yoga practice works all of your muscles quite hard and some of those muscles have done nothing for a very long time. As a result of this activity your muscles are going to be stiff the next day.
The first thing you can do to make your next day comfortable is to have have a hot bath. The bath needs to be deep enough that it covers your body when you lay down. Add Epsom Salts to the bath and once the bath is drawn have a long soak. Stay in the tub until the water starts to get cold.
The long soak in the hot bath with Epsom Salts will increase the blood flow to the muscles and help to reduce the stiffness you are going to feel the next day.
This is the one thing that you can do right away. There is something else you can do tomorrow to help your muscles to recover from the shock of your first yoga practice.
2 – Have a light work out the next day
Alice’s teacher told her that she can wait several days for the stiffness in her muscles to gradually go away or she can do some light exercise to work the stiffness out now.
Alice is planning on doing several Sun Salutes when she gets up in the morning. These yoga poses will help to warm the muscles up and get rid of the stiffness.
Alice was told by her teacher that the first one or two Sun Salutes will be very challenging because her muscles will be stiff and not want to move into the various poses of the Sun Salute. She should move gently into the poses and give the muscles a comfortable challenge. Gradually her muscles will start to loosen up and their stiffness will go away. Once the stiffness goes away it will stay away and Alice will be able to move around with a lot more ease.
The other alternative is to not do any yoga poses and wait for the stiffness in her muscles to go away on their own. This process usually takes about 2-3 days.
Alice has the two things to do well in hand. She has already had her long soak and tomorrow she is planning on saluting the sun.
There are still the two observations for her to make over the next couple of days.
Two things to observe
1 – When are you muscles sore
If Alice is like most people after they finish their first yoga class, her muscles will be stiff and sore the next day. For a few people there muscles will be sore a day later.
The next day
It is a good thing if Alice’s muscles are sore the next day. This means that Alice worked within her range of motion and did not try to go beyond it and over extend her muscles.
The day after
If Alice’s muscles are not sore until two days after class then this is a bad thing. This means that she has micro tears in her muscles from trying too hard.
You may get caught up in the enthusiasm of the yoga class and try really hard to emulate your yoga teacher. You forced your body to move into the pose even though your muscles were not flexible enough to go there. This extra force resulted in the muscles having small tears.
There are sore muscles to check out and then there is pain to check for. Pain is quite different from soreness.
2 – Where is there pain
Alice should have stiff muscles but not pain.
If she has pain in any of these areas she needs to talk to her teacher when she goes to her next class.
- Upper back, shoulders, and neck area
- Lower back
- Wrists
- Knees
These are the most common areas where you can develop pain.
The usual cause of the pain is improper alignment and incorrect weight distribution. Usually Alice’s teacher would correct these problems during class, but sometimes they do not get caught and corrected.
Will your muscles always be this stiff after class?
There is good news here.
Your muscles should never be this stiff again as long as you keep practicing yoga on a regular basis. Even when doing the intro class and coming only once a week. After the second class your body will not be as stiff and sore as it was after the first class.
What should you do if you have micro tears in your muscles?
If you end up with micro tears in your muscles you need to stop trying so hard to do the yoga poses just like the teacher. It is going to take a while for your muscles to get as flexible as the teachers.
Your teacher has been doing yoga for many years and developed their flexibility gradually over a long time.
It took you all your life to shorten your muscles and it is going to take more than one yoga class to stretch them back out again. In some cases it may take many years to stretch them enough to do some of the more challenging poses.
Take your time and enjoy the journey back to flexibility and good health.
There is an excellent article about finding your edge that you should read to help you to protect your muscles from injury when you are doing your yoga practice. Once you can find your edge your yoga practice will be much more enjoyable.
Summary
Alice can do two things to avoid becoming a petrified tree.
She can have a long soak in a hot tub with Epsom Salts.
She can do a light practice the next day to stretch her muscles and remove the lactic acid that built up in her muscles.
Alice can do two more things to make sure her next class is fun.
She can observe when her muscles get sore and adjust the level of intensity of her practice accordingly.
She can check to see if she has any pain in her body as a result of her yoga practice.
Next Step
Talk to your teacher before your next class and tell them about your observations. They will help you make any adjustments in your yoga practice to avoid the pain.
