6 Misconceptions About Yoga

Although yoga is a practice that is over 4000 years old, it only became popular in the West in the 90s. Some people are still quite skeptical about this new activity that does not necessarily follow the codes of already known physical practices. We have selected 6 preconceived ideas about yoga, and hope to get them out of your head once and for all!

1) Yoga is for women only

If 80% of Yoga practitioners are women, it is probably because men prefer a competitive physical activity, with more immediate benefits. But Yoga is just as beneficial for men as for women! Originally, Yoga was even thought of as an exclusively masculine activity. And if some men think that only women have the qualities of flexibility necessary for the practice of Yoga, think again! Practicing asanas is not just a question of flexibility, it is also a question of muscle tone, and in this area, we are at an advantage...

Guys, if you're just missing one more reason to try it, tell yourself that the qualities of Yoga (concentration, muscle strengthening, flexibility, tone) also make it an excellent complement to other sports, such as surfing, football, running, and even breakdancing!

2) Yoga is reserved for vegans and purists

Drinking soy milk, being vegetarian, wearing only clothes made of natural fibers: some people are sometimes afraid of joining a kind of sect if they start yoga. Don't worry, not at all! To start Yoga, you don't need to revolutionize your personality or your lifestyle habits. However, practicing Yoga could well lead you to take better care of your body, and make you more aware of lifestyle habits that, ultimately, are not necessarily good for you. Yoga also helps you listen to your body, which, ultimately, is not a bad thing!

3) Yoga (like napping) is not very complicated.

Practicing yoga is not just about sitting and lying on a yoga mat. Depending on the style of yoga, there are a multitude of positions, some of which require a lot of training to achieve. Yoga also requires a great deal of concentration. It is much harder than you think to empty your mind, leave your problems in the locker room and think about nothing other than your own body's presence.

4) Yoga is a fad

Yoga has been around for 4,000 years. If you think of a fad as something fleeting, temporary, then it's hard to put Yoga in that category! The goal of Yoga is to help you become your most authentic self. As you begin your practice, you learn about yourself, and it's not a process with a definite end...You're always learning about yourself!

5) Yoga is “an old man’s thing”

Often, when I tell my friends that I do #yoga, I literally think of them as "Sitting on a chamois leather watching flies fly, I couldn't do it"... But what most of my friends don't know is how physical some styles of Yoga can be! Thinking that Yoga is a remake of Indian in the City (a circle is a square, a square is a circle) is a mistake, and those who have tried Bikram Yoga without being warned know: yoga can sometimes allow you to come back to yourself while exerting yourself enormously.

6) You have to be flexible to do Yoga

Just as you don't need to be an oenologist to appreciate wine, you can perfectly start Yoga without being thin and flexible! Quite the opposite is true: if you want to gain flexibility (and not just physical!), taking up Yoga is a great school! Practice makes perfect after all! And don't be discouraged by seeing the mind-blowing contortions of some yogi masters! Yoga can't be learned in a day, and none of these postures are essential to benefit from your practice...

If you take away one thing from this article, it is that Yoga is within everyone's reach... The benefits of Yoga are not necessarily palpable from the first session, because it is an "incremental" discipline: the more you practice, the more you feel the benefits on your general well-being and your body. However, it is one of the most complete practices (because the benefits are physical and mental), and an extremely effective way to refocus and know yourself... So, what are you waiting for?