“I was always the biggest person in the class. It’s changing now, but generally speaking, it takes a lot of chutzpah to be a bigger person walking into a yoga class. I would be in the back, and I could just see the way the teachers would look at me and think “What do I do with this guy?” But then I’d have my blocks and stuff, and they’d figure out quickly that I was just fine…”

Current Thursday Series in Progress

Parivrutha Thirikonasana with straps

“The great yoga wall” is the evolution of the Iyengar yoga wall. The wall uses various types of adjustable straps, belts and bars to create traction, stability, awareness, anti-gravity assistance and more. It has great benefits for people with “buddha bodies” — the large, voluptuous, tall, muscular, or other non-stereotypical yoga body.

ardha chandrasana supported by straps -- using traction and support to find more space and release

In my personal practice, working with the yoga wall has helped my postures and helped me to discover new things about my own body. For example, I found that a lot of my challenges which I had thought were coming from my legs and knees, were actually coming from my ribs and upper psoas tightness. By allowing my body to be supported in various ways by the straps while in postures (and using my breath), I was able to open up more of my ribs and feel more of my psoas in the upper quadrants. I believe it would have taken me a longer time to find these issues and get to this practice without the yoga wall.

Another personal practice with the wall is hanging upside down, which I do on a daily basis. Hanging upside down in a supporting belt not only works to slow and reverse the aging process, but it also forces me to breath in my ribs, rather than my belly, which helps me open up my ribs, shoulders, and arms.

The wall is great for assisting large bodies with supported backbending

A good example of that is practicing downward facing dog, which is for many big people a nemesis. Because they may have a lot of body weight, they are often either they are putting their weight too much in their hands or feet. When they come off of the yoga wall, they find that their downward facing dog is a lot easier; their weight is no longer too much on the hands or feet, but instead their body is elongated, and they are able to sustain the elongation through their pose. In this way the body is able to distribute weight so that the body is working efficiently and in a focused manner in each posture.

As well as teaching on my private yoga wall, Buddha Body Yoga will also be offering group classes on the Great Yoga Wall, location TBA. These classes will use a studio that has a wall for many people at once, but the classes will be specifically for large bodies. I’m not interested in working with small people.

Parivrtta Parsvakonasana - Revolved Side Angle assisted by 2 straps

Buddha Body Yoga offers a series class on Thursday evenings at 7pm. This class is, for now, not a wall class, but offers many benefits for the large bodied, using props such as chairs, belts, blocks, and the (regular) wall.

I look forward to seeing more people who have previously thought they can’t do the postures, move into the postures and know why they are practicing them, with the assistance of the wall and it’s offerings. Watching these new patterns of thinking and movement being carried into my clients’ daily life is a true pleasure.

To read the article and watch the video go to WABC NYC

Nicole Bengiveno/The New York Times

Nicole Bengiveno/The New York Times

Read the entire article written by Sara Eckel here New York Times Striking A Pose for Girth