Yoga for a Toned Body – 3 Asanas

Yoga does not only shape your mind, it also can help you to shape your body. Here are 3 yoga poses for a toned body that will help you to stay - or become - fit and healthy.

By now yoga is an inherent part of many people’s routines. Some see yoga as a way of life, some fully immerse themselves in it, some appreciate it for it’s physical part. 

Practicing yoga for a toned body is not necessarily part of yoga philosophy, but for many people this aspect is the main motivation to begin with it – and once you are hooked you have all the time of the world to explore the deeper levels of yoga.

Like any physical activity, asanas shape and strengthen your body. Additionally they can also have a stress-relieving and harmonizing effect, that begins to affect you on the deeper levels of your consciousness. 

How Yoga Tones Your Body

The connection of mind and body can be harmonized with asanas and breathing methods. It is a well-known fact among yoga practitioners that regular practice stretches, pulls out tired muscles, and refreshes.

If we look at the physical side of yoga, then the practice has a dynamic process, that helps you to achieve a toned physique by strengthening and stretching your muscles at the same time. 

By stretching, connective tissue and muscle fibers become longer, and the added resistance creates tension that helps the body build and maintain a toned appearance. For these reasons, yoga is an excellent way to shape virtually any major muscle group, including the buttocks and abdominal muscles. 

And it does all this while calming the mind, relieving tension and reducing stress – making yoga great for the soul, body and mind. Is there better practice than that?

If you’d like to try yoga for a toned body, then practicing the following yoga poses will help you to achieve this goal.

1) Bridge Pose for Your Back and Abdominal Muscles

Bridge pose, or Setu Bandha Sarvangasana helps to tone the torso, your back and the glutes, stretching the abdominal muscles.

Starting pose: lie on your back and pull your feet up close to the buttocks. Stretch our arms out next to your torso, so you can touch your ankles.  

When you inhale, lift your hips up and press your heels in to the ground. Hold this pose for a few deep breaths, then slowly lower your hips down to the floor with your last exhalation. 

Repeat at least five times.

2) Chair Pose for Your Legs

Chair pose, or Utkatasana, activates almost all the muscles of the buttocks, thighs and legs. It also turns on the back muscles while holding.

The exercise: we start from a standing position, the legs should not be too wide apart, soles of the feet on the ground. From the scalp, keep the entire back stretched. Raise the arms up, stretching your fingers forward while smoothing the shoulder blade into the back. From this pose we sit down as if an invisible chair is beneath us and hold there. Pushing our center of gravity toward our heels.

Hold this pose, reaching out with your arms and stretching your thighs for 5-8 deep breaths. This pose is also repeated at least three times.

3) Downward Facing Dog – a True Allrounder

One of perhaps the best known poses is the downward facing dog, or Adho Mukha Svanasana. There are different variations of this pose.

Let’s start with a knee support: get on all four, with your palms just below the shoulders,move your hands a little bit forward and push the hips up from there to exhale. You can also start from a plank pose, and from here we push the hips upwards in the same way to exhale. With the buttocks, try to stretch upwards.

Meanwhile, press the palms firmly into the ground with the fingers spread apart and the middle finger facing forward. Try to touch the floor with your heels, but it’s okay if they don’t reach down. If your hamstrings are very tight, you may also need to slightly bend your knees. It is important to push yourself firmly away from the ground with your palms so that your spine is straight and can stretch out nicely. 

Relax your neck, keep your chest open, your abdominal muscles engaged. Keep the feet wide hip-wide. The body basically takes the form of an inverted, rectangular letter “V”.

Practice Yoga Safely

Yoga can also be a strengthening in the sense that when  you are holding asanas you activate many muscles, thus bringing the muscle fibers to life. But don’t forget how deep the philosophy of yoga can also affect our mind, so that if done with the right awareness and attention, we can also achieve improvement on the spiritual level.

If you are a beginner, make sure you learn the poses safely.  It is best to attend classes and practice with a trained instructor- They can not only provide guidance on which poses are best to target certain areas of the body, but they can also help you to execute those poses correctly and safely. 

Check out the best yoga studios in Budapest. Many of them offer online classes, so you can practice with an experienced teach, but don’t even have to leave your home!.

barbara