Yoga isn’t just a good form of exercise for people who are already in great shape – it can also be used to rehabilitate or even prevent recurring injuries…

Yoga can be a great form of exercise for those recovering from an injury or in a rehabilitation program. However, yoga is also particularly good at helping to prevent recurring injuries from happening in the first place.

Often when people get injured, the area that is damaged remains susceptible to more injuries in the future as the tissue and muscle has been weakened by the injury.

By doing yoga exercises that specifically target the area of the injury, that part of the body and all the supporting muscles can be strengthened to help reduce the chance of the injury occurring again.

Often there are also factors that contributed to the injury in the first place, for example, where there was a weakness that went unnoticed, making you more prone to injury in that area.

This can be brought about by something as simple as a slight imbalance from one side of the body to the other. Without even realizing it, your body may be constantly compensating for this imbalance, leading to overwork in some muscles, and weakness in others – both of which can make you more susceptible to injuries in that area.

Yoga can be very beneficial in this situation, because it helps to strengthen ALL muscle groups throughout the body, thereby helping to correct these imbalances. It can also help to break unhealthy movement patterns that may be making injury more likely – such as poor posture.

A good yoga instructor may also be able to identify areas of misalignment that could be the cause of many physical problems. If the spine and the rest of the body are in alignment when you perform your yoga poses then there is less likelihood of recurring injuries.

Similar to the teachings of people who use the Alexander Technique to bring about alignment in the body, thereby reducing injuries, yoga does this through poses and exercises that help to strengthen weak areas and bring your body back into balance.