The Power Of Power Yoga

Power yoga is a vigorous, fitness-based approach to ancient vinyasa yoga. It is assumed by many to be the adoption of "Gym style" workout methods in yoga. But as a matter of fact, power yoga is closely derived from Asthanga Yoga.

Power yoga incorporates the athleticism of Ashtanga, including lots of vinyasas (series of poses done in sequence). It gives each teacher the flexibility to teach any poses in any order, making every class different. With its emphasis on strength and flexibility, power yoga brought yoga into the gyms of America as people began to see yoga as a way to work out.

The term "power yoga" became popular during the mid-1990s when two American yoga teachers who had studied with Ashtanga guru Sri K. Pattabhi Jois began to make what they had learned more accessible to Western students. They also wanted to move away from the rigid Ashtanga sequence, which is a set series of poses that are always done in the same order.

Bryan Kest, based in Los Angeles, and Beryl Bender Birch, based in New York, are most often credited with the nearly simultaneous invention of power yoga on opposite coasts. Both were part of the second generation of American Ashtanga students; Kest originally learned from David Williams and Bender Birth from yoga guru Norman Allen. Williams and Allen were both among Jois's first western students. Kest went on to study with Jois in Mysore, India. Bender Birch, who had previously done Sivananda, Kundalini, and Iyengar yoga, worked with Jois during his trips to the United States in the 1980s.

Kest and Bender Birth both used the term power yoga to differentiate the intense, flowing style of yoga they were teaching from the gentle stretching and meditation based practices that many Americans associated with yoga. Bender Birch has said that when she started calling her classes power yoga, she still taught the Ashtanga sequence of poses. Some conventional yoga teachers dismiss power yoga as a gimmick that undermines the holistic and spiritual foundations of the classic forms of the practice and places too much stress on physical exercise.

Power yoga enthusiasts say it enhances stamina, flexibility, posture, and mental focus. Like all physical activities, it also relieves tension and releases toxins through sweat. Because it is rigorous, it burns more calories than most traditional forms of yoga and therefore can help with weight loss.

Feel free to contact us to know more about the types of Yoga we cover in our classes.

Credits: Ann Pizer, Verywellfit.com