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“Asanas keep the body healthy and strong and in harmony with nature.” - B. K. S. Iyengar
Many people are aware of the benefits of yoga. Breathing exercises, meditation, and poses work together on your mental, physical, and spiritual well-being. Yoga is a comprehensive activity that allows you to work on your overall well-being.
Studies have shown that when it comes to yoga, it’s still mostly women with men only making up around 20% of participants.
So does this mean that men aren’t fans of sun salutations or improving their flexibility?
Maybe, but they should be.
There are so many benefits to regularly practising yoga. With regular practice, you’ll improve your lung capacity, strengthen your spine, and learn to let go. For men, there are many positive aspects that’ll make them want to head out right now and pick up a yoga mat.
Interested?
Here are 10 good reasons for men to do yoga!
1 - Build Muscle
One of the main benefits of yoga for men is that it allows you to build muscle. Yoga can help you tone and sculpt muscles.
No matter the pose, there’ll be part of your body working hard to make it happen. That’s the great thing about yoga; sometimes you won’t even notice. A sequence of poses mightn’t make you feel like you’re working really hard, but you are.
Every movement is linked to your breathing in order to further increase the benefits. But we’ll get back to that later. Yoga is a smart way to build muscle.
You can look at which specific poses will work for you.
Check out our guide to yoga for men.
2 - Become More Flexible with Yoga
Yoga can also help men to become more flexible. Taking into consideration that men are generally less flexible than women, yoga can do more than just stretch out your spine, thighs, or forearms.
A cobra pose followed by a downward-facing dog is just one sequence that can make you more flexible. The more you do yoga, the more you’ll see the benefits of each sequence of poses. With practise, breath control, and determination, anything is possible.
However, don’t forget that while yoga can make you more flexible, you don’t want to overdo it and attempt poses that could injure you. Don’t worry if you can’t teach your feet at first. You’ll get there the more you do yoga. Namasté!
3 - Improve Your Concentration
It seems quite obvious that yoga will improve your physique, but yoga also helps your concentration.
How so?
By making you remain balanced as you do a pose. How much you need to focus mentally will depend on the type of yoga you’re doing.
Hatha yoga is a dynamic type of yoga that is quite physically intensive, unlike prenatal yoga which is designed with the opposite in mind. The latter has a larger focus on the mind and the spirit than the body.
Of course, both men and woman can improve their concentration with yoga.
Find out more about yoga sessions for men.
4 - Complementing Sport
While yoga is a sport in its own right, that doesn’t mean that you can’t do other sports, too. Yoga can also be an important part of your training alongside your main sport.
The sport you’re doing will affect the yoga you should do as there are some that go incredibly well together.
Are you doing a lot of weights?
Then choose a calmer type of yoga where you can stretch out your muscles.
Play tennis? Why not go for yoga poses that focus on your lower body?
There are a lot of ways to marry yoga to the sport you do.
5 - Improve Your Balance
Are you familiar with the tree pose?
It’s a great pose for working on your balance.
Why not work on it with yoga?
When paired with effective breath control, there are many poses that can improve your balance by having you hold them for a bit.
You’ll soon see that balance and equilibrium is an important part of yoga.
Find out how and where men can do yoga.
6 - Reduce Stress
“Hatha yoga is spirituality of the body; it is the most perfect union of corporeal and incorporeal.” - Terri Guillemets
Yoga is a great way to relax thanks to meditation and breathing exercises. There are moments where you can focus just on what you’re doing or are just about to do.
Focusing on what you’re doing is also a great way to improve concentration. These moments are also great for dealing with stress and anxiety.
The same is true for the poses. With the help of a yoga instructor, you’ll find dealing with stress and anxiety easier. Your mind, body, and spirit will be at ease.
7 - Lose Weight
You might want to get rid of that gut and yoga and poses like the chair pose are pretty good for this.
Since yoga is essentially exercise, it can help you build muscle, burn calories, and lose weight. As you do more poses and breathing exercises, you’ll start seeing the benefits of yoga.
8 - Prevent Injuries
Yoga is a great activity to help you less prone to injury. By improving your physique, concentration, and balance, you’re less likely to hurt yourself.
How? It’s very simple. The sequences will also strengthen muscles, joints, and endurance.
Check out the best yoga poses for men.
9 - Get to Know Your Body
Yoga is also a great way to learn more about every part of your body with every breath you take. You get a lot of time to focus on certain parts of your body and you’ll become aware of what your body is capable of.
This is often down to your flexibility. You don’t need to immediately be able to touch your feet so don’t worry about it. Yoga will let you know exactly what your limits are.
Yoga is also about seeing the positives.
10 - Improved Libido
Yoga can be great for your sex drive. This is on top of improving your concentration, balance, flexibility, strength, and endurance. All useful traits, if you know what I mean...
Yoga can give you energy and performance. It also increases testosterone production. It’ll also reduce stress and anxiety, which can hinder performance.
In short, yoga can help you anywhere, any time. Not that you’ll probably be interested in doing yoga afterwards.
If you're interested in learning more about yoga, consider getting help from a private tutor or yoga instructor. You can easily find an experienced and qualified tutor on Superprof and start enjoying yoga sessions for all levels.
There are three main ways to be taught yoga from a private instructor: face-to-face, online, and in a group. Each approach comes with its advantages and disadvantages for you and your wallet so think carefully about which one will work best for you in the long-term.
Face-to-face sessions are just between you and the instructor. This is a good option for anyone with specific requirements for their lessons as the instructor will tailor each session to you, your level, and what you're interested in learning or doing. Of course, this premium service comes at a cost and you'll be paying for all the extra time the instructor spends planning and organising each session for you and travelling to the class.
Despite being the costliest, one-on-one sessions are normally the most cost-effective as every minute of the session is spent focused on you and the sessions themselves are adapted to you to make sure that you get the most out of them.
Online tutors usually charge less than face-to-face tutors as they don't have to travel and can schedule more sessions every week. Generally, yoga adapts quite well to being taught online. The advantage of this type of instruction is that you can broaden your search to yogis from all over the world, which is useful if there's a very specific type of yoga you'd like to learn.
Group tutorials are a great choice for those on a budget. Whether you want to do yoga with some friends, colleagues, or family members, with everyone footing the bill, they tend to work out cheaper per person per hour. Of course, you can't expect each session to be fully tailored to you as the instructor has to teach everyone in attendance, but learning in a group can often help spur on each individual member.
Remember that many of the yoga instructors on Superprof offer the first session or lesson for free. Use these free sessions to try out various potential instructors before choosing which one is right for you.
It's a good idea to outline what you're looking for in a yoga instructor before you start your search as you can make a shortlist of instructors that meet your requirements before you start getting in touch with them and organising the free sessions.
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