How's Your Yoga Dog Today?

Upward or downward, my dog does the best “Yoga Dog”.  She practices it at least daily, many times, and it just comes natural to her.  She lengthens her paws forward and arches her back, extending and lengthening her spine with her head slightly up.  I can see it on her face that it feels good.  Perhaps you’ve watched your dog or a friend’s dog do their “Yoga Dog”.  You can tell by the look on their face that lengthening and stretching makes them feel good.

Just like our animal companions and/or friends' animal companions, millions of people wake in the morning and practice Downward Dog pose (Adho Mukha Svanasana) and Upward Dog pose (Urdhva Mukha Svanasana) lengthening their spines.  Many of these people practice their “Yoga Dogs” in a sequence of poses called the Sun Salutation (Surya Namaskara).  They may repeat the Sun Salutation 12 times. That’s a lot of “Yoga Dog” Poses being done in the morning and throughout the day around the world.

Both Downward Dog pose and Upward Dog pose can be done with a prop or a chair.  Sometimes it’s hard to reach the floor or while healing after an injury it helps to support your back by using a chair to do Downward Dog and Upward Dog.  Even using blocks at the wall can help assist you with your Yoga Dogs.

When your calf muscles are tight your heels may not reach the floor.  When this happens raise your heels up.  As you practice daily watch your calves and hamstrings lengthen allowing your heels to reach the floor again.  Daily practice helps you to remain pliable but if you take a break, or if unforeseen events occur in your life, you can always start again.

As you can see, Downward Dog and Upward Dog are not only practiced by people but by dogs and other animals.  A lot of yoga poses are named after animals.  Perhaps 1000’s of years ago people studied, observed, and imitated animals discovering benefits of how the actions that the animals performed helped them.  Today those actions, now called yoga poses, can help you.