Ep 129: Should Chaturangas Be in Every Vinyasa Class?

Chaturanga is one of the most repeated movements in vinyasa yoga, and one of the most commonly practiced by students without having the foundational capacity to support it. For yoga teachers, understanding what chaturanga actually demands of the wrists and shoulder joint, and recognizing when students are not ready to practice it in a way that supports their bodies, is essential knowledge for teaching safe, effective vinyasa classes. 

This episode challenges the assumption that you should teach chaturanga in every flow, answers the question "Why?", and offers you alternatives to use with the real range of students who come to a typical vinyasa class.

• Challenging The Assumption That You Should Always Teach Chaturanga
• The Makeup of Students In Your Classes 
• Why the Wrists Matter
• Why the Shoulder Joint Is the Bigger Concern
• What to Offer Instead

Free Resource

10 Chaturanga Variations - 

Download the free 10 Chaturanga Variations video series for a complete toolkit of modifications and alternatives you can offer any student in any vinyasa class.

Related Episodes: 

Why Traditional Restorative Yoga Isn't for Everyone

How to Teach Students Body Awareness in Yoga

Transcript

Monica 0:00

Welcome back to the podcast. I'm Monica, and I'm so glad you're here. Here is where we talk about all the things that your yoga teacher training probably skipped over or didn't give the conversations their due diligence, the anatomy, the injuries, the real conversations about what is actually happening in the bodies of the students in your classes. A lot of what I teach, I learn by watching students, by asking questions, and honestly, by recognizing moments in my own teaching where I suspected something wasn't right. Today, we're getting into a topic that I think might ruffle a few feathers, and I say that with so much love. We are talking about Chaturangas. Specifically, we are talking about whether Chaturanga should be included in every Vinyasa style class. And my answer, which I am going to spend this whole episode explaining, is no, it should Now, stay with me because this is not about watering down the practice or making yoga easier. This is about understanding what Chaturanga actually asks of the body and being honest about whether the students who come to our classes on any given day actually have the capacity to do it safely. And spoiler alert, a lot of them do not So we're gonna talk about what capacity actually means in this context, what I have seen happen in my classes full of students practicing Chaturangas that they were not ready for, why the wrists and the shoulder joint are particularly important to understand here, and what you can do instead that still gives students a meaningful, challenging Vinyasa experience. And at the end of this episode, I'm gonna point you toward a free resource that I created that gives you 10 Chaturanga variations and alternatives so you always have options ready. So let's get into it. There is an assumption in a lot of Vinyasa style classes, and I think it's worth calling out, it's that because Chaturanga is a standard part of the Vinyasa sequence, students who come to a Vinyasa class are ready to practice it. that it is a baseline, a given, something students can be expected to move through multiple times in a class without it being an issue. And I want to gently but firmly challenge that assumption because I think it is contributing to a pattern of avoidable shoulder injuries in yoga students, and it is something that we as teachers have the power to change Chaturanga is not a beginner pose. It's not even a straightforward intermediate pose. It is a highly demanding shoulder stability exercise that requires significant upper body strength, wrist mobility, and load-bearing capacity, scapular control, and the ability to maintain spinal alignment under load. When it's practiced well, it's impressive to see students practice it. When it's practiced without the capacity to support it, it puts stress on structures that are not designed to manage that kind of load in that position. And the thing is, most students are not coming to a Vinyasa class with all of those pieces in place. And that's not a criticism of the students, it's just the reality of who yoga students are. So let's talk about the students who are actually in a typical Vinyasa class because I think this helps to reframe the conversation quickly. You have newer students who are still building the foundational strength to support their own body weight. They wanna keep up with the class. They wanna do what everyone else is doing in class, so they move through Chaturanga even though their body is not yet ready to do it in a way that protects their joints, and they do this multiple times per class every class week after You have students who sit at a desk for eight or more hours a day. They have tight chest muscles, rounded shoulders, and limited overhead mobility. They come to yoga to move and they're trying hard but their shoulder girdle does not have the range of motion or the stability to manage the demands of a properly executed Chaturanga. Every time they move through it, they are compensating somewhere else. You have students with wrist issues, carpal tunnel, old injuries, or general wrist sensitivity for whom bearing their full body weight on an extended wrist for even a few seconds is genuinely painful or potentially harmful. And in a typical Vinyasa class, teachers don't typically ask students about their wrists at the beginning Or offer an alternative in place of Chaturanga. Teachers just continue to teach Chaturanga because what else is there to offer? Then you have students with shoulder histories, old rotator cuff tears, past impingements, maybe even surgeries, who come to yoga because they want to move, because they have been told yoga is good for them, because they genuinely enjoy the practice. These students need a teacher who is thinking about what they are asking their shoulder joints to do. I have watched my students in Vinyasa classes and seen what happens when their capacity is not I have seen students whose shoulders collapse forward as they lower down, and the whole front of the shoulder joint is taking a load that it was not designed to take in that position. I have seen students whose hips droop towards the mat because they don't yet have the core strength to keep their spine in neutral under that kind of demand, and they're doing this over and over again in a single class. These students are not practicing Chaturanga. They're doing something that looks like Chaturanga from the outside, and it's not serving them. So let's break down the two areas I really wanna focus on, starting with the wrists. Chaturanga requires you to bear your full body weight on your wrists with the hand flat on the mat and the wrist in extension, meaning the hand is pressing down while the forearm stays roughly perpendicular to the This is a significant demand on the wrist joint, the tendons that cross it, and the structures of the carpal tunnel. For students who have healthy, mobile wrists and have built up to this load gradually, this is manageable. But for a large portion of the general yoga population, people who type all day, people who have had wrist injuries, people who have never done significant load-bearing on their wrists before, this is asking a lot and when students are also fatiguing through their upper body during a Chaturanga they don't have the strength for, the wrists absorb more load than they should because the muscles that work normally to be doing the work are no longer doing it effectively. This is one of the reasons I'm so deliberate about not treating Chaturanga as a default put it in every sequence, pose, or transition. Not because the wrists are inherently delicate, but because load on a structure that is not prepared for that load repeated many times is a pattern that leads to overuse injuries over time. Now, let's talk about the shoulder because this is the one that I think is prone to most injury risk and the one I feel most strongly about. Chaturanga asks the shoulder joint to manage significant load in a position that is inherently demanding. As you lower from plank halfway towards the mat, this requires the rotator cuff muscles to work hard to keep the head of the humerus centered in the socket. It requires the serratus anterior to keep the scapula stable against the ribcage. It requires the entire shoulder girdle to work in coordination to manage that load without the humeral head migrating forward in the socket. When any part of that system is not doing its job, which happens when students don't have the strength, when they are fatiguing, or when they have the kind of postural patterns that come from spending most of their day at a computer, the shoulder joint takes that load in ways it was not designed to sustain. The front of the shoulder gets compressed. The rotator cuff tendons are in a compromised position. And again, this is happening in a single class sometimes 10, 12, 15 times or more. Over time, this is a pattern that contributes to real shoulder problems, impingement, rotator cuff strain. And the frustrating thing is, is that it's so preventable because we have perfectly good alternatives. So I wanna pause here and speak directly what you might be feeling as you listen to this episode if you're thinking, "But Chaturanga is part of Vinyasa. If I take it out or offer alternatives all the time, is this really still a Vinyasa class?" And I totally hear that. I understand why this part of the practice feels important to protect. But here is what I want you to sit with. What is the actual purpose of including Chaturanga in every flow? Is it to build strength? Is it because it's traditional? Is it because students expect it? And then ask yourself, does repeating a demanding movement multiple times in a class with students who cannot yet do it in a way that supports their bodies actually serve any of those purposes? Building strength requires appropriate load, meaning a challenge the body can manage with reasonable form. A movement that a student cannot execute in a way that protects their joints is not building strength. It's building a pattern of compensation. And we have the ability as teachers to offer progressions that actually build towards Chaturanga rather than just having students practice it before they're ready. Teaching yoga is not about delivering a standard sequence to whoever shows up to your classes. It's about meeting the students who are actually coming to your classes. So what do you do? Because if you are thinking, "Well, okay, Monica, but if I skip Chaturanga, what does the transition look like?" And I wanna be clear here. There are excellent options that keep the flow of a Vinyasa class intact, and two of my favorites are very simple. The first is a plank hold. Instead of lowering through Chaturanga, students hold plank for a few breaths. This keeps the upper body engaged, builds the foundational strength that eventually supports Chaturanga, and does not put the shoulder in that demanding position under full body weight. Plank holds are hard. Students who do it well will feel the challenge, and it's accessible to a much wider range of students than Chaturanga is. The second option is something I love for its simplicity, and that's going straight from a forward fold to downward-facing dog, skipping the plank position altogether. This completely removes the upper body load of the transition and keeps the class moving with a breath and rhythm that still feels like a Vinyasa style class. For students who are newer, students with wrist sensitivities, students who are fatiguing, or students whose shoulder capacity is limited, this is a meaningful and valid way for them to practice. And if you want more options, I have a free resource called 10 Chaturanga Variations that gives you 10 specific options to offer your students. It's a video series that builds strength with alternatives that serve students who are not ready for Chaturanga at all. And having these in your back pocket means you'll never have to default to only teaching Chaturanga with a room full of students whose bodies are telling you they need something a little bit different. I'll add the link to the video series in the show notes below. Go grab it and watch the videos. Use it when you are planning your classes because the students who are collapsing into their shoulders in your classes deserve a teacher who can spot what's happening and has options for teaching Chaturanga, and now you will. All right. I hope this episode helped you think about the effects that continuing to teach Chaturanga has on students who just might not be prepared for it and what you can offer students instead. Remember to grab the Chaturanga video series in the show notes, and thank you so much for being here. I'll see you next week. All right, bye.