Ep 135: When Yoga Props Help And When They Don't

Yoga props are widely understood as tools for accessibility, but in practice they are often offered as an option rather than a tool to alter the biomechanics of a pose. For students who are injured or managing chronic pain, the gap between those two things matters significantly. This episode examines when props actually change something meaningful in the body and when they create the appearance of a modification without addressing what is really happening, how to think more carefully about the difference, and how to build a class culture where props are part of everyone's practice rather than a signal that something is wrong in students' bodies.

Episode includes:

• When Props Are Not Helpful for Students in Pain
• When Props Are Genuinely Helpful
• Building a Class Culture Where Everyone Uses Props

Watch Next

YouTube: Why telling students to "listen to their body" is not helpful advice for students in pain [Watch video here] 

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Monica facilitates anatomy trainings for yoga teachers and mentors teachers who want to build a practice grounded in real anatomical understanding. Book a strategy call to talk about what deeper anatomy education could look like for you.

Transcript

Monica 3:59

Welcome back to the podcast. I'm Monica, and I'm so glad you're here. Here is where we talk about anatomy, injuries, the nervous system, and answer some of the questions you have but didn't get addressed in your yoga teacher training. if you are new here, I'm a yoga teacher who specializes in helping teachers work confidently with students who have pain and injuries. I facilitate anatomy trainings for yoga teachers, and I mentor teachers inside my six-month mentorship program. And one of the things that comes up quite a bit in that work is the use of props, specifically what we think props are doing and what they are actually doing. So today I wanna talk about that because I think that we do a lot of assuming around what props are actually doing for the students in our classes. There's this widely held belief in yoga that props make a student's practice more accessible, and in a general sense, that's true. Blocks, blankets, bolsters, straps, chairs, these tools exist because different bodies need different support, and props can truly provide that. However, I do think props have become a default answer to a much more complex question, and that question is what to offer when a student has an injury. The universal answer to that has become to offer a prop. but what about when a student looks uncomfortable? You offer a prop, right? Or when a student can't quite reach the floor, you offer another prop. And while none of those instincts in you are wrong exactly, the problem is that offering a prop is not the same as actually addressing what is happening for that student. A prop is a tool and like any tool, it's only useful when it's the right tool for the right situation. When we hand someone a prop without understanding what they actually need, we are doing something that kind of looks like helping but might not be helping them at all. This is especially important to understand when we're talking about students who are injured or managing chronic pain because this is where the just grab a prop instinct really misses the mark and here's why. When a student is in pain, the most important question is not, Well, what prop can I give them?" It is, What is actually happening for this person and what does their body need right now?" Those are different questions and a prop only answers the second question, what does their body need right now, in very specific circumstances. Take a student with a herniated disc in their lumbar spine who is in a forward fold. Handing them a block so their hands don't have to reach as far to the floor does not necessarily change the flexion load in their lumbar spine. The block is between their hands and the floor, yes, but their spine is doing the same thing it was doing before. The prop looked like an intervention but it did not actually change the biomechanics that are creating the problem. Or think about a student with a rotator cuff pain in a plank pose. Telling them to use blocks or a towel to help raise their hands or elevate their wrists slightly off of the floor might help, but the load through their shoulder joint in that position has not meaningfully changed. The prop created a visual modification, but it did not serve the injury. And then there's the nervous system piece, which I think about a lot because students who are in pain are often operating in a heightened protective state. Their nervous system is already more alert, more vigilant. When we as teachers casually toss them a prop without actually understanding their experience, we can inadvertently reinforce the idea that something is wrong with them, that they need to be managed differently, or that their body is a problem that needs to be solved. And none of these helps the nervous system settle, and it can actually do the opposite. So when are props not helpful? That's a big question. When they change the appearance of a pose without changing what the body is actually experiencing. And when they are handed to a student as a substitute for a real conversation about what that student actually needs. Now, let's flip this because I absolutely believe in props. Every class I teach uses them. I do not teach without them. And I think that they are some of the most valuable tools we have available to us as teachers. Props are helpful when they change the actual experience in the body in a meaningful way. When a rolled blanket under the knees in Shavasana allows the lumbar spine to settle because it reduces the pull on the hip flexors, that's a prop doing a real job. When a strap around the feet in a seated forward fold allows a student with tighter feeling hamstrings to maintain a neutral spine instead of rounding through their lower back to reach their feet, that strap is changing the actual mechanics of the pose in a way that serves the student. When you place a bolster under the thoracic spine in a supported backbend to offer the spine a chance to open in a supported, safe way, that bolster is doing something real for the student. For students with injuries and pain, props are most helpful when they reduce load on the structure that needs less stress right now, when they support a position that the student cannot hold independently without compensating in other areas of their body, and when they give the nervous system a sense of being held and supported. That last example is particularly important because a well-placed prop communicates safety to the nervous system because the physical sensation of being supported changes the body's experience of the pose. Therefore, we know props are not the problem, but offering props as a one-size-fits-all solution is the problem. There is a real difference between those two things now let's talk about how we normalize props so that the students who most need them actually use them. Because here's what I see happen, and I'm sure you experience this in your classes, too. You prep for class, you ask students to bring blocks and a strap by their mat to use in class, and then when you cue a particular pose, the students who reach for blocks are almost always the newer students or the students who are visibly struggling because those are the students who feel they need them. Everyone else continues without props, either because they feel like they don't need them or because reaching for one feels like they're admitting that they cannot do the full pose. This creates a dynamic where props become associated with limitation rather than intelligent usage. And that association means the students who would benefit from them, the student with the hip injury, the students whose hamstrings are feeling the sensation of tightness, the student whose wrist sensitivity bothers them in plank, those students often do not use props because they don't wanna stand out in class. The way I handle this in every class I teach is simple. Props are not optional in my classes. They are part of the practice for every student. Before class starts, every student brings the props I intend to incorporate into the sequence by their mats. I don't wait for a student to look like they are struggling before I suggest a prop. I build props into how I teach the pose for the whole class every time. So instead of saying, "Grab a block if you need one," I will say something like, "Place a block to the inside of your foot." Not some students or if you need it, everyone. I cue for everyone to do this. And then the student with the hip injury is not reaching for a block because they have a hip injury. They are reaching for a block because that is what we're using in class right now. This changes the culture of your classes. Props stop being a signal that something is wrong and start being part of how we're all practicing in class. Students become more curious about them, more willing to experiment with different heights and positions, more likely to discover that a prop actually changes their experience in a positive way that they would have missed had they skipped using it and for the students who do not need a particular prop in a particular pose, that's fine too. The block is there. They can use it or they can set it aside. Nobody is singled out either way. I wanna tie this up all together Because I think the props conversation is really a bigger conversation about how we respond to the variety of bodies and experiences those bodies have had that are in our classes. When we offer props reactively, we are responding to what a student looks like from the outside. When we build props into the practice for everyone, we are responding to what bodies actually need, and we are creating an environment where students can meet themselves honestly, rather than performing a version of the pose that looks right but does not serve them. And when we start to think more carefully about what props are actually doing, that's when they become the powerful tools they're designed to be, a real functional intervention that changes what the body experiences in a way that matters. Something I wanna share with you before we close. I have a YouTube video that goes into a topic that connects really closely with everything that we've talked today, And it's why telling students to listen to their body is not actually helpful advice, especially for students who are in pain, chronic pain. If you are a teacher who says that phrase, "Listen to your body," and wants to understand why it can fall short and what to say instead, that video is going to make you think again about what you say when you have a student with chronic pain in your class. I'll link that video in the show notes below. And if you wanna go much deeper into working with students who have pain and injuries, including how to build a practice that actually meets these students where they are, the strategy call is the place to start that conversation with me. That link is also in the show notes. Thank you so much for being here and being part of the conversation that we deserve to have as yoga teachers. All right, bye.