r/ashtanga

Does it ever make you angry?


This is Ashtanga Yoga Tech Support. Real questions from the yoga community, answered.

The Question

U guys. I love Ashtanga. I love the challenge. It used to chill me out in my 20s. Now I’m practicing more often (6ish days per week) and 38 years old and I find many mornings that I am much more feisty after practice. Sad part about that is it’s literally only like- 7:30 and I’ve got a whole f-cking day ahead! It takes me a while to settle after practice these days. Am I supposed to add a 10 min meditation to the end of my practice? Make it even LONGER?! Help! submitted by /u/YogaN…

— via r/ashtanga

Our Response

So you're amped. Not calm.

That's not weird. That's information.

Six days a week at 38 is more load than your nervous system is settling from. You're getting fitter, sure. But you're also getting wired.

The practice isn't broken. The dose is off.

Try five days. Or four strong days and two restorative ones. See if that changes the texture.

And yeah—savasana counts. If you're racing out of final rest because you've got shit to do, that's the problem right there. Stay down for five real minutes. Let it land.

You don't need to add meditation. You need to let the practice you're already doing actually finish.

If you want to go deeper on how rest days and intensity actually work in Ashtanga, check out the study guide on practice frequency.

But start here: less volume, more completion.

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