Have I mentioned I hate sun salutations? I mean… not so much now after many years and many teachers helping me sort out exactly how to do this sequence. But it still doesn’t feel great in my body if I do more than a few. It hurts my wrists. Yes I know the modifications.. yes I know… but actually none of them really feel good in my body.
It is pretty standard where I live to see a sun salutation taught in almost every class. I don’t really understand why. Even gentle beginner yoga classes have sun salutations. 50+ classes have sun salutations. Really??? I was shocked to hear it to be honest. When I started doing yoga it was sun salutations that were primarily what I did. Beginners = Sun Salutations. They gave me carpal tunnel. They gave me sore shoulders. They just didn’t feel good at all.
Yesterday in my 50+ class a student came to me and said she had attended another gentle yoga class but it had hurt her body. Sun Salutations. 6 of them in a row… I hear this all the time. I just don’t believe this is a gentle sequence especially for new practitioners. I have decided to declare all my classes “Sun Salutation Free“. Be free wrists!! We can lengthen, heat up, warm up, and move some other way that feels less risky.
Sun salutations are the number one reason I do pilates and not yoga. I hate them. And really, they are just a burpee in slow motion – who likes burpees?
Thank you! I am so glad to know that I am not the only person that doesn’t enjoy doing sun salutations — especially when we have to do them between nearly every other element in class! They make my shoulders feel stressed, and I always left class feeling tighter in the shoulders than when I came in. After trying that class off and on for several months, I decided to quit it altogether and go back to the gentle yoga class at the YMCA