Dakota said:
genero81 said:
Well I managed to hurt myself pretty good. Missed a couple nights work. So y'all be careful. Good news is it motivated me to seek out chiropractic care and I found a place that's very reasonable. Something I needed anyway. I plan to return to the yoga as soon as I feel it's safe to do so, and much more gently next time!
Sorry to hear this, I still have injury from practice of yoga 10 years ago. My left shoulder will always be reminder how is to easy to fall into trap when you push yourself beyond your limits.
Feel free to share details about your injury if you like. Books on yoga may give some contraindications, but I have yet to see actual desciptions of mishaps or injuries. However, from those one can also learn.
If I have to begin talking about "being careful", I would say the force of habit can be a pain. I was in a habit of doing a set of exercises, but at one time I had some swelling in the legs, but still proceeded with the crossed legged postures. That was not condusive to healing, so I had to stop until the swelling had subsided. As the knee was a problem, I did a simple spinal twist (Meru Vakrasana) instead of a half spinal twist (Ardha Matsyendrasana).
Sometimes I overwork on a computer or doing physical work and end up with a weak wrist in the right arm. In such cases instead of a cobra pose (Bhujangasana) I can do the easier sphinx pose. Or if the back stretching pose (Paschimottanasana) is overdoing it, then the head to knee pose (Janu Sirshasana) might be a possibility.
One of the greatest dangers I have had while doing asanas, has not been the poses, but the objects around me, especially when doing exercises in unfamiliar and tight places. Sometimes I have thought "That was close".
Here are a few pages about what can go wrong while doing yoga and suggestions on how to prevent mishaps:
_http://www.yogapoint.com/mainstory/TopstoryContents/painandinjury.htm
_http://www.besthealthmag.ca/best-you/yoga/the-5-most-common-yoga-injuries-and-how-to-prevent-them/2/
_http://www.huffingtonpost.com/details/the-4-most-dangerous-yoga_b_8408476.html
The last link is not about physical injury, but mentions the possibility that some poses might trigger strong emotions in some people who have been exposed to traumatic events. The language of the article ends a bit new agey, but the idea and intention is alright.
_http://www.spiritvoyage.com/blog/index.php/dos-and-donts-of-teaching-yoga-to-trauma-survivors/
but if you don't pay attention to that and just laugh, her general approach is, IMO, really good. She focuses a lot in the breathing and always remembers you how important is to breathe while doing the asanas. She's got lots of different videos and of different duration, videos from one hour to even 6 minutes. And also programs that last a month, and every day you work on different things, building up the practice little by little. 
