PHYSICAL:
Alleviate muscle tension, neck & back pain - Chiropractor in a swing.
Promotes increased joint mobility.
Core strengthening - essential for good spinal health and posture.
Benefits cardiovascular, respiratory, digestive and lymphatic systems.
Hold powerful Yoga postures longer for a greater benefit.
The support of the swing makes it easier to work on proper alignment in yoga asana.
Novel and engaging movement experience can enhance proprioception.
Activates the parasympathetic nervous system, benefiting sleep.
Benefits of Aerial Yoga
SPIRITUAL
For those more interested in Yoga as a tool for spiritual growth and transformation (An inner orientation). The presence of mind and ease of experience,that using a swing can generate, is a great staging post from which to go on the inner journey. As soon as you begin using the swing, you have entered a union (another word for Yoga). You have started the journey to be reunited to your divine consciousness by enacting this physical union with the swing. This will encourage connection, surrender, the breaking of boundaries (physical and psychological) and presence. All of these states are part of the spiritual journey.
MENTAL & EMOTIONAL
Helps to relieve anxiety and stress.
Improves concentration & mental functioning.
Mood lifting - stimulates the release of happy hormones - serotonin & endorphins.
Oxytocin release, produced by contact between swing and body, can enhance feelings of security, trust and wellbeing.
Putting the body into a novel and challenging environment, like an Aerial Yoga class, can build courage and confidence.
Following the joy - the story of Aerial Yoga
I originally got a swing to practice inversions with, many years ago. It lay in the house for weeks before I eventually got around to installing it. Once installed, I began to notice how joyful and present people became when using it. This was a real 'eureka' moment for me. For years I had been trying - and failing - to get people to find the joy, pleasure and lightness in a Yoga practise. Suddenly, because of the swing's assistance, they were finding it. This is something that I’ve never forgotten. Since then, I would have to say, I have been in love with the swings. Or more precisely in love with what they can do for people. I believe they take people closer to an experience of the feeling of Yoga. It is a feeling characterised by pleasure, lightness, spontaneity, freedom of movement and presence. It is a great privilege, as a Yoga teacher, to be able to take people to that place. Initially, I had to teach myself as there was no training available at that time. Beginning with friends, moving onto small groups and then starting 'Aerial Yoga London' in 2011 - London's only dedicated Aerial Yoga studio. Within a couple of years I had given up most of my other Yoga work and by 2017 we were teaching up to fifteen classes a week of Aerial Yoga at the studio. In 2017, after 6 years of teaching classes and workshops in London, Agne and I decided to take a break and plan our next move. We moved to India for 9 months and in that time created an Aerial Yoga Teacher Training course that distils what we have learnt over teaching thousands of classes. We now feel ready to train others in how to safely, artfully and creatively use the swings to help people reach this joyful 'feeling of Yoga'.
Richard Holroyd