Does Yoga Come Naturally For Children?

It’s been a wonderful journey watching my son grow and develop over these past 18 months.

So many of us take for granted how we’ve grown and evolved from children into our emotional and physical adult selves. As adults, how many times have we just resigned ourselves to being a certain way without thinking that we could initiate changes and enhance our inner and outer selves?

Have we ever thought how simple it could be to find balance through yoga?

For the past couple of evenings, I noticed that when I’d finished nursing my son, he rolled off into his toddler bed that is parked right up against my bed. I watched him as he lay on his back, breathing from his tummy, palms up, legs hip distance apart, and it occurred to me that his pose looked just like a perfect Shivasana. So I lifted his hands a few inches and let go – plop. Totally relaxed.

Then last night he rolled over into the perfect Child’s Pose – head turned to the side, both arms beside his body, palms up. Wow.

This morning as I was changing his diaper, he grabbed his feet and went into Playful Pose.

I think I get it now. I have an inkling of how and why some yoga poses were named. But what was awesome to me was that my son did both the Shivasana and Child’s Pose in his sleep. His body just naturally moved into those positions, and I found that incredibly beautiful.

My child is doing yoga without any prompting from me.

Like all of us, I’m always learning something new about yoga. And now I’m wondering whether part of the reason yoga is so incredible in helping an individual attain body and mind awareness is because yoga subconsciously reminds the body of its innately primal postures. Maybe that’s a question for the experts out there.

For me, as I’ve mentioned before, my son is my teacher in this lifetime.

[tags]baby yoga, baby as a yoga instructor, natural yoga pose[/tags]