Progress: More Poses vs. Quality Poses?

One of the Beginning Senior students, +Peter, asked me if we should do more repetitions of a pose to progress. Good question, Peter! Doing more repetitions of an exercise makes sense in many types of exercise routines, when we are doing resistance or strength training, aerobic workouts, or distance/time increases for cardio work (more is better).  However, for yoga, the number of repetitions of a yoga pose we do is not as important as the improvement in the quality of a pose.

Consider a distance runner. He overdevelops the muscles needed to run a lot in a straight line, while underusing the upper body and the proximal muscles (such as the sides of the legs & hips), thereby leaving his body in a state of imbalance.  Yoga is about achieving balance, strength, and flexibility.

The number of times one does a pose can be a factor in the depth we can go into a pose.  Most of the time I teach a pose:

• First to accustom the student's body to the pose.  
• The second time is to allow the student's awareness to become part of the pose, facilitating the depth and attention we give to the pose.  
• The third time we do a pose allows us to fully be aware of what we are doing in the entire body, to be able to work with where the body is by allowing it to surrender into the pose (pratyahara) a bit deeper.  

After three times, I usually move on to a different pose unless I'm teaching specific alignment techniques, or building confidence levels such as in salamba sirsasana (headstand). Initially in headstand, there is often a fear factor in the student. The fear can be overcome by repeatedly working on going up into the pose, increasing the confidence level through repetition.

Salamba Sirsasana (Headstand)

In practice I will often do a sequence of going into a certain pose over and over, tweaking this and changing that, making minor adjustments and exploring just what else my body will do as I work, move, and adjust into the pose.  A pose should not be a static arrangement of body parts.  The goal is not to get into a certain perfect shape.  The idea is to be fluid, open, and fully aware, adjusting with the waves of the breath.  We have an idea what the pose will look like, but the going into and coming out of it are as important as being in the pose itself. This is more about the inherent quality of the practice.