Chair Yoga: The Best Way to Manage Stress at Work

There isn’t just “one” type of yoga, but “many.” Today, everyone is talking about yoga; studios are popping up on every street corner around the world; brands selling yoga gear and clothing are springing up like wildflowers; and every day, a growing number of new instructors are being trained.

More than 60 million people practice yoga worldwide—the equivalent of France’s entire population!—and France had more than 2.6 million practitioners in 2019. People call it a fad, or even a tidal wave… But this “fad” has actually been around for two thousand five hundred years! Originating in India and sharing common cultural roots with the major Eastern “Zen” traditions, yoga is a philosophy, a physical, intellectual, and spiritual practice.

Nevertheless, the yoga we refer to in the West today refers almost exclusively to the physical practice—the postures, or asanas. There are countless styles of yoga, some more esoteric, some more meditative, and some more physical than others. They are often named after their founders (Iyengar or Bikram) or the schools from which they originated, which were established in the early 20th century (ashtanga, kundalini) or, in some cases, much more recently (power yoga, strala yoga, jivamukti…).

Keep in mind that all “physical” yoga classes are derived from hatha yoga. So what do all these styles of yoga have in common, and what sets them apart from a sport, a gym class, a core workout, or Pilates? Yoga is based on coordinating movement with breathing, and focusing your attention on that movement and that breath. No acrobatics needed! If you simply raise your arms while inhaling as you stretch, and lower your arms while exhaling, focusing all your attention on that movement and your breath, that’s yoga.

On the other hand, if you try to do a very complicated pose without breathing and with your mind elsewhere, you’re no closer to doing yoga than I am to rowing. Another difference from sports in the broader sense: yoga isn’t a competition. No challenges, no performance metrics. Everyone comes to their mat with their own body, their own potential, and their own limits, and does their best without ever comparing themselves to their neighbor.

Yoga adapts to every body type, every age, every injury, and even disabilities. I can’t bend my right leg, but that’s never stopped me from practicing! It’s not you who adapts to yoga—it’s yoga that adapts to you.

There’s a lot of talk about stress. To me, it’s the biggest epidemic of this century, the number one enemy we need to defeat. It’s become a buzzword used to describe a general sense of unease. But do we really know what we’re talking about? To put it simply, stress isn’t a bad thing in and of itself. It can even motivate you and push you to accomplish great things! The danger lies in chronic stress—the kind that never subsides, that builds up pressure and tension without allowing it to ease off enough.

When we were hunter-gatherers thousands of years ago, stress was a very useful warning system. At the slightest warning—for example, when a wild animal approached that wanted to gnaw on your calf—the sympathetic nervous system would activate, and energy would concentrate in the legs, temporarily at the expense of the digestive system or other less “vital” functions, which were then put on hold to allow for flight. (This explains why you have digestive issues or a knot in your stomach when you’re stressed, and why you get sick more easily, since stress suppresses the immune system.)

Once the danger had passed, the parasympathetic nervous system kicked in to restore the body to normal function, slow the heart rate, and redirect energy to the digestive system and the brain… Our ancestors would return to their camp to rest after hunting mammoths for a month. Look at antelopes, too: once the lion has moved on and the danger has passed, they go back to grazing peacefully.

This is the relaxation response—the process of returning to a state of relaxation after a spike in stress, thanks to the activation of the parasympathetic nervous system. It acts as a shield that prevents stress from becoming chronic and manifesting as physical symptoms. Today, the threat of the lion has been replaced by a multitude of challenges: emergencies, public speaking, time management issues, mental overload, all kinds of hassles, and simply everyday life!

We react to stress at work or a traffic jam as if our lives were on the line, triggering the same chemical reactions in our bodies as when our lives were actually in danger. Our sympathetic nervous system is constantly on high alert, and our bodies sometimes overheat. Without breaks or real time to relax and disconnect (no, watching TV isn’t true deep relaxation), we no longer know how to activate our parasympathetic nervous system.

The result: insomnia, stomachaches, migraines, back pain, and various factors that can increase the risk of diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and more… Not to mention that stress is one of the leading causes of weight gain.

Breathing is a direct, natural, and immediate way to influence our parasympathetic nervous system and prevent us from becoming overwhelmed. You’ve likely already noticed this connection between breathing and stress: when you’re anxious, your breathing speeds up and your heart rate increases; when you’re relaxed, your pulse is calm and your breathing is steady. Over the long term, you’ll also find that breathing helps control the mind, which in turn affects the body.

In everyday life, breathing is therefore your best antidote to stress. But deep breathing is a skill you can learn! And breathing in coordination with movement is often much easier: that’s what I offer in this book—breathing exercises on their own for a variety of situations, as well as exercises where you’ll coordinate your breath with movement for a combined physical and stress-relieving effect.

Yogist – Well at Work helps you manage workplace stress
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