A single yoga class can leave you feeling energized, stronger, and calmer, all in one go. “After practicing yoga, many of us notice that our minds feel clearer and calmer, and there seems to be a little bit more energy available to us,” says Baxter Bell, MD, a yoga instructor based in the San Francisco Bay Area, who has an individual yoga therapist certification from the International Association of Yoga Therapists (C-IAYT) and is an experienced registered yoga teacher with a 500-hours-of-teacher-training credential from the Yoga Alliance (eRYT 500).

 

“It can be a wonderful tool for managing the stress in our lives,” he says. But, depending on the type of yoga you practice and how often, experts say you can overdo it.

 

There are many types of yoga, from the physically demanding “power” classes to yoga nidra — which is about as close as you can get to taking a nap while practicing yoga (it’s sometimes described as “yogic sleep”). If you’re in good health, it’s probably safe for you to do a moderate amount of yoga every day, especially if you do a variety of different styles, says Dr. Bell.

 

But because most styles of yoga involve a physical component, you can definitely overdo it when it comes to the demands you’re putting on your body physically if you’re doing a practice that is too advanced for you or one that’s too intense (without adequate rest), he says. “It’s about balance — if we do too much, we can run into problems such as injuries, and if we do too little, we may not get the benefits we’re looking for,” says Bell.

 

So, how exactly can you overdo it when it comes to yoga? And how do you know when you are pushing your yoga practice too hard?

 

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