Yoga's momentum is building. It's no longer about hippies getting high on yoga. Today, people everywhere are doing yoga: from young to old, athlete to couch potato, student to educator, and white-collar to blue-collar worker. They all are conditioning their bodies and quieting their minds -- and are reaping enormous benefits from what was originally, the ancient practice of yoga.

Nationwide, it's estimated that over 20 million people practice modern versions of yoga. Locally, evening adult education classes are offering several new yoga classes and yoga is popular at the gym.

Today's yoga goes far beyond what was originally taught by the orange-robed swamis from India. Yoga is in metamorphosis. From back yard to boardroom: corporations now offer yoga. Its popularity is benefiting from scientific scrutiny: the NIH recently funded research on yoga and back pain.

Today, there are many different styles of yoga to meet anyone's needs: from gentle and restorative where pain is to be avoided, to literally the hottest thing going.

One approach to yoga literally turns up the heat. In rooms approaching 100 degrees, you are told it increases flexibility and promotes an enhanced cardiovascular workout. 

Appropriate for younger people demanding extreme fitness, this and other forms of extreme yoga are appealing because they embrace "no pain no gain," and are extraordinarily demanding.

Conversely, extreme yoga is difficult and even dangerous if you're out-of-shape; or if you've been injured or chronically ill, or when you're older. Even if your body can adapt, these approaches may lack the calming, relaxing benefits that less vigorous yoga provides.

Within the different styles, there are instructors who teach pragmatically while others teach quasi-spiritual, quasi-athletic yoga with incense burning and quiet Eastern music playing in the background.

In most yoga classes today, the instructor demonstrates the exercises while students try to follow the best they can. These approaches are perfectly ok for anyone in reasonably good health, but students who are already in distress or those who have difficulty following will usually drop out.or worse yet; they may become injured.

If you are profoundly out-of-shape, injured, or chronically ill, just about any exercise system can be risky or even unattainable. Along with a select few of my colleagues nationwide, I teach both ExTension and Recovery Yoga, a system designed for everyone, but is especially beneficial for people who are recovering from acute injury or illness. Oddly enough, we use the very same techniques with outstanding results when training Top-rated athletes.

Our intention is to first enhance the parasympathetic nervous system. This allows your body to profoundly relax, so that when you first begin the exercises, you are able to intelligently and safely build, step-by-step, appropriate foundations without injuring yourself.

This allows you to ultimately build substantial strength, flexibility, and endurance without forcing or trying. In fact, this approach is so totally counter-intuitive to everything you've learned before, it's initially difficult to grasp, especially in light of its rapid results. In part, that's what makes this particular approach to yoga so fascinating.

The above article was written by Sam Dworkis. This article and others can be seen on his webiste at www.extensionyoga.com