One way to look at the asana practice is as a expression of your mind/consciousness/intelligence. Our words and actions reflect the state of our minds, so by choosing to express a particular asana with intelligence, purpose, whole-heartedness you are, in fact, also training your consciousness.

When I see people doing the physical practice of yoga I am seeing their consciousness in action. This isn’t a judgement for judgement sake. This is information being presented through a particular medium. The medium is a conveyor of information and as such I purposely don’t fixate on the medium. I look at the information that is being presented through the medium
that indicates a deeper truth: that the person is self-critical, or afraid, or noncommittal, or aloof, or whatever.

If you as a practitioner of yoga see this in the way you practice your asana, you can use this as a way to see what is going on underneath the approach that you have to your practice. That is when you can also choose what thought or attitude of mind you want to express through your practice. When you express a particular thought you won’t be able to have another one there at the same time.

This is also why it is good to learn asana before meditation, because in asana the physicality of the body is a more obvious medium. It has a range from gross to subtler and subtler movements and adjustments. But if you don’t deal with the mind stuff at that level, how can you be expected to deal with it in meditation.