Reclining Hero Pose in Prenatal Yoga

This is a pose for all my prenatal yoga students.  It is called reclining hero pose and it has been shown to be effective in easing symptoms of morning sickness, constipation, and heartburn (all those fun side effects of pregnancy). I usually incorporate this pose into our class by using our bolsters but if you cant come to class and don’t have bolsters it works with a few pillows as well.

To accomplish this pose, start by kneeling with your knees hip distance apart. I usually tell my students to have their feet just at the edge of their bolster (pillow) or just slightly straddling it.  Next lower your bum to the ground and recline backwards until you are resting on your bolster. Let your hands fall out to the side or up overhead. Relax in this pose for 1-3 minutes. When you come out of this pose make sure to come to the side and use your arms to sit up (don’t put any stress on the belly). Counteract this pose by coming and resting in child’s pose afterwards.

For more tips and poses that help alleviate pregnancy side effects come to my Monday night prenatal yoga classes!

-Namaste

www.gobodhiyoga.com

Yoga: A Pathway to Emotional Honesty

Yoga is more than mere exercise. In fact, I would say that yoga can be a pathway to discovering and freeing different emotions within yourself. There have been several times during my personal practice where I have become overwhelmed with emotion. This is not uncommon. Yoga is a cleansing practice. These emotions that are brought to the surface during your practice do so because you are ready to face these feelings. You are ready and strong enough to see and feel these feelings without unneeded blocks or mind/body distractions.

Emotions can be suppressed in our bodies for several reasons:

* Because at the time when they were originally experienced it was not "safe" to feel or express those emotions 

* Because they were taken out of context and the maturity and or ability to understand them was lacking

* Because there was some sort of overwhelm to the system at the time that they would have originally been experienced 

Suppressing emotion can lead to many different outcomes. It can manifest itself in mental distress such as depression or post-traumatic stress, or physical distress such as disease, including fibromyalgia and other chronic health problems.  It also can manifest itself in a wide range of addictions as a form of self-soothing or distraction over cover-up. Finally, it can manifest itself in a form of "zoning-out" also known as dissociation. This can be as small as a momentary daydream and as severe as becoming completely dissociated with reality (DID-Dissociative Identity Disorder).

Emotions, generally, are made to be experienced and felt. Sometimes in our culture, we are taught that it is not always appropriate to express how we feel. Sometimes we are unsure of what is deemed appropriate expression and "guidelines" for such are sometimes contradicting. For example, as young children we are told, "not to cry" and that "you are ok" when something is wrong. Instead of letting children experience that emotion, we are asking them to mask it.

Yoga can be a very therapeutic outlet in expressing these emotions. During yoga, the emotions that are behind held in the body begin to move. As we begin to move and feel more comfortable in our body, we are more able to feel, say, and do what we honestly feel.

I personally have felt this with my own practice. My decision to get certified as a yoga instructor came shortly after the unexpected death of my dad. Needless to say, I had a lot of emotion, both being expressed and withheld. There were several times during savasana that I found myself in tears or otherwise overwhelmed because of the intense feelings that were surfacing and that I was allowing myself to feel. I know that my yoga practice has been a catalyst in helping me cope and adjust to my fathers passing. It has been a huge blessing in my life and a way for me to live as honestly as I can. It is for this reason that I am so excited to be able to teach others as they embark on their yoga experience and journey and help them be able to express themselves through the movement of yoga.

-Namaste

www.gobodhiyoga.com

Just Breathe

This week in my classes I wanted to really break down and focus on the breathing techniques that we use during yoga. All too often I find my students retaining their breath, and as a result not getting as much out of their practice as they could. Breath is the foundation behind every movement, every extension, and every asana (pose). Essentially breath is the foundation of yoga. As I was taught, "The breath holds both the basis and the potential for your practice in the melody of movement through each inhale and exhale."

UJJAYII BREATH:

The main breath that we use during our yoga practice is called the Ujjayii breath. Ujjayii is a Sanskrit word that means victorious. It is a warming breath  that retains heat in your body during your practice.  This retention is what helps to deepen into your poses and facilitates movement. It is the key to any vinyasa practice.

HOW TO:

When teaching the Ujjayii breath I first tell my students to hold their hand in front of them and pretend they are trying to fog up a mirror. I draw their attention to the heat that they can feel on their hand. This is the foundation of the breath. In yoga, that heat is retained in the body. With this breath you inhale through the nose, with a slight throat restriction (like fogging a mirror) and exhale through the nose doing the same thing. To accomplish this I then tell my students to relax the jaw and rest the tip of their tongue gently on their upper palate just behind their front teeth. The lips then gently close and you turn the corners of your mouth up slightly. The noise made during this breath is similar to the sound of a wave.

This breath is not only beneficial during yoga, but has been found to lower blood pressure, reduce stress and anxiety, and alleviate symptoms related to asthma, depression, insomnia, chronic fatigue, and fibromyalgia. Also this breath is pivotal in prenatal yoga seeing as this breath can help during labor and birth.

So now that you have a better understanding of the breath behind yoga, you can take your practice to the next level!

Namaste

www.gobodiyoga.com

Benefits of Prenatal Yoga

This past week I started teaching a prenatal yoga class in addition to the other classes that I teach. It was  a beautiful experience. There isn't anything quite like prenatal yoga. It not only is a great exercise to help pregnant women get more prepared physically and mentally for the birth of their child, but it also helps them to bond with their unborn baby.  It is so amazing to watch and facilitate women as they go through this bonding.

For anyone who is interested in starting a prenatal yoga routine here are a few (of many) benefits of doing yoga while pregnant.

•  Helps improve sleep
•  Reduces stress and anxiety
•  Increases the strength, flexibility and endurance of the muscles needed for childbirth
•  Decreases lower back pain, nausea, carpal tunnel syndrome, headaches, shortness of breath, and other common complaints of pregnancy
•  Decreases the risk of pre-term labor, pregnancy-induced hypertension and intrauterine growth    restriction-- a condition that slows a baby's growth
•  Balances hormones
•  Increases self-esteem and helps relax body and mind
•  Increases circulation for both mother and baby
•  Encourages bonding with unborn child

Now before you go and jump right into yoga, make sure that you find an instructor that has been trained specifically in prenatal yoga. There are several poses that should be avoided during pregnancy such as inversions, backbends and many twists unless they are supported or otherwise modified. Prenatal yoga is recommended three times weekly during pregnancy. Also, typically practice is suspended during weeks 8-12 of pregnancy because, in general pregnancy statistics, most miscarriages occur during this time frame.

For information as to when my prenatal classes (as well as other yoga classes) will be taught, see the following link: http://www.facebook.com/groups/100826750095616/

www.gobodhiyoga.com

Why Fall and Yoga Go Hand-In-Hand

I LOVE FALL! It is by far my favorite season! Boots, changing leaves, pumpkin cookies...and YOGA! Now while yoga might not be something you typically associate with fall, I'm here to tell you why you should.

First of all, I have learned that it is very important to follow the seasons. For most of us, summer is very active (get-it-all-in mentality). Fall on the other hand tends to slow down, some of us go back to school, and we tend to get into more of a routine. It is a reflective time of year. For me, it used to be very difficult to say goodbye to summer, and as a result I would drag on that summer mentality all the way through fall. I would skip over the slower, reflective part of fall and before I knew it....BAM, it was the holidays, and life was hectic again. I suffered from this because my life felt like a constant GO-GO-GO. I never had a time to relax. I tell you this because I feel like it is very important to honor each season and recognize what each time of year has to offer us. If we don't, we may feel out of balance, get sick, or just feel overwhelmed like I did.

So lets talk about fall for a minute. Fall is all about change. It's energy is shifting; ryping. There is a shift in weather. The leaves start to change colors, the days get shorter, and the temperature drops. The message of autumn is learning to trust this shift. We also need to take this time to reflect on aspects of our life that need changing. If we honor fall, we find that it is a great time for a clense, a shedding of bad habbits, and setting new goals. This is where yoga fits in. There is not a more perfect time to start a yoga practice or to improve the one you already have. Yoga and meditation is one of the best ways that I can think of to honor this wonderful time of year.

So if any of you have wanted to try out yoga, or just want to improve your practice there is no better time! Do it now! Dont know where to start? I can help. Ill be trying to set up classes within the next few weeks. Stay tuned for dates and times! Until then, go outside, enjoy the beatuiful fall weather, and get that yoga mat out of the closet!!

namaste

www.gobodhiyoga.com

9 Surprising Benefits of Yoga Practice

So lately, a lot of people have been asking me "why yoga?" Why have I decided to dedicate so much time to one thing and what are the benifits. Well the answer that I give everyone is that the benefits are numerous. There are many reasons for why I chose to get certified, but there are also many benifit to practicing yoga. In this post I will summerize a few of the unexpected benefits that you will get from a regular yoga practice.

Benifits:

1. Healthy skin! Yoga can help you achieve a healthy glow helping your body detox through sweating, balancing hormones, and boosting the flow of oxygen-rich blood to the skin. Also yoga movements help the body produce collagen which is essential to the formation of hair, skin and nails. So why spend hundreds of dollars on creams or supplements when yoga will do it for free?

2. Helps supply oxygen to the blood and as a result, oxygen to all parts of the body. Why is this important you ask? Well, here is a quick anatomy lesson. When we breath, oxygen is carried to all the tisues in the body via red blood cells. Without oxygen we go into an anaerobic state. According to some theories, when oxygen doesnt reach the tissues, the tissues go into a unhealthy state in which they survive on fermentation rather than oxygenation. It is believed that cancer thrives in these oxygen deficient conditions. In other words, without oxygen, cells will weaken, die, or may mutate into something that can survive without the normal flow of oxygen, like cancer.

3. A better functioning digestive system.  Yoga practice can help to oxygenate, tone and clear the digestive system. It is a natural cleanse to the GI tract and a healthy way to stimulate a balanced eliminative practice.

4.  Balances hormones. We all have them and we all blame our worst moments on them.... Yoga can help balance the hypothalamus, pitutatry gland, thyroid and also the adrenal glands. How important is this you ask? VERY IMPROTANT. These glands influence almost every cell, organ, and function in our body.  They are crucial in regulating mood, metabolism, sexual and reporductive function, tissue function, our flight or fight response, and sleep patterns. Basically everything you would want functioning well.

5. Helps you handle stress. Yoga helps to balance the sympathetic and parashympathetic nervious systems and heightens awareness and relaxation of the mind.  In other words, it will help increase your brains ability to focus better when in stressful situations.

6. Improves mental functionin and abilty. A balanced practice can help increase concentration, focus and awareness. Regular posture repitition helps to connect the right and left hemisphers of the brain which in turn enhances brain coordination, its ability to conceptualize, and opens the channels of awareness. This repitition can even "re-wire" the brains thought patterns and can take positive experiences and patterns and hardwire them into your daily living.

7. Mindful eating. Studies show that those who practice yoga regularly are genearlly more aware of the food they are putting into their bodies. They also tend to eat healthier and eat right size portions.

8. Confidence. Yoga is beautiful and and as you practice it you will begin to feel that beauty within yourself. With determination and persistance, the balance that yoga brings helps you realize that you can do anything you put your mind to.

9. FINALLY, it can give you a KILLER body! Yoga can be a great cardio workout while toning all the muscles of the body at the same time. It can help you build muscle and lose weight! Everybody's dream right?

So now you have my answer to why yoga, and in return I ask you why not yoga?

Namaste

www.gobodhiyoga.com

Sleep Better With Yoga!

So I learned an interesting little trick yesterday involving yoga! In our training session yesterday we talked about a specific pose that, if performed before you go to sleep, can actually put you into your REM cycle two hours earlier than your body normally would. What this means is you will have more time to be in that deep stage of sleep throughout the night, resulting in a better nights rest. Who wouldn't want that?

So here is the low down: The pose is called Vparita Karani and this is what it looks like...doesn't that just look relaxing!?

 It has several health benefits in addition to helping you get a better nights sleep. It can improve concentration, spinal alignment, and digestion, as well as strengthens your abdominal organs, lungs, and your core muscles.

To perform this pose you will want a round bolster or pillow for your lower back. your legs and bottom should be right up against the wall and your arms should open comfortably out to your sides.  You may experience a tingling feeling in your legs but it shouldn't be uncomfortable. For modifications you can drop your legs wide or even bring your knees out and feet in together.

For the best results, practice RIGHT before bed, holding the pose for 15 minutes. Make sure you get into bed right away after! if you stand up and stay vertical for too long after performing this pose, it will give you a burst of energy, making it difficult to fall asleep. In other words, make sure you have brushed your teeth before doing this pose!

Being a wife and mother of an 8 month old, I could DEFINITELY use a better nights rest. So seeing as it is 11 pm, im going to go get myVparita Karani on and hit the sack.

Namaste

http://www.gobodhiyoga.com