Hard & Soft Yoga

Hard & Soft Yoga

 

Today I visited and participated in a Satyananda style class led by the director of Yoga Directions in Taree, Peppa.  The dreads-coifed Peppa is something of a local household word – that is, if the conversations in your home run to yoga.
The 15 or so attendees in this morning’s session were all females, ranging in age from upper 20’s to upper 60’s. […]

Yoga for the Choir (and Everyone Else)

Yoga for the Choir (and Everyone Else)

Thursday night I attend my community choir. It makes me happy to go along and sing with a whole group of people who enjoy joining together in harmonies.
The dedicated choir director, Telly, lets me lead some yoga stretches at the beginning of the 1.5 hr. session, so the group follows along as I demonstrate and instruct.
I think about what will prepare us best for singing, so we do stretches that open up the lungs, loosen the rib cage and release tension from shoulders. […]

Yoga to Help Tolerate the Temperature

Yoga to Help Tolerate the Temperature

Oh my, it’s been hot here! This extreme humidity feels like it stacks on tons of degrees to the temperature.
I tell the yoga students who venture out on sultry days that they get extra yoga merit points in heaven for attending class when our brains are feeling like they’re simmering in their juices.
Here’s 5 Tips on What to Teach…when it’s 30 plus and 90% humidity.
1. Chest openers of any passive variety – You can’t go wrong with something that promotes breathing when the lungs are approaching pneumatic apathy, block pose, for instance:

2. […]

Yoga for the Choir (and Everyone Else)

Sequences for "Intensive" Week: Day 2

The word inversions when applied to yoga asanas strikes fear into many a heart. Formerly polite and obedient students will openly rebel against doing them. Previously undisclosed injuries and anatomical asymmetries will be used as excuses for not participating. And, women who stopped menstruating years ago will claim having their period as reason for abstaining.

Between Two Breaths

Between Two Breaths

I’m a late bloomer when it comes to doing yoga breathing exercises (pranayama) and meditation. If you are a person who likes to be active, both mentally and physically, if might take you awhile – perhaps lifetimes – to settle down enough to savour the sweetness of these practices.
Until till then, you’ll be like an untrained puppy, bucking the leash. Probably more like me till more recently.
This morning, at the end of my physical yoga practice, in a lying down position, I played with lengthening my inhalations and exhalations. […]

Biorhythms

Biorhythms

On a list of things that are good for recovery from jet lag, I reckon digging in your garden rates pretty high.
What doesn’t work well, I believe, is looking at a screen for hours on end, be it iPhone, iPad or Mac. Also leave out any inordinate amount of thinking, shopping or consumption of alcohol, even in what you deem modest amounts.
Walking on the beach is pretty good, especially smelling sea spray and hearing the ocean pounding. Sunshine in limited exposure will help reset your clock. […]

Yoga for the Choir (and Everyone Else)

Vital Energy

After the busiest day yesterday that I’ve experienced in a while: yoga practice (good girl), gardening, house cleaning, baked a cake, attended book club, and then a four drive to Sydney – today’s yoga class with John Norris was a dream.
Basically, we alternated doing pranayama with “flopasanas” over bolsters and blankets for chest opening over 1.5hours.
At the end of the session, I felt like a cool, clear, and calm pool of vital energy had collected around my heart.
I’ve been practicing pranayama in much smaller doses than what I did today, at the end of my asana practice […]

Inside Job (2)

Inside Job (2)

Incense and oriental bells are time-honoured instruments to nudge us back into the present if our minds have gone elsewhere. Meditators know that if they don’t have a strong focus they will drift, probably often.
An even more powerful device for making us aware in the moment is our breath. In the practice of pranayama, we can listen to our breath, identify such nuances as tone, pace, and depth, and even locate it in various areas of our bodies. […]