How to Use Your Shoulders to Move into Uttanasana
Try this yoga hack: In Uttanasana (forward bend), fix the hands onto the mat and attempt to drag them forward. This contracts the anterior deltoids and draws the upper body deeper into the yoga pose. If you can’t reach the floor,
How Your Breath Affects Your Nervous System
One little known fact about yogic breathing techniques concerns their profound effects on the autonomic nervous system. Extending or lengthening the exhalation is a powerful way to trigger the parasympathetic nervous system, the Rest and Digest part of our nervous system’s balancing program.
“Hip Openers” in Yoga? Let's Stop The Madness
Our knowledge of addressing, preserving, and attending to the hip joint has exploded during the past decade. Prior to this new age of research, the hip was relegated to a joint worthy of no more than a tendonitis, bursitis, or
Yoga for Every Body: Practicing with a Disability
Yoga is challenging. No doubt about it. It pushes us mentally and physically. It forces us to dig deep and find strength, and it forces us to accept who we are and where we are. On the flip side, when
Change Your Perspective of Pelvic Tilting: How the Transversus Abdominis Can Help
"Tuck your tailbone under" or "lengthen your tailbone" have long been among the most common alignment instructions in yoga. But lately, this instruction has taken a lot of flak, because the instruction can result in people flattening their lumbar curve, which,
Yoga Teaching: The Wisdom of Not Knowing
This morning a student asked me what should have been a simple question: What should I be feeling in this position? A minute or so later, I’d given her the best non-answer I could. Why a non-answer? First, I’m not
Tom Myers: Why Yogic Deep Breathing Matters More than You Think - The Many Important Functions of the Diaphragm
Most any yoga practitioner knows the importance of full, deep diaphragmatic breathing to enhance wellbeing and reduce stress. However, while the diaphragm plays a significant role in respiration, it has many other important functions that are often overlooked. As Tom Myers, author of Anatomy
Ayurvedic Tacos for Spring
An Ayurvedic diet takes into account the qualities of the season to optimize health benefits. A cool and damp spring is heavy, slows you down a bit, and can make you feel sad. Your digestion may be sluggish, your chest
JAMA: Mindfulness-based Therapies, Yoga, May Offer Alternative to Painkillers for Low Back Pain
If you struggle with chronic low back pain, here's some good news: Programs that combine yoga, meditation, and breathing exercises may be just as effective as painkillers in reducing the symptoms of chronic low back pain—and without the troubling side
Ahimsa at the Dinner Table
I had just returned from my evening power walk using my new fitness app to track and record the miles I covered and calories I burned. As I sat outside to cool down a bit, I scrolled through Facebook and
Rest in Center
Gravity and entropy are powerful processes in the natural world. Gravity draws things together, toward a center, while entropy scatters them into disorder. In much the same way, in our own lives, some things bring us to center, while others disturb and disperse
4 Types of Yoga Poses that Increase Axial Extension
Technically, the term “spinal extension” refers to the spine returning into the neutral position from flexion (1) and bending backwards (2) seen in the drawing on the left. But the term “extension” also means lengthening. So when we say “axial
The Fourth Limb of Yoga: Pranayama
The eight-limbed path of yoga was delineated by the Indian sage Patanjali approximately 2,000 years ago in the Yoga Sutras. Many see this as the definitive work of classical yoga philosophy. In Light On Yoga, B.K.S. Iyengar explains how each
Deepen Your Breath, Soothe Your Mind
From our first inhale to our last exhale, our breath is what sustains us, what gives us life. The process of breathing is unique in that it is one of few automatic bodily functions which we can consciously modify. If
Body Mindfulness - How to Reconnect with the Wholeness of Your Being
As a kid, I was really out of touch with my body. I hardly noticed it most of the time, and when I did, I prodded it like a mule to do a better job of hauling “me”—the head—around. This