Roll It Out: 5 Ways to Incorporate Foam Rolling into a Regular Yoga Practice
While yoga practice usually promotes stretching tight muscles and increasing flexibility, an often-overlooked benefit is a myofascial release that can happen during your yoga practice. “Myo” refers to muscles. Fascia is what wraps and connects the muscles, organs, bones, nerves
Your Fascinating Fascia: How Stress Creates Chronic Contraction and How Yin Yoga Can Help
One of the key aspects of the stress response is muscular contraction. We need these muscular contractions to get us away from a real or perceived threat. However, when overused it can become a serious health risk leading to chronic
The Yoga of Embodied Presence: Coming Home to the Body in a Stressed-Out World
As I wrap my attention around the breath moving in and moving out, I’m here right now. So simple to feel my abdomen rise on the inhalation and descend on the exhalation. So fresh to sense the coolness of in-breath
Yoga Teaching Methodology: Making Props Palatable
While yoga teachers know that using a prop during asana can enhance practice by bringing the floor closer, alleviating the load on an unstable or unready joint, or creating a healthier position for the spine, getting their students to buy
Words Matter: How to Take the Stigma Out of Yoga Modifications
As a yoga teacher and an introductory linguist, I’ve grown to appreciate the language of yoga. I’ve realized how important it is to explain our yoga jargon. Often some of the things we say can be abstract. Sometimes we reiterate
New Year, New Start: 8 Steps to Creating Postive New Habits
It’s a new year, and many of us are looking to make positive changes in our lives. The best way to do that is not by making resolutions, but by creating habits that will stick for the long term. If
Trikonasana, Part 1: How to Co-Activate Your Psoas and Quads in Trikonasana
Sometimes doing just one pose can set you up for the whole day. Let’s look at Trikonasana (Triangle Pose) and a powerful cue for stabilizing your pelvis and lumbar. Understanding tips like this one also sharpens your knowledge of anatomical
Rolling Right: How to Re-Enter after Savasana
Physical therapists and yoga teachers alike tell us that rolling to your side before sitting up from a supine position is healthier for your back. But why do so many yoga teachers suggest rolling onto our right sides specifically? And
Embodiment Is the New Xanax: 4 Reasons to Tune in Instead of Zoning Out
Everyone knows it’s important to get some downtime. But if your primary relaxation strategy is Netflix and/or alcohol, you may need an upgrade. Here are four reasons why kicking back with a bottle to binge watch “Parks and Recreation” is
How to Fall in Love with Your Yoga Practice
I’ve played music most of my life. As a member of the Salt Lake Symphony, I practice most days. I practice so that my embouchure (the way I engage my facial muscles in order to get a sound out of
Yoga Strap Magic: Use a Long Strap to Put Your Shoulders in Place
Typing, driving, cooking, gardening: almost everything we do encourages us to slide our shoulder blades up our backs and roll them forward. Over time, that can lead to stiff shoulders, sore upper backs, and neck pain. You can reverse this
Neuroplasticity: How Meditation Changes Your Brain
Neuroplasticity is the word for the brain’s capacity to rewire itself through experience and learning. Our brains are “plastic.” That is, it can easily be molded through external stimuli. The brain actively grows and rewires itself in response to stimulation
Yoga Visualizations: How Our Brains Visualize and How to Create Safe Space for Students
Our brains store huge amounts of information that need to be kept organized and ready so that we can pull it up quickly. The brain keeps this information organized in categories, similar to how you keep your computer files in
Tias Little on Tuning In To The Subtle Sensation of Flow in Yoga
The word "flow" is often used in the context of yoga practices–primarily asana–in which each posture or asana melds seamlessly into the next to formulate a movement sequence. But applied in an energetic context, the word can take on a
The Nap Meditation (How to Protect Your Happy Place Part 2)
Welcome to Part II of the Protect Your Happy Place series! No worries if you missed Part I, here it is: Protect Your Happy Place: Where Stress is Positive & Your Core is Strong. Now that you are all caught up