Burn Outs

The levels of stress running around my house right now are insane. Yoga and meditation are helpful and lovely and I will cling to them until my dying day, but they're not magic. The stressful situations are still there - we can simply handle them a little better because of the whole yoga thing.

Between the unemployment and the emergency room visits and the hospital paperwork I keep messing up and the snow... oh the snow... I'm so sick of the cold. Between all that - yoga is my connection to sanity. It's our little bit of absolute reliability every day. Every morning, without fail, we get up and do sun salutations then some inversions - followed by a long cozy meditation. Then we cuddle - but that's just our weird little sappy married people thing. Our full practice may or may not come later, but that morning practice is always there.

This country is all about pushing people to their limits... pushing them until they burn out and then laughing at them for burning out and pushing them some more. We've been thinking and talking about that a lot. Some people just handle being pushed better than others. Some people are worriers. To those people when you say "stop stressing", they can only ask "HOW?!?". Yoga is one good answer, but many don't see how yoga is supposed to help. They may even stop because they don't see the change right away.

John Friend (founder of Anusara yoga) has often said that the 1 or 2 hours a day of asana practice is literally practice for how you deal with the other 22 - 23 hours a day. Practice isn't like stamping yourself new and improved - it doesn't just happen immediately. Just like practicing anything else - handling things with more equanimity comes in tiny bits. Eventually those bits add up into a fully transformed life, but at first it's a slow build-up.

Other tips for lowering stress:
Eat the healthiest food you can afford (fruits and veggies mostly)
Exercise
Spend time in nature
Specifically, try the beach where the air ionization is perfect for lifting moods.
Spend time with people you love and laugh as much as possible.

Yoga Wrist Care Guide

Yoga practice can be rough on your body, but certain joints especially. Lots of newbie and advanced students complain of wrist pain. Sometimes it's purely from weakness, sometimes it's from injury, and sometimes it's from poor alignment.

I came across this great article via Yoganonymous:

Floating, Flying and Balancing: A Guide To Yoga Wrist Care and Proper Alignment by Angela Kukhahn

Whether you spend all your time in handstands, various arm balances, or the most vigorous thing you do is downward dog - go check out Angela's article for important points on wrist care for yogis.

Is Bikram Yoga a Cult? (Video)

Of course it's not, but I saw this video and found it amusing.  Not for Kids. You've been warned.



Readers via Email - Click here for the video.

All Things Are Connected

"This we know: All things are connected like the blood that unites us. We did not weave the web of life, we are merely a strand in it. Whatever we do to the web, we do to ourselves." - Chief Seattle

Easter Cupcakes

Yoga for Heart Health - Emergency Room Edition

As a yoga fanatic, I tend to prescribe yoga for everything. It's just what I do. Turns out, the rest of the world is starting to catch up with me on that one. Especially for heart health.

Late last week Adam started having heart palpitations - a lot. Eventually we ended up in the emergency room and long story short he has a lot of abnormal heart rhythms and we have to wait and see if it continues to worsen or not. Not a whole lot of help, but in our research and in our take home pamphlet we're finding a lot of lifestyle tips. Mostly things like don't smoke, don't drink, don't do drugs, quit caffeine, eat your vegetables, and avoid cough/cold medicine (which apparently can cause heart arrhythmias). We also know that getting more cardio exercise is important, and everywhere we look people suggest yoga and meditation (primarily for stress relief).

Luckily, Adam already does yoga and meditates every morning, but he hasn't been doing it regularly, long enough to have a big impact on his health and stress levels. While doing yoga and meditating has an immediate effect - it takes about 6 weeks to have a greater overall health impact.

So do yoga and meditate every day - not just because I said so, but because it's doctor recommended and good for your heart.

Recycled Post - Supporting the Source

Happy Earth Day!! Earth day is a great time to start recycling (Reducing, Reusing, Recycling, and Repairing actually) and in support of that grand theme - I'm having a recycled post. Last year I wrote about "Supporting the Source", and it's just as relevant this year, so check it out >>>>> Here. <<<<<

It's the EARTH - kind of

Touch Your Toes - Eventually

As a yoga teacher I've gotten a lot of good juicy body-oriented questions. They come from students, from friends, even from random people that have seen my classes from another room. I figure that means I look like I know what I'm talking about. Yay me.

One question that comes up often, in many variations, is:

"How long will it be until I can touch my toes?"

Let me set some things straight about toe-touching. One guy I spoke to said he thought it was "pathetic" that he couldn't touch his toes. Most people that don't specifically work on it - can't touch their toes. You're not pathetic! Ask all your friends and family if they can stand with straight legs and bend over at the hips and touch their toes - you'll likely find that few can. Especially in our current society where people sit in chairs, sit in cars, sit at desks and generally do everything they can to tighten all the muscles that affect toe-touching.

I've heard a story about a student asking his Guru this popular question.  What did his Guru tell him?
Stack up a bunch of telephone books or bibles or something. Books with VERY thin pages. Stack them to a height you can bend over and reach today. Keep practicing your forward bends every day. Each day tear off the top page of the stack. How many pages away are you? That's how long will it take.

Luckily, I like to remind my students that it will probably not take anywhere near that long. If you're new to yoga and you listen to the tips and you do the work on a regular basis then you will see results. You will see results quickly.

• Tip 1: If you don't want to stack books - you can place a couple blocks down to lift the floor to a more appropriate level.


• Tip 2: Feet together is limiting, so if you're struggling with your forward bends (or even if you're not) then keeping your feet hip distance apart can be mucho mucho helpful.

Now you might ask: If it doesn't actually take that long - then what's with the story?
The point of the story is all about patience. One page a day - that's the kind of patience forward bends require. It's the kind of patience they teach. You may be able to remove a whole book from your stack today, but don't think less of yourself if that one page is all that happens right now. You'll get there in time, and all you can do is breathe and learn to enjoy the practice.

If you're reading this post there's a good chance you want to read these too:
Standing Forward Bends for Unflexible Bodies
Seated Forward Bends for People That Don't Bend That Way
So Your Forward Bends Suck