The Magic of Sun Salutations, or what I learned on my summer vacation
I had three months off teaching this summer, mostly because I spent June in India, studying at the Iyengar yoga institute in Pune. Anyone who has studied at RIMYI knows that a month there doesn’t really qualify as a holiday. Not with a two-hour class and a three-hour practice six days a week, along with […]
Lean Into a Brick in Baddha Konasana: Five-Minute Yoga Challenge
Lately I’ve come to have a whole new appreciation for my shoulder blades, and in particular, for the thick part at the very top rim. In the past, I always imagined my shoulder blades to be light and fragile, part of a gossamer shoulder girdle meant to float on top of my ribcage. Now I […]
Shoulder stand preparation on a little plastic stool: Five-minute Yoga Challenge
caption= “So lovely. All it needs is an ‘I heart little plastic stools’ bumper sticker. It is unlikely that little plastic stools will ever take on the iconic status that’s afforded to chairs in Iyengar yoga. You need only look at Eyal Shifroni’s amazing new book, A Complete Guide to Iyengar Yoga Practice with a […]
Five-Minute Yoga Challenge: stretch your arms in a doorway
The most yogic use for a doorway, real or metaphorical, would surely be to come and go mindfully, knowing when you’re on one side, when you’re in the middle, and when you’ve passed through. But doorways also have yogic uses that are far more physical. You can, for instance, use a doorway to get a […]
Five-Minute Yoga Challenge: stretch your shoulders with an imaginary sticky mat
One of the conundrums we face as beginning yoga students is that we can’t know what the pose is supposed to feel like until we’re doing it. But if you start with the standard issue collapsed chest and tight shoulders of a 21st century desk worker, how can you even begin to know how large […]
Five-minute yoga challenge: roll your upper back on tennis balls
Place the tennis balls in the meaty part of your upper back, one of each side of your spine, close to your spine. As yoga props go, tennis balls are close to unbeatable: inexpensive, widely available, and supremely effective. True, you will never find an ancient Vedic seal with a yogi rolling on a tennis […]