What’s the most exotic place you’ve ever struck a pose? Tell me and you could win
Okay, fireworks would be overkill. But massage balls? Nice.Have you ever let a benchmark slip by unnoticed? If so, I think you’ll know how I feel. Some time late in August, I noticed that we were bearing down on a thousand sales of the My Five Minute Yoga Practice iPhone app. I was excited. One […]
Savasana: a new use for an eye bag
(Need more sleeping cat pictures?) Relaxation pose is the name we give Savasana (shah-VAH-sah-nah) in English. In Sanskrit, it means corpse – a pose that mimics death. But if you have a rounded upper back you can easily become one of the undead: not quite able to settle without something to prop up your head. […]
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 […]
Prop up in half-moon and learn to fly
The first time I lifted off in half-moon I was in a setup just like the one in the picture below, but without the belt. At that moment, after months of mid-room struggle, I finally understood why yogis so often count this demanding balance pose among their favorites. Between the wall at my foot and the […]
Five-minute yoga challenge: strap up and rotate your thighs in triangle pose
For the last few weeks I’ve been strap-happy – deeply in love with the simplest and most economical of yoga props. In every practice I do at least one pose, and often more, with a strap wrapped around one upper thigh. On strap extravaganza days, I wrap both thighs. Why? Getting a good strong rotation […]
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 […]