Three HUGE Benefits of Standing Yoga Postures

Standing yoga postures are some of the most often practiced yoga postures across many styles and traditions of yoga. But have you ever taken a moment to step back and wonder WHY these postures show up so much? I honestly hadn’t until recently, but when I did I realized they really offer us some amazing benefits when we give them the attention and focus they deserve. Here are three HUGE benefits of these yoga poses and some ideas that might help you bring them into better focus and appreciation the next time you get on your mat.

Standing Yoga Postures Stretch and Strengthen Large Important Muscle Groups - Whenever you’re working in standing yoga poses you are either stretching or strengthening some of the largest and most important muscle groups in your body. These include all the gluteal muscles (did you know that there are three of them per side?), the hamstrings (there are three of them too!), the quadriceps (bet you know how many of those there are! 😉) and the calf muscles, along with some other smaller muscles that are in the same general neighborhood. Depending on the posture you’re doing, you may be flexing or extending key joints in the legs like your ankles, knees and hips helping them to move through their full ranges of motion.

Why is that important? If you’ve ever had the experience of being unable to walk without assistance you know why. The full functioning of our legs in our life is an essential key to a life well lived and part of what makes us fundamentally human. Think about how many things, both simple (getting to the bathroom) and more complex (getting around the grocery store to get everything you need from the top shelf to the bottom one), that you wouldn’t be able to do or would be extremely difficult without working legs. Certainly, many people overcome this obstacle in amazing ways, but if you have two functional legs this family of postures offers a great variety of benefits to keep them healthy and working for you for a long time to come!

Point of focus for practice: Cultivate a sense of the muscles of the legs engaging (contracting) in your standing postures. The ones that are in a lengthened position might build a bit of eccentric strength and the ones that are already stabilizing might build a bit of isometric strength, both of which are important and beneficial for many reasons.

Standing Yoga Postures Can Help Train Your Body to Balance - The standing postures that require us to stand on one leg are probably the most obvious that come to mind here, but if you’ve wobbled in your warrior or triangle pose you’ve actually experienced this benefit as well. Have you ever considered how incredibly quickly the messages between the sense receptors in your feet and legs have to travel to your brain and back to help you maintain your position in any of these postures? It’s so fast we don’t even notice it most of the time. The only time we tend to notice is when we DO feel that wobble happen. But here’s the great thing - those moments of wobble are creating experiences that train your body to respond and correct more accurately and more quickly by developing core strength, kinesthetic awareness and proprioception. It’s something that not a lot of people practice once they learn to walk. Living in New England, especially in the winter months, I really think of this as one of the greatest benefits of our practice. When you’re doing that winter shuffle to the car you have a much better chance of recovering if you start to slip than you would otherwise. That doesn’t mean accidents won’t happen, but it sure does stack the odds more in your favor!

Point of focus for practice: The next time you wobble and recover, instead of cursing yourself or getting frustrated for a weak moment, turn some gratitude toward your incredible body for being able to compensate and correct when needed. Then consider where it is you might need more engagement to help you maintain stability.

Standing Yoga Postures Can Make You Feel Grounded - Life has definitely shown us some serious challenges recently and a sense of not knowing when the next shoe might drop or the ground beneath us might shift again may still be operating in the back of our minds and hearts. [Incidentally, if that’s something that’s really bothering you, check out PSTEC to get some relief.] When we practice standing poses we have an opportunity to allow ourselves to make a deep connection with the steadiness of the earth beneath us through the parts of our body that were built for the job, our feet and legs! I’ll often draw your attention in class to rooting down into the earth through the feet before coming into a standing posture or again once you’re there. Have you ever noticed the rebounding effect that happens when you do so? There’s an amazing relationship there. You press into the earth and she gives you the energy and stability to grow and stand tall. That feeling and that relationship can’t be underestimated. The Warrior poses are called that for a reason! When you do them, you embody the strength of a warrior. That can be a great reminder of that quality existing inside of you when you’re feeling like anything BUT a warrior.

Point of focus for practice: The next time you come into a posture like Warrior 2, before you move into it, press down through the feet and see if you can feel that rebounding effect through your torso. It might be a sense of lightness or ease that allows you to float up rather than feeling like you’re trying to drag your torso away from the ground. You may also find you arrive in the pose with a greater sense of steadiness.

Not sure where to place your feet for your unique proportions or feel you could use more steadiness in standing postures? Join me for my upcoming workshop - Set Your Foundation: Finding Stability in Standing Yoga Postures.

Details and sign up here.

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7 Self Care Items to Double Down on This Winter (and a gift for you!)

If I’m hearing it from so many places, I’m sure you are too. The next couple of months are going to be difficult. It’s dark at 4pm, the weather is cold and dreary and the slow burn trauma of the pandemic is continuing to hit closer and closer to home. With these realities comes the recommendation to double down on self care. But what if you’re in such a mental space that you can’t even think of what to do to feel better? I’ve got a simple list of 7 Self Care Items to Double Down on This Winter and a little gift to help you remember. These are the things I’m doubling down on myself. I hope they help you too!

1. Reach out - Phone a friend, text someone, get on that zoom call or go for a socially distanced walk (yes, even in the cold). Connection to other humans (and seeing them in 3D if you can do so safely) is so important right now. This is especially true for humans that don’t live in your home. We love our immediate families, but our extended family and friends are important too!

2. Be playful - You may feel like doing anything but playing right now, but what if you spent a moment or two playing with your cat, dog, hamster, child, grandchild or hedgehog?? I bet they would be more than ready to oblige and they might bring a smile to your face too! When’s the last time you dusted off the board games or took out the playing cards? Maybe there’s something else that you do for play that you’ve forgotten about? Adults need playfulness too! So go glitter bomb those cards or get out the paints and allow yourself to play!

3. Meditation - Here’s an interesting tidbit I read recently. Meditation increases blood flow to the prefrontal cortex of your brain. This is the area responsible for really important things like regulating impulses (no you don’t need to put yet another Christmas gift you can’t afford on your credit card!) and the execution, order and and timing of sequential acts towards a goal. Want to know what to do next when that next difficult choice comes up? MEDITATE NOW. You’ll be glad you did. Don’t know how? I’ve got some downloads that can help.

4. Healthy Food - We all know it’s the time of year when we are more likely to throw caution to the wind and indulge in all those holiday treats we may have loved as a child. I’m right there with you. And I think there’s something actually healthy about that. But I also believe in the 80/20 rule. Make your choices in food better for you 80 percent of the time and your body, mind and spirit will thank you. Now pass the egg nog! 😉

5. Gratitude - It’s so simple but so overlooked. There are still things to be grateful for right now. Really! Write down 3 things each morning, evening or both and your mindset will start to transform. Be sure to do your best to really allow yourself to FEEL that gratitude deeply. It actually rewires your brain and that’s something we all need right now.

6. Movement - Take a yoga class! Or go for a walk. Or dance around your living room to your favorite song between zoom calls with your camera off and freak out the cat. Just get yourself moving somehow. Stagnation doesn’t feel good. Get your heart pumping so you can remember that you are alive and how precious a gift that really is, particularly right now.

7. Sleep - I know zoning out watching Hallmark movies until 3am just kinda happens but I can’t impress upon you enough the transformational power of sleep. More and more studies are showing that not sleeping is worse than smoking and other similar things that we know aren’t healthy for us. Sleep is when your brain takes out the literal and figurative trash. It’s just so important to your overall health and wellbeing. If you struggle in this department make sure your room is cool and dark, get the screens out of the bedroom and turn them off two hours before bed and go to bed and get up at the same time EVERY day (that last one is tough but trust me, it works!).

Are you going to get all of these done every single day? Probably not. Could you do one? I bet you could! Will you feel absolutely wonderful and fine if you do all these things? Probably not. Life still happens. But you’ll be able to come back to your center much more quickly when life throws you for a loop.

To help you remember to do at least one thing from this list EACH DAY I’ve created these phone wallpapers for you. Just load this blog post on your phone and save your favorite. Make it your Lock Screen or your Home Screen so you can remember to check one thing off the list each day.

And please, if you are seriously struggling with your mental health or are contemplating suicide please call the National Suicide Prevention hotline at 800-273-8255 in the USA or contact an organization like NAMI for mental health resources. You matter and we need you here doing your work in this world.

Wishing you health and safety as we move forward into this next season. 💙🙏🕉

If you’re having trouble fitting my livestream classes into your daily schedule consider trying out my On Demand Membership via Patreon. You’ll find all the details on accessing On Demand Membership here!

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6 Poses to Free Your Breath

“The Breath Is Life Itself.”

I heard Sharon Salzberg say this recently in an online retreat. That’s certainly the view that the teachings of yoga present to us for consideration. The breath fuels everything from the fire of our digestion to the urge to eliminate to the length of our time here on earth according to the sacred texts. The circumstances of the last several months may have our breath feeling less than free and open for a variety of reasons including fear, stress, and sitting at computers more and more. If you find yourself unable to take a deep breath lately because your holding so much tension around your lungs and ribs, consider working with this simple sequence to bring some balance and freedom to the area.

As you approach this sequence you might look at it in one of two ways: 1) A series of postures you can hold for a couple to several breaths each or 2) some points to emphasize in the context of a flow. Either way is perfectly valid and will allow you to find some benefit. You might experiment with both ways depending on your energy level and the time you have to work through the sequence. Let’s look at each pose in turn and I’ll give you some options.

Cow pose - We don’t often see this posture without it’s complement, cat pose, but it certainly has merits on its own in the context of this sequence. As you move into it bring some emphasis to the feeling of broadness it may create through the front of the chest. I’ve heard some teachers talk about “pulling the chest through the shoulder blades” as you inhale into it and that certainly draws a good mental picture. Hold this one for one to several breaths or make it more dynamic by adding cat pose on each exhalation.

Gate pose - This posture creates a deep opening through the side body that may be felt not only through the rib cage but perhaps even up into the arm pit or down into the belly, hip and the standing leg. This is an area where many of us have considerable constriction. This can inhibit the breathing because the ribs aren’t as able to lift and separate from each other to create the space for deep breaths to enter the body. In our daily lives most of us don’t lift our arms into this position more than once a day on purpose! You might consider some padding under the standing knee for this one if your knees are at all tender. Be sure to do both sides!

At this point you may want to bring in some half sun salutations or some lunging salutations to warm the body and bring in some demand to the breath intensity, or as I mentioned above, you might just move into the next posture.

Low lunge - Bring careful attention to the alignment of this posture as I have it pictured here. Many practitioners come into the posture with the hips forward and down a great deal more with the front knee often coming past the ankle. In this version, I am purposely drawing a line from my hips straight down to the lower knee. The torso stacks on top of that and there may even be a little backbend here. Also important is the top of the back foot pressing down firmly into the mat. The overall effect of these details is a great deal more length on the front side of the body, especially through the hip flexors which are often tight and short. What does that have to do with the breath? I can almost guarantee that as you’re reading this, you’re sitting in a chair and perhaps a bit hunched forward. 😉 Try to take a deep breath in that position. Yeah, it doesn’t work so well. Now, sit up tall (even better, stand up and do this) and you may notice a subtle but tangible difference. Front body space allows for deeper breaths. It also prepares us for a real backbend. But first…

Twisting lunge - There is a whole network of long, rope-like muscles that run up and down the length of our spines. It’s a place where many of us hold tension we don’t even notice and many of these muscles tend to be under a great deal of stress because they’re over stretched. Twisting can relieve this tension in these muscles while also bringing length to some of those side body muscles that wrap the ribs and abdomen that we touched into earlier in this sequence. With this one you can always simplify by dropping the back knee to the floor. Also consider allowing the pelvis to turn into the twist and work together with the spine.

Bridge pose - There are so many benefits to this pose, but for our purposes here let’s focus on how this frees the breath. With the hands interlaced behind the back as pictured, there’s a great opportunity to broaden through the front of the chest. As the hips lift, nearly the whole front side of the body is opening as well. Additionally, with the hips above the heart we have a slightly inverted relationship with gravity. This gives us a chance to exercise the breathing diaphragm, an essential muscle of respiration that moves down toward the feet when we inhale and up towards the head when we exhale. In this position, instead of working WITH gravity as it normally would when we’re upright, it’s working AGAINST gravity (just a little bit) and you may actually find yourself having to work a little harder to take an inhale. It may be quite subtle, but this is good exercise for a muscle we don’t often consider strengthening in most forms of physical movement.

Supported Fish - Our last posture is one that when well adjusted can be quite restful and allow us to take advantage of the space we’ve created in the body for our breathing throughout this sequence. You can use two yoga blocks, one behind your skull (that’s important!) and one behind your heart. Depending on your experience with this posture and your flexibility, you might want the one behind your heart on the lowest level and the one behind your skull on the highest level or some other combination. You can also do this by rolling or folding up a blanket and laying back over it with it landing behind your heart, just below your armpits. Whichever option you choose, allow your arms to come out to the side and turn the palms up for more space through the front of the chest. Once you’ve settled in and gotten comfortable, this is a great place to linger and focus on your breathing. I like to imagine my breath coming in through the nostrils and down to the base of my spine and then filling my torso right up to my collar bones with breath and then allowing all the breath to release in reverse. Stay for a few breaths or several minutes and enjoy all that freedom you created!

You’ll find many of these postures in my vinyasa classes this month. If you can’t join me for the Livestream consider signing up for my new On Demand Video Membership through Patreon.

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Tech Advice for Getting the Most Out of Your Online Yoga Class

I’m taking a break from posting about the specifics of your yoga practice today to give you some tech help. Online Yoga is here to stay. Even when we’re able to go back into spaces and safely gather together again, the conveinience factor for online yoga alone is likely to make it a part of our yoga practice far into the future. But if you’re straining to see a small screen or your teacher can only see your ceiling, you might not be getting the best experience from your Online Yoga Class. Here are a few ideas from a technological perspective that might help you get the most out of your online yoga experience and calm your fears about diving in if you haven’t done so already.

First, let’s talk devices. Did you know that you can do your online yoga practice from nearly any device? Zoom has apps for phones and tablets as well as laptops, desktops and everything in between. It can also be used through any web browser such as Chrome or Safari. You can use it on Apple and Android devices as well and your account will work across multiple devices. Most other platforms have multiple device compatibilities as well. Perhaps this is obvious to most of you reading this, but we wanted to be sure you knew that you could use nearly any device.

Second, the bigger your screen size, the better your viewing experience will likely be. You may want to try casting to your TV or directly plugging into your TV or other monitor. Here’s where we get into some nitty gritty details in the tech, so hang with me here. There’s typically two ways of taking what you’re viewing on your smaller device (like a phone or tablet) and making it work with your TV. Whether or not either of these will work will have a lot to do with how old your TV and your device are and if they are on similar operating systems. Let’s talk about these two ways individually. First up:

Casting or Sharing Your Screen

These are terms for wirelessly transmitting the sound and video from your smaller device to your TV. This can be accomplished through your home WIFI network or with the help of additional devices such as an Apple TV, Chromecast, or Smart TV such as a Roku or Fire TV. To do this, make sure your TV is attached to your home WIFI network. If you’ve been streaming Netflix that’s probably already happening. The next steps depend on whether you’re using Apple or Android devices.

For Apple devices including a Mac computer, you can share your screen using Airplay. You can do this with a compatible Airplay device (such as Roku, Smart TV or adapter) or an Apple TV, which is another box to plug into your television. Follow the instructions that come with it for connecting it to your TV. Once that’s done, make sure your phone or tablet is connected to your home WIFI network. Then go into the Settings on your Apple product and look for “Screen Mirroring” or “AirPlay”. Once you open that, your Apple TV should show up in the list of available devices. Click on it and you will see whatever you had been working with on the phone show up on your TV. If you’re using Zoom on a Mac, you’ll have to set your speaker choice to Apple TV to hear sound on your TV.

For Android and Samsung devices, you can use a Chromcast to share your screen. Some TVs will come with this built in nowadays. With older TVs you’ll need to buy an additional device, similar to Apple as described above. Once you’ve connected that to your TV following the instructions that came with the device, you’ll follow a similar procedure as above for connecting. On your Android device, go to the Settings menu, click on the Cast icon. Then choose the TV or Chromcast you want to connect with.

For PCs running Windows 10 you can share your screen using the Connect function in your Settings panel. You may be able to Cast directly to a Smart TV or Chromcast Device or by using Microsoft’s wireless display adapter.

Remember, with any of these options the camera on your device will still need to be used so I can see what you’re doing during your class. More on this below.

Direct Plug In

This is my preferred method because it’s typically more reliable and easier to manage. You’ll need a couple of things to make it work. The first is an HDMI cable. You can get one of these inexpensive cables from the typical big box stores like BestBuy or Amazon.

One end is going to plug directly into your TV through an HDMI port. They are often labeled as such but they typically look like this:

HDMI Input on Back of a TV

The other end is going to plug into your device. Many computers and laptops will have an HDMI out port on them somewhere but phones and tablets will not. For those smaller devices, you’ll need to purchase an inexpensive adapter such as this:

Various Adapters

When you plug into your TV, you’ll be able to control your zoom meeting on your device, but you’ll see a much bigger picture of everything that’s happening on your phone on your TV screen. You can do this same thing with a big external computer monitor as well. Just look for the HMDI port on the back of the monitor and use the same adaptor on your phone or tablet. (Adapters are also available if your computer does not have an HDMI port or if you need to connect to a monitor using USB-C, VGA, DVI, or Displayport.)

Audio controls

If you’re using Zoom on a computer, you’ll have more choices on how you can hear and be heard on your device. There’s a little microphone icon on the screen while you’re running Zoom. Click on the little arrow next to it to explore your options.

Zoom Audio Settings Menu

If you are using a phone or a tablet, some of the audio settings will be available by changing your zoom account settings. You’ll need to access zoom’s website from a browser on either a computer or other device to change these settings. Connecting an external device such as a bluetooth speaker or wireless headphones may be an available option through these or your device’s settings.

A Note About Hearing Aids

I’ve had a couple of students who have bluetooth capable hearing aids tell me about sending the audio for these classes directly into the hearing aids. Basically, the hearing aids are connected to your smartphone (I think the hearing aid companies typically help with this setup, but I imagine it’s the same as connecting any two devices together via bluetooth) and so instead of using the audio on the computer or tablet, you would choose to “call in to the meeting" with your phone when you enter via Zoom. If you do this, be sure to mute the audio on the computer or other device or you might get some unpleasant phasing of the audio (the delay in the audio being heard on your computer will be different then in your hearing aids) or feedback (just like when you accidentally aim a microphone at a speaker). You may also be able to pair your hearing aids to your device directly. We aren’t experts on this one at all, so I’d advise you to talk to your hearing aid provider about this if you have questions. I just wanted you to know this was possible!

Help Me See YOU!

Now that you can see and hear me better, time to make it easier for me to see YOU! My interactive livestream classes are meant to allow me to help you since it’s a two way system. I’ve made jokes lately that I’m getting used to only having half of you visible at any time, but it doesn’t have to be that way! Here are a few ideas to help me see you better.

1. Now that you are using a bigger screen to see me, the device you're using and the camera on it can be farther away from you. That will give me a better picture of your whole body and is a really good start.

2. Ideally, you’ll place your camera so that I can see you from the long side of your mat, with the full length of your mat in view from floor to ceiling. I’m talking about something similar to the view I provide you of me. Something like this:

3. If a full view from the side isn’t possible, a small angle can also be helpful for me. It allows me to see a little bit of what is going on on the side of your body that is facing away from the camera. Something like this:

4. Depending on how far away your device can be will often determine how much of you will be in view from floor to ceiling. From my perspective and from what I’ve learned over the last several months of teaching this way, if your whole mat and body are in view, but I can’t see your arms when your standing and reaching up, that’s better than if I can’t see your legs and feet. Opt for a camera angle that gives more of a view toward the floor than the ceiling if possible.

Making sure I can see your feet more than your arms will help me help you!

I certainly hope you found this post helpful. I’m happy to provide a bit of tech support for you for my livestream classes and private lessons if you feel like you still have questions. Feel free to email me to let me know what specific devices you might be using or would like to use. We can even set up a time outside of class to test things out and make sure they’re working for you, to talk about camera set up and other issues as well.

Many thanks to my husband Justin (who often gets referred to as the I.T. Guy around here) for his help in making this post possible.

[Links in this post are for clarity and convenience only and are NOT affiliate links. We always encourage you to support your local small businesses whenever possible!]

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Creating Abundance Through Simplicity

One of the many lessons of the last several months has been how meaningful simplicity can be. Many of us have found ourselves doing without things that we thought we needed, shifting our daily living patterns and bringing a greater focus to what is truly important and meaningful in our lives. As we make our way into the season that celebrates abundance, I find myself reflecting on how my experiments with simplicity at the beginning of the year created the space for dramatic shifts, eliminated unnecessary decision fatigue and allowed me to bring greater quality of attention into my life. If you’re curious about how 33 items of clothing could do all that & create a sense of abundance, read on!

In January of this year, I did something called "The 30 Day Minimalism Game" with some friends on Facebook. The idea comes from The Minimalists and goes like this: starting at the beginning of the month you remove one thing from your home on the first day, two things on the second day, three on the third and so on until the end of the month. As you can imagine, it starts out being pretty easy but when you start getting into 20 and more items per day, things get interesting. For myself, I found once the momentum began, and with the support of an accountability group, I ended up letting go of WAY more stuff than was called for. My husband even started to get involved!

I had no idea how important this little exercise would become just a few months later when I found myself suddenly running my entire business out of my home. Not only did I have the space I needed to teach my yoga classes, I didn’t have to move a bunch of stuff and figure out where I was going to put it to make it happen. A few months after that, when I found myself moving what remained of the physical items from my physical studio into my home, there was far less panic than there might have been otherwise. Who knew in January that I was creating space for such an important shift in my life and business?

After the inspiration of January’s accomplishments, I decided to take it a step further when I found out about Project333. I’ve never been much of a fashionista. I’ve often made the comment that I wished I could go back to the days when someone else dressed me. It seems such a silly thing to be stressed about, but deciding what the heck to wear every day was never my favorite thing because it always seemed to take far too much thought and consternation. And then I found this new possibility of simplicity.

Choose only 33 items to wear for three months including shoes and accessories.

Whoa.

(If you just fell out of your chair you’ll be happy to know the creator of the idea often jokes that she looses most people when she gets to the shoes part! 😂 Also, please note that there are certain things that don’t count including underwear, bras, socks, loungewear and workout clothes [as long as you actually work out in them] if you were worried).

I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but we have four dramatically different seasons here in New Hampshire.

Apparently so did the creator of the project, sighting that she had one day where the temperature swung from 90-30 degrees in her home state of Utah the first time she tried this herself.

“Ok. If she can do it, I can do it.”

Knowing that I was heading to California during that month I figured it would be a pretty good test.

So I went for it. I didn’t throw away everything I owned, but I did a thorough once over of all my clothing, and donated what no longer fit, got rid of what was worn beyond repair and what I simply didn’t want anymore. In the process I cleaned out a couple of drawers in my dresser and decided on what I would wear for the next three months.

Spoiler alert: I didn’t get down to 33 items. But I was around 40 or so. I figured that was pretty good for my first attempt, especially given the fact that I’d be going from freezing NH to a sweaty hot studio in CA and back in between. (I also traveled carryon only for a 2 week trip but that’s a story for another day.)

It took a fair amount of time to get started. I had to be really intentional with everything I chose.

Once the choices were made I noticed immediately how much easier it was to get dressed in the morning. I had spent a little more time on the “front end” of that decision making process and it immediately alleviated my decision fatigue when it came to clothing. That little bit of my morning was no longer a chore and didn’t set a negative tone in my day. My attention shifted to far more important things. Again, as I reflect back on this, I find myself so grateful for creating that mental space for a future that would involve a LOT of decision making in a short period of time.

After the initial work, I fell into an easy routine. And not a single person said anything to me about my clothing choices during those first three months. Not one. When my three months were up I actually forgot that I had to reconsider my choices until the weather started getting warm enough that I needed some different choices. So I decided to do another round. You can probably see where this is going.

I just did my revision for the third time and I intend to keep going with this approach to my personal wardrobe indefinitely.

So what the heck does getting rid of stuff and simplifying have to do with abundance?

When I took the time to be really intentional and considered about what I surrounded myself with and what I put on my body I learned so much about myself and what was really necessary.

I learned

• that I really didn’t need as much as I thought I did. A lesson that seems to keep coming around for me.

• that a clear plan and intentionality can save you so much energy in the long term. And that energy can be used to focus on so many other important things.

• that simplifying can actually create the space for change. It isn’t always the change that we would have wanted or the change we’d planned, but that doesn’t mean it’s bad.

• that quality over quantity isn’t just a catchy phrase. Abundance doesn’t have to equal excess. In fact, over abundance can actually be draining. That’s something we tend to think of when we have an over abundance of business meetings or tasks to do, I don’t think it’s something most of us think about when it comes to the physical objects we surround ourselves with each and every day. Or the physical objects we put on our bodies each day.

• that just in the same way that the things get accumulated, the letting go of them is also a process. I’m still not down to only 33 items. I might never be. But the process of making the choices and considering fully what I spend money on and what I bring into my life is so very valuable in not only my possessions, but in all other aspects of my life.

• that I can actually feel more abundant when I own less.

• And so many more things I can’t quite put into words.

Would you ever consider doing something like the Minimalism Game or Project333? Leave me a comment and let me know!

I’m going to be talking more about TRUE abundance in my classes this month. Join me for a weekly class or sign up for my Thanksgiving Gratitude Flow.

You’ll find all the details here.

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How a Modern Interpretation of Foot Placement May Help Your Standing Yoga Postures

When I began my teaching career I noticed right away that many students had stability problems in standing yoga postures like Warrior 1, Warrior 2 and even Tadasana. As I continued to observe my students and experimented in my own practice, I found time and time again that a wider base of support seemed to eliminate these issues almost instantly. Depending on the lineage of teaching that a student and teacher may have come through, confusion may still remain as to appropriate foot placement for individual bodies in these postures. In this post you’ll find an anatomical explanation for this modern interpretation of foot placement and how it might help you feel more steady and at ease in these commonly practiced standing yoga postures.

Traditional versus Modern Interpretation

I often make the joke to private students when we start to work with these kinds of details in their postures that “this practice was created by skinny little Indian men, and honey, I’m an American woman and I have hips! I need space!” (If you’ve never met me in person I’m nearly 6 feet tall and weigh about 185, so I am neither small nor skinny!) All joking aside, what I’m pointing out is something very important to this understanding of foot placement - the traditional interpretation of the postures revolved around the narrow pelvis of the people that “created” the postures and the people that were being taught. Students of yoga in those days were of typically of Indian decent, young and male. They therefore had a naturally more narrow pelvis and were taught a more narrow placement of the feet in standing postures.

Anatomically speaking, our knowledge of an individual’s unique differences in their anatomy and how they might affect their practice has improved in the last century. We now know that the female pelvis is wider than the male pelvis, primarily to accommodate childbirth. This google search will give you some images and articles to make this more clear. But the important part for our asana practice is that, generally speaking, our unique anatomical make up, our general range of flexibility and the shape of our frame will have a great deal of affect on the stance we take in our standing postures. The majority of yoga practitioners in the US are female and with our more recent anatomical understanding many teachers, myself included, have begun to teach foot placement in standing postures in a more anatomically informed way.

Let’s give you some examples so you can start to put this into practice. And please bear with my rather rudimentary illustrations! And also bear in mind, the use of traditional vs. modern is NOT a value judgement, but a way of making a distinction.

Let’s take Tadasana (Mountain Pose) for instance:

In the traditional interpretation of the posture, the big toes would come together to touch as you stood at the top of your mat. Some people would even bring their inner heels together. Let me be very clear here: THIS IS NOT WRONG. For many bodies this won’t be a problem. For many other bodies this may feel like a very narrow base of support that isn’t at all grounded. In my body, this additionally creates a tension in my outer hips that doesn’t feel beneficial.

Also, when I look at the center line of my foot, it is offset compared to my pelvis. I can tell because when I feel my hip points (the two bones you might be able to feel if you palpate the front of the pelvis), if I were to draw a straight line down to the center of my foot, that line hits more towards my outer ankles. So instead, I take my feet “sit bones distance apart” (I often have people measure this by bending forward and taking two fists together between the arches of the feet. It seems to work well.) which gives me a broader base and more appropriately aligns my body. So it would look more like this:

With this broader base I’m more able to hold my ground, or be more firmly grounded in this pose that is supposed to embody stability.

This wider foot placement in Tadasana also translates into other common standing poses. Tadasana, is after all, the foundation for every other yoga posture. Take Warrior 2 for example. Here’s what the traditional foot placement would look like:

You can see from the lines on this mat (thank you Liforme!) that the heel of the front foot would have bisected the arch of the back foot. (I have also heard it described slightly wider, so that the heel of the front foot would have lined up with the heel of the back foot in traditional teaching.) This might give a practitioner with wider hips a feeling of, what I often call “walking the tightrope”; the base of support is too narrow to be stable. This often shows itself not while the practitioner is in the pose, but when they are making the transition up into the pose from a lunge, for example. There’s a wobble that happens in that transition and I’ll often see students reflexively step the back foot wider to catch themselves! What they’re instinctively doing is creating a stance more like this:

This comes into play again when we look at Warrior 1. Again, the more traditional placement would look like this:

But for many bodies, this foot placement becomes problematic when the practitioner attempts to make the transition into the pose from a lunge and/or places unnecessary forces into the knee joints in particular as the pose is held. With Warrior 1, as the pelvis rotates toward the top of the mat, the narrow stance may not allow for much rotation. With the pelvis unable to rotate and force still being applied (a discussion for another day), that torque has no where to go but to the next available joint, which is the knee. Unfortunately for our poor yoga student who is fighting to do what is asked, the knee is a hinge joint and does not lend itself to rotation. Chances are, they feel this as something happening IN the joint, a thing we typically want to avoid in a vinyasa yoga practice. This can all be avoided by stepping the feet wider like so:

With the broader stance pictured above, there’s greater freedom for the rotation of the pelvis, the integrity of the knee is no longer questionable and there will be a greater sense of stability in the pose overall.

What Does This All Mean for You?

To apply what you’ve learned here you might take the time to experiment with these different foot placements outside of a class. Start with Tadasana and see how your body feels with the two different foot placements. Depending on your specific body type and shape, you may find one that feels more stable and easeful than another. Then do the same experiment with Warrior 2 and Warrior 1. Take the time to really notice the effect on the joints of the legs in particular and your sense of stability. Do you feel like your “walking the tightrope” or if a strong breeze came by would you be steady? As with anything in yoga, the proof is in the experiment within the laboratory of your own body, life and practice!

I’m considering offering a workshop on this topic in the near future. If you’d be interested in such an offering, let me know in the comments below or send me an email!

If you’d like to experience a group class with me where I teach this more modern interpretation, check out my schedule for an upcoming vinyasa yoga class.

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Get to Know Your Shoulder Joint

Part of the study of yoga is getting to know our bodies better. With all our focus on the shoulders lately in my classes, I thought it might be helpful for you to get to know your shoulder joint a bit more from an anatomical standpoint. If your eyes glaze over when anyone says anatomy I understand! That was me for a very long time. But when you see how the knowledge of anatomy can inform healthy movement patterns and inform the choices you make in your practice, it all becomes a little more palatable. I'm going to give you a very basic overview here which I hope will enable to you to make good choices for your own body as you move through your life and practice.

What is a joint in the human body?

First - a basic definition. A joint is where two or more bones come together in the human body. You probably already knew that. We typically think about the knees, hips and shoulders when we think of joints but did you know there are also joints in your spine, your fingers and toes and other places? This simple definition helps us be clear as we move forward.

Bones of the Shoulder

There are three important bones that create your shoulder joint as you can see labeled above. I’ve given you both the common and the technical name for each of these. I highly recommend that you palpate your own body with your hands as you look at the image to really find these things in your own body. If you have a willing and consenting other human nearby that can be helpful too! The combination of read information and sensory input will help you learn.

The first and probably most obvious is your Humorous or upper arm bone. It’s probably the bone that we think about the most when we think about the shoulder. It may even be the ONLY bone we think about when thinking of the shoulder. But there are two more important players.

The second is the Clavicle or collar bone. It’s that bone on the front side of the body that extends from the front of your neck (just slightly offset to the right or left) out to your shoulder. You’ll find it at the top of your rib cage and it forms the part of the top edge of what we often think of as our shoulder. If I asked you to take your left hand and put it on your right shoulder the heel of your hand would likely be resting on this bone.

While you’ve got your hand on your shoulder [you did do that didn’t you?! ;-)], your fingers are probably curling over the back of your shoulder and that’s where you’ll find the third bone, your shoulder blade or Scapula. You may never have thought of this before, but your shoulder blade is called your shoulder blade because it’s an essential part of your shoulder joint! And what you’re likely feeling under your fingers is what’s often referred to as the “spine” of the shoulderblade. The tip of that spine (closer to the outside of your body) is called the Acromium.

So where’s the actual shoulder joint?

The actual shoulder joint (or glenohumeral joint if you want to get technical) is where the humorous and the scapula fit together. There’s a shallow cup on the shoulder blade where the upper arm bone fits in. They are connected together first by connective tissue (labrum, cartilage, ligaments, etc.) and then by a series of complex muscles known as the rotator cuff. So unless you have an injury or something else going on, the big thing to know here is that your upper arm bone (humorous) is attached to your shoulder blade (scapula). While the collarbone is not directly connected here it does play an important role in movement, but that’s a bit beyond the scope of the current exploration.

Why should you care?

Any time you move your upper arm bone your shoulder blade MUST move. This becomes really important when you set up for postures like bridge or wheel because how you position that upper arm bone will influence the movement of the scapula and therefore the whole shoulder joint. Any time you take the arms overhead like in Warrior 1 or Down dog, the shoulder blades must also move upward (that’s an over simplification but for the purposes of this discussion it’s sufficient). Not allowing the shoulder blades to move properly may cause trouble over time for the healthy functioning of the shoulder joint.

Knowing how these two bones are connected also gives us a better understanding of what “stability” in the shoulder joint really means. There are three very stable positions for the shoulder joint: 0 degrees of flexion (when the arms are resting alongside your torso in a standing position), 90 degrees of flexion (plank pose) or 180 degrees of flexion (arms directly overhead like in handstand). This is helpful if you DO have an injury or strain in this area because you can pay attention to how your bones are aligning to create stable positions and avoid unstable ones. You can also offload weight from the shoulders if they are moving between any of these angles if you do have an injury or you know that you still need to build strength in this area (chaturanga anyone?!).

Questions? Leave me a comment below!

If you want to get to know your shoulders more through movement, sign up for one of my livestream classes this month or join me on Patreon to practice on demand!

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Two Poses in Ten Minutes for a Simple Restorative Yoga Reset

2020 continues to be a year of significant stressors for most of us. We're worried about children's education, the stability of our jobs, the state of our country and our environment and it's taking a toll on our physical, mental and emotional health. And we all know, now more than ever, we need to engage with practices that can help us stay healthy and well on all levels. But the thought of trying to make that happen can just add to the overwhelm! When you're too overwhelmed to think straight, it's easy to miss the fact that the greatest effect on our health and wellness can come from simple things done with consistency. Today I want to bring you a simple (and I do mean S-I-M-P-L-E) restorative yoga practice that can help you reset and renew yourself for whatever comes your way next with two poses in just 10 minutes.

Before we get to the practice I just want to say another word about this idea of simplicity. I think it’s something that is SO over looked in our culture. We always seem to make things more complicated than they need to be. Got time in your calendar? Fill it with something! Have one monitor on your desk at work? Why not two! Making dinner? Add six more spices! That will make it better! Some of these things can make our lives better, but often times when we peel away the extraneous baggage we can find ourselves with much more calm and much more ease. I’m finding this to be one of the big takeaways from this time we’ve all been experiencing these last several months. It’s the simple joy of having a cup of coffee with a friend that we miss, not the running here there and everywhere.

So let’s get to relaxing, shall we? You’re going to need a few things:

Props

If you have yoga props, awesome. If not, you can steal from the couch or the bed to make this work. This is not the time to stress about gear. Remember simplicity?! Get yourself a big bolster or pillow and at least two or three blankets. Another smaller pillow can be handy.

Get yourself a nice sounding timer.

Not the kind that makes you jump out of bed in the morning, but one that’s kind of like your Mom gently shaking you to wake up from a nap when you were a kid. There are probably several appropriate sounds on your phone, but if you use that put it on airplane mode. Seriously. The world will be ok without you for 10 minutes.

As I mentioned, you are going to do two poses. Period. You’re going to repeat the first one twice. Here it is:

Supported Spinal Twist

I love this supported spinal twist because you not only get the benefits of a supported restorative yoga posture, but you also get a good twist in as well. It may be not be anatomically correct to say so, but twists tend to feel like they wring the stress right out of the body. We tend to hold a lot of tension in our spinal muscles and this pose will help to gently relieve them of that tension.

To find your way into the pose: set up your bolster or big pillows like a ramp. As you can see in the photo, I used one block at the low level and one at the medium level to rest my bolster on. Have a couple of blankets handy on either side of the bolster/pillow ramp. Get that extra blanket or smaller pillow handy. Then sit next to the ramp with your right hip up against it, your knees are bent out in front of you and your thighs are making a right angle to your hips. Place the small pillow or extra blanket between your knees for some extra cushion. Then start to lay your torso down on the ramp with one hand on each side of it. Your forearms should come to rest on the floor but if they don’t, that’s what the extra blankets are for. You’re going to fold those up under your forearms until they rest easily. Your head can face the same direction as your knees or you can turn it to face the opposite way if that’s comfortable for you.

Set your timer for 3 minutes. Breathe deep as you rest here and imagine that your body is getting heavier with each exhalation. It’s like your body is sinking into the floor.

When the timer goes off, press the earth away with your hands to come back to seated. Sit with the ramp behind your back for a moment or two. Then gently swing your legs over to the other side and repeat the pose there. You’ll likely need to adjust the blankets under your forearms if you were using them.

Set your timer for 3 minutes. Breathe deep as you rest here and imagine that any lingering tension is draining out of your body and into the earth where it gets washed away.

When the timer goes off, come back up to seated.

Supported Shavasana

Last pose. Shavasana.

I really like this supported version with the addition of eye pillows in the hands and over the eyes. But that’s complicated. It’s perfectly fine to just lay flat if that works for your body.

Set your timer for 3 more minutes and maybe take two or three more deep breaths that you release with a big sigh through an open mouth. Then, just allow yourself to rest. If your mind decides to run away into the complexities of life, either just let it, or draw some gentle attention back to your breath.

When your timer goes off, slowly find your way to one side, press up to seated and celebrate that you did something really good for yourself today that is going to help your body, mind and spirit deal with everything life is throwing at it these days. You’ll face it all with a little more calm and a little more focus.

Repeat this short restorative yoga practice whenever you remember to do so.

What if I want or need more?

If you find yourself with more time or you’re just wanting to stay a bit longer you might hold each twist for up to five minutes and extend shavasana to 5 or more minutes. If you wanted to add in one more pose, you could add in legs up the wall. (If you have trouble with getting comfortable in that pose, here are some tips.)

Want EVEN more?! I’m teaching another online restorative yoga class via Zoom in October.

Space is limited and I’m only offering a couple of discounted spaces.

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The Ridiculous Looking Yet Highly Effective Breathing Practice to Keep You Cool This Summer

While it might look a little silly, Sitali breath can be a powerful breath for use in the summer when we might be overwhelmed by the hot and humid conditions that tend to pop up here in NH. I used to use this breath a lot when I was working in NYC in the summertime. As the 90+ degree heat radiated off the buildings and the streets I was often passed by buses and cars spewing hot exhaust while I briskly walked (near ran sometimes) the 10 blocks from my office to Penn Station to catch the train home. When I remembered to use this breath, I didn’t even break a sweat! If it can work under those conditions, with a little practice, I’m sure it can help you!

Here’s how to do it:

Sit comfortably, allow your mouth to open, stick out your tongue a bit and curl it into a straw that you’ll sip your breath through. This is an ability ruled by genetics, so if you can’t do this, just let your tongue lay low in your mouth broadly and relaxed.

Slowly inhale through your curled tongue or over the surface of your relaxed tongue.

At the end of your inhale, retract your tongue back into your mouth and exhale slowly through your nose.

That’s one round.

Repeat this process 3-6 times. When finished, breathe normally and notice how much cooler you feel. You may even get goosebumps when you’re doing this!

You can use this breath during a yoga practice if the heat catches up to you, on a hike, or any time you’re feeling overheated. If you’re experiencing some of the signs that the summer heat has settled into your tissues like a red rash, irritability or digestive issues like indigestion, you might add this breath to your regular practices. If you’re having the hot flashes associated with menopause, this can be a great breath to have in your tool kit as well.

I hope this helps you stay cool this summer! Let me know if you have any questions!

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Yoga Related Book Suggestions for your Summer Reading

One of the greatest things I did for myself when the pandemic hit was give myself the gift of Jim Kwik’s Reading course. It’s really sparked my love of reading again, something that has been lying dormant for sometime (translation: after I finished grad school the second time I didn’t think I’d ever want to pick up another book again! But that was ^cough^ years ago and I’m finally over it, thanks to Jim!). While I’ve been reading on various topics ever since, it occurred to me that this is the time of year people often ask me for suggestions of books on the topic of yoga. Below you’ll find a few recent reads and some old favorites to inspire your summer reading.

1. Lovingkindness by Sharon Salzberg. I’ve been familiar with Lovingkindness meditation for some time, I even did a 40 day practice earlier this year, but I had never read much in-depth about it. I’m so glad I finally decided to pick this one up and read it cover to cover. Sharon’s expertise in the subject really shines through, despite the fact that this is one of her first books and was originally published 25 years ago! I feel like I have a whole new insight into this type of practice, a greater understanding of the benefits and obstacles to working with it and a real roadmap of how to go about it and what I might experience as I practice now. I definitely wish I had read this sooner! If you’re interested in Buddhist psychology, meditation or lovingkindness in any way, don’t hesitate to pick this one up.

2. The Yamas & Niyamas; Exploring Yoga’s Ethical Practice by Deborah Adele. This one is an old favorite and I can’t recommend it enough. The Yamas and Niyamas are the first steps on the yogic path in a traditional approach, but in our modern exploration we often skip these and go right into the Asana or physical practice. Never fear! Deborah Adele’s book is here to help you shore up that foundation that you may have missed with explanations that make this ancient wisdom that is still so relevant to our modern lives accessible and understandable to the modern yogi. If you’ve been thinking, “I really want to know more about yoga but I’m not sure where to begin.” begin here. You won’t be sorry. And you’ll be coming back to this book over and over again for years!

3. When Things Fall Apart by Pema Chodron. What can I say that isn’t said in the title? If you’re struggling with the circumstances of the moment we’re all living in right now you might give this one a try. Your thinking about many things will be challenged. But the love that underlies that challenge can be deeply felt if you’re open to it. This wisdom comes from one that knows suffering and is able to bear witness to it in such a way that I felt like I was being guided through Very Hard Things with a very soft touch. This book is a great gift if you can allow it into your consciousness. If right now is not that time, just put it on the shelf for later.

4. Buddha’s Brain by Rick Hanson. (I realize I’m pretty Buddhism heavy here but they did grow up in the same neighborhood with the yogis so go with me on this!) This book is all about the intersection of neuroscience and Buddhism. The author, having studied for sometime with Jack Kornfield, pulls the two subjects together in a very practical way. The first chapter can be a bit tough to get through, but if you hang in there, it’s totally worth it. I find myself drawing on this book over and over again for myself and my classes. The summaries at the end of each chapter of the key points really help solidify what you’ve read which is a nice feature. (I recently heard Mr. Hanson has a new book out which is definitely on my future reading list!)

5. The Heart of Yoga: Developing a Personal Practice by T.K.V. Desikachar. While I wouldn’t necessarily list this amongst my favorite books on yoga, I will recommend it because it does provide a foundational understanding of the practice from a source that is highly trusted. Desikachar was the son of Krishnamacharya, who is widely considered to be the “grandfather” of the physical practice of yoga as we understand it today. You’ll find some interesting historical context in here as well as a foundational discussion on yoga philosophy. The Yoga Sutras are included with commentary, but if you’re new to all this I’d definitely recommend starting with Deborah Adele’s book first. To the modern reader there are elements that will come across as dated (this one was first published over 20 years ago as well), but if you read it with context in mind including time and place, you may find yourself filling in the gaps of some of your knowledge depending on how yoga first appeared in your life.

BONUS: Meditations of John Muir compiled by Chris Highland. This is a bit of a tangent but you might find it valuable. If you love the outdoors like I do you’ve probably read some of John Muir’s writings. This compilation comes from a spiritual perspective and intersperses Muir’s words with quotes from some of the leaders of the world’s great spiritual traditions. It’s a great one to sample from while sitting by the campfire this summer.

I hope this gives you some inspiration for your time reading in a hammock at a state park campground, at the beach or in your backyard this summer. If you’ve got a title you’d like to share with me or you want to see what else I’m reading lately, feel free to look me up on Goodreads.

Happy Reading!

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