...props developed for specific poses.

Bolsters are excellent for certain floor poses, and are often used to support the back. Blocks are typically used in standing poses, are and very useful when students are not yet flexible enough to reach the ground. This is particularly true in standing poses that involve twists. Belts are used in a variety of poses, including foward bends, and others that help keep the arms in the correct alignment. These are not usually expensive items, and are worth having on hand. They may allow you to really spend a lot of time in a particular pose.

The most expensive yoga supplies tend to be the very specialized props that can be used in headstand and backbends. They are certainly not crucial, in that you can use cheaper props to gain support in those poses. But they may offer particular benefits that are worth the cost to those than can reasonably afford them.

Good yoga props can make a home practice more enjoyable. It is particularly gratifying to be able to extend one's ability in a pose, and practicing at home certainly provides the luxury of time sometimes not available in a class. Props, in this instance, would be very beneficial. But whether you need anything beyond the basics, a mat, is an individual call.more

The Power Behind Yoga - See How Practicing Yoga Heals the Human Body

... us return to a healthy balance.

Continuous stress increases levels of cortisol in our body, which in turn suppresses the immune system resulting in serious health problems like those mentioned above and other symptoms like sleep disturbances, loss of sex drive and loss of appetite. Stress can cause wear and tear on organs as well, a symptom that might not be immediately apparent, but takes its toll in the long run.

Practicing yoga regularly lowers your respiration and heart rates, and your blood pressure. It stimulates and aids in digestion and helps regulate blood flow to all of your important organs and systems: digestive, reproductive, glandular, circulatory and immune! Yoga boosts our well-being and keeps us healthy.

Yogas asanas...more

Learning To Love The Yoga We All Hate

...Listen in to conversations after any yoga session, and were almost guaranteed to hear someone discussing this or that yoga pose that they hate and wish they never need to do again ever.

But why is it that there are certain yoga poses that we just dread? We can feel them coming, and start to hope the instructor isnt going to do it this time. Then we inwardly cringe when the instructor even mentions that postures name. Simply recognising our reaction and can tell us a great deal not only about our physical abilities but also a great deal about our character and our approach to difficulties, adversity and failure. We should all observe our approach to the poses we hate. Is our approach to put in little effort and avoid doing the pose properly or try to think more about why we dislike it, to figure out if were doing it wrong, or if we need to put in a little more effort to get past this challenge.

Whatever our approach to the poses we dislike, simply identifying which specific poses these are can tell us a lot about how to improve our practice.

It hurts too much I dont wan...more

Karmic Yoga and the Necessary Mindset

..., and justify it with the fact that they are poor. They need that color television of that camcorder. Their poverty can become an excuse for despicable behavior like spousal abuse, child abuse, sexual abuse, and more and more despicable things. You can often even find them abusing each other. What do you do when your confronted with this?

When you meet a person who has done things so terrible, and continues to do things so terrible that they deserve to be put to death, what do you do? Where does the touchy feely idea of Karmic Yoga and charity go then, out the window? Do you pack up your bags and give up on social justice work and service, realizing that what all your rich friends or middle class friends said are right? What do you do? The truth is that Karmic Yoga, like any type of Yoga or spirituality, is not easy. At times it gets downright ugly.

During the worse of times when you meet that horrible person that is unlovable, or when that thief steals your camcorder, or when you find out that people have been coming to your food pantry, getting food and t...more