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Showing posts sorted by relevance for query yoga. Sort by date Show all posts
Showing posts sorted by relevance for query yoga. Sort by date Show all posts
Tuesday, December 5, 2017
Wednesday, September 13, 2017
September is National Yoga Month
Editors note: This is part II of a 4-part weekly series on yoga providing you with information on the benefits of yoga and provide you with practices that you can start in your home.
Yoga is a commonly used practice to invite strength and flexibility, and there are many healing benefits of a regular yoga practice. The Department of Health and Human Services designated September as National Yoga Month as a way to build awareness to the many health benefits of yoga. Here are just some of the benefits:
- Stress Relief
Research has found that yoga reduces the stress hormones that are found in our bodies, such as cortisol. Yoga is a practice that can invite presence and relaxation, therefore reducing the stress found within our bodies. In many yoga practices, breathing practices or meditation practices are utilized as additional means to invite greater self awareness.
- Pain Relief
Yoga has been prescribed to many as a means to stay active and reduce aches and pains. Through frequent stretching and strengthening, many people have reported a decrease in overall pain when yoga has been practiced regularly.
- Flexibility
While it is commonly thought that you need to be flexible to practice yoga, this is not true. Just like strength, flexibility is something that can be built. Yoga can support people to build a greater range of motion through stretching all of the muscles, ligaments, and tendons in the body. Practices such as yin yoga allow for deep stretching to occur of fascia, releasing tension and tightness throughout the body.
- Breathing
Throughout life it is common to forget to breathe, or how to breathe properly. Yoga practice encourages movement with breath, encouraging people to breathe deeply. This type of breathing, when practiced regularly, invites in greater lung functioning and triggers the body’s relaxation response.
- Cardiovascular Conditioning
Yoga is known to increase the amount of oxygen in the bloodstream. Oftentimes we have developed breathing patterns where we take shallow breaths, leading to high levels of anxiety and lower levels of oxygen. A gentle yoga practice can help to lower your resting heart rate and increase your overall endurance.
A great resource to find out more information on how yoga practices can improve health is the book, Yoga As Medicine by Dr.McCall. http://www.drmccall.com/books.html
Amy Green, LMSW, is a counselor and the Chief Operating Officer of Ready Nest Counseling. She specializes in trauma informed care and maternal mental health, focusing on perinatal mood disorders and grief surrounding traumatic childbirth or infant loss. Amy provides comprehensive care through a combination of mind-body modalities and is passionate about sharing practices of self-care to increase wellness in the lives of others. Amy has her Masters in Social Work and is also trained as a breath coach hosting sessions and workshops at Lakshmi Ayurveda Nashville, and is a Registered Yoga Teacher presently teaching prenatal yoga at Blooma Nashville. She has been a Guest Lecturer at the University of Tennessee Masters in Social Work program teaching on trauma informed care and child and adolescent treatment. Amy will soon be featured on New Focus Network with A Breath of Fresh Awe, a new program that features stories, practices, and movements for your soul.
Wednesday, September 27, 2017
Top Online Resources and Inspirational Teachers -Celebrating National Yoga Month
Editors note: This is part IV of a 4-part weekly series in New Focus Daily on yoga providing you with information on the benefits of yoga and provide you with practices that you can start in your home.
Now we know that not everyone can get to a yoga class or finds a yoga studio that they are automatically in love with. We also know that yoga, or fitness in general, requires a financial investment that may not always be in everyone’s budget. With that said, we have compiled a list of our favorite online resources and yoga classes, as well as a list of inspirational teachers.
Adriene is oftentimes playful and humorous, inspiring people of all shapes, sizes, and personalities to connect with their bodies on a daily basis with free yoga videos. Her videos are well made and easy to follow, and she oftentimes incorporates the inspiration behind each yoga video.
With Gaia online, you can practice yoga anywhere and anytime. These videos stream, so you can select the style, teacher, level, length, and focus of the practice- and go! Some of our favorite teachers are on here from Matt Giordano, Tara Lee, Shiva Rea, Seane Corn, Rod Stryker, Leslie Kaminoff, Kathryn Budig, and Amy Ippoliti.
Yoga International is an amazing resource, with online resources, articles, and vidoes. They aim to nurture the mind, body, and spirit with their content. For those wanting to deepen their practice, they also have workshops and teachings that will leave you not only inspired, but feeling connected to a deep inner wisdom, from teachers like Pandit Rajmani Tigunait and Swami Rama.
Yoga Glo is a fantastic resource for those wanting to start a practice at home, for the cost of one studio class in person per month. They also offer classes from some of our favorite teachers, such as, Amy Ippoliti, Elena Brower, Jason Crandell, Kathryn Budig, Rod Stryker, Seane Corn, Taylor Harkness, and Tiffany Cruikshank.
Why do we recommend the teachers that we do? They offer a range of expertise, different styles of practices, different ages, different genders, and offer, in our opinion, a beautiful example of what yoga looks like when it is taken off the mat and lived in the world- both inspiring others and being responsible and accountable to the values of yoga. That said, here are some people that we are inspired by and links to find out more about them:
Taylor Harkness- http://taylorharkness.com/
Tiffany Cruikshank- https://www.facebook.com/tiffanycruikshankyoga
Seane Corn- http://seanecorn.com/
Rod Stryker- https://www.parayoga.com/
Kathryn Budig- http://www.kathrynbudig.com/
Jason Crandell- https://www.jasonyoga.com/
Elena Brower- https://elenabrower.com/
Ami Ippoliti- http://www.amyippoliti.com/
Matt Giordano- https://www.theyogimatt.com/
Leslie Kaminoff- https://www.yogaanatomy.org/
Amy Green, LMSW, is a counselor and the Chief Operating Officer of Ready Nest Counseling. She specializes in trauma informed care and maternal mental health, focusing on perinatal mood disorders and grief surrounding traumatic childbirth or infant loss. Amy provides comprehensive care through a combination of mind-body modalities and is passionate about sharing practices of self-care to increase wellness in the lives of others. Amy has her Masters in Social Work and is also trained as a breath coach hosting sessions and workshops at Lakshmi Ayurveda Nashville, and is a Registered Yoga Teacher presently teaching prenatal yoga at Blooma Nashville. She has been a Guest Lecturer at the University of Tennessee Masters in Social Work program teaching on trauma informed care and child and adolescent treatment. Amy will soon be featured on New Focus Network with A Breath of Fresh Awe, a new program that features stories, practices, and movements for your soul.
Wednesday, September 5, 2018
NEW on New Focus Daily-- It’s all about Yoga
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Wednesday, September 20, 2017
Starting a Yoga Practice -Celebrating National Yoga Month
If you have never tried yoga before, it can feel intimidating to see people in handstands in pictures on social media and find the courage to then go to a class. Remember, everyone had to start somewhere, and there is a lot more to a yoga practice than a handstand.
As recommended in our first article, it is recommended that you start off by finding a local studio to begin your practice. Teachers have been certified in yoga, have gone through training programs, and are there to support you to master alignment and learn the flow of the class. Again, try a few different styles of yoga with a few different teachers, and learn what feels best to you. There are many great books and online resources nowadays, however there is no substitute to learning directly from a teacher.
Some tips for your first yoga class:
- You will want to wear loose, comfortable clothing.
- While most studios have mats that you can either rent or use, you may want to check ahead of time, and bring a mat with you if possible.
- You may be using other props that the studio has during class to maximize your practice- this could be a block, yoga strap, bolster, and yoga blanket.
- When you lay out your mat, you will want to give yourself some space in between the people next to you.
- Oftentimes when you arrive to class you may notice that other students will be sitting on their mats or stretching before class starts.
- In a typical class, you will start off with a form of a ritual, and this ritual may look different depending on the teacher. Examples of this can be: chanting, breathing exercise, meditation, or setting an intention.
- The class will then move into warm up poses, more vigorous poses, some deeper stretches, and final relaxation. In any class you can always go into child’s pose if you need to rest.
- After your first class, you may be a little sore.
It is typical to feel in the first class like you are a little behind, as you are learning the poses and postures, how they feel in your body, and that is to be expected. It can feel awkward and uncomfortable, and the one of the benefits of yoga is learning how to stay when there is discomfort and breathe into it. So if you begin to feel anxious or nervous at all, try to invite a deep breath in and out a few times and remind yourself that everyone in that room was or is a beginner at some point. Yoga has a beautiful community where people from all walks of life, ages, races, genders, and backgrounds come to invite in greater peace, relaxation, and health. You will find a space who generally are positive, open-minded, and non-judgmental and who will cheerlead you on as you grow and challenge yourself!
Amy Green, LMSW, is a counselor and the Chief Operating Officer of Ready Nest Counseling. She specializes in trauma informed care and maternal mental health, focusing on perinatal mood disorders and grief surrounding traumatic childbirth or infant loss. Amy provides comprehensive care through a combination of mind-body modalities and is passionate about sharing practices of self-care to increase wellness in the lives of others. Amy has her Masters in Social Work and is also trained as a breath coach hosting sessions and workshops at Lakshmi Ayurveda Nashville, and is a Registered Yoga Teacher presently teaching prenatal yoga at Blooma Nashville. She has been a Guest Lecturer at the University of Tennessee Masters in Social Work program teaching on trauma informed care and child and adolescent treatment. Amy will soon be featured on New Focus Network with A Breath of Fresh Awe, a new program that features stories, practices, and movements for your soul.
Monday, September 4, 2017
September is National Yoga Month. The basics.
Editors note: Over the next four weeks, we will have a weekly series on yoga providing you with information on the benefits of yoga and provide you with practices that you can start in your home.
Yoga is a commonly used term that covers the physical practice and poses, and also has a much richer and deeper meaning beyond just the physical practice. Yoga does more than just burn calories, increase strength and flexibility. The practice of yoga has been around for more than 5,000 years, so this is not a fad that will fade away anytime soon.
Did you know that there are more than 100 different types of yoga? Some are fast paced, some are in hot studios, some are more intense, and others are restorative and relaxing. Here are just a few examples of the types of yoga practices you may find at a studio near you:
- Hatha- This is the most common form, and is associated with a series of basic movements with breathing.
- Vinyasa- Series of poses that flow smoothly into one another.
- Power- A faster, higher-intensity practice that builds muscle.
- Ashtanga- A series of poses, combined with a special breathing technique.
- Bikram- Also known as “hot yoga,” it is a series of 26 challenging poses performed in a room at a high temperature.
- Iyengar- A type of yoga that utilizes props to help you move your body into proper alignment.
The best way to learn what style you like is by going to multiple studios and trying out different classes with different teachers, and then reflecting on what class and movements feel best in your body and leave you feeling refueled and relaxed. To find studios near you, visit www.yelp.com to read different reviews, reach out to friends on Facebook or Instagram to find out their favorites, or visit www.yogafinder.com to search different yoga studios and find events near you. If it is your first time, ask the studio for a tour and overview of the yoga practices and what to expect.
Amy Green, LMSW, is a counselor and the Chief Operating Officer of Ready Nest Counseling. She specializes in trauma informed care and maternal mental health, focusing on perinatal mood disorders and grief surrounding traumatic childbirth or infant loss. Amy provides comprehensive care through a combination of mind-body modalities and is passionate about sharing practices of self-care to increase wellness in the lives of others. Amy has her Masters in Social Work and is also trained as a breath coach hosting sessions and workshops at Lakshmi Ayurveda Nashville, and is a Registered Yoga Teacher presently teaching prenatal yoga at Blooma Nashville. She has been a Guest Lecturer at the University of Tennessee Masters in Social Work program teaching on trauma informed care and child and adolescent treatment. Amy will soon be featured on New Focus Network with A Breath of Fresh Awe, a new program that features stories, practices, and movements for your soul.
Friday, July 20, 2018
Ignatian Yoga Summer 2018 Newsletter
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