Feedback From the Field: Wrist Modifications
In a previous issue of Inner IDEA Body-Mind-Spirit Review, we asked: What kind of modifications do you offer for yoga participants who complain of wrist pain? Here’s what you had to say.
Yoga for Recovering Addicts
Whether it is an addiction to cigarettes or food, alcohol or television, hard drugs or shopping, compulsive behaviors can take over. The cravings might be seemingly harmless ones that lurk beneath the surface of a functioning life, or they might be immediately and obviously devastating. For some, these patterns sever relationships, put jobs at stake, and cause serious or financial risk. For others, these habits might simply impede a sense of physical, mental or spiritual wholeness.
Sample Class: Body-Mind Fusion
Fusion classes typically combine two or
more formats, equipment choices and
training methods. Sometimes these cross-
training opportunities can yield more benefits
than practicing a single discipline. This
sample class draws from the influences of
yoga, Pilates, tai chi and the Feldenkrais
Method®. Feel free to replicate the class exactly,
or use it to stimulate your creative
…
Yoga Lesson Plan 4: Finding Focus
About this series: Each lesson plan provides both a physical focus, to guide your choice of postures, and a practice focus, to help students explore an important principle of yoga practice. The intention of the series is to present guidelines for creating a coherent and thoughtful class experience, with suggestions broad enough to allow you to choose poses that are appropriate for your students.
Yoga Fusion
Participants sometimes have a difficult time making the transition from the work phase of class to the final section, and it can be a challenge to help them rein in their thoughts and concentrate. This yoga and tai chi-inspired cool-down moves from active recovery to flexibility exercises, ending on a positive wellness note that participants will appreciate.
Making Fitness Easy
When it comes to exercise, everybody's got an excuse. Or 10. "I had a list," says Farai Chideya, a 36-year-old Los Angeles journalist who recently began lifting weights and taking dance classes. "I'm too busy. Maybe I'll hurt myself. Shouldn't I be out meeting new people instead?"Despite the well-documented health benefits of exercise, fewer than…
Yoga for Recovering Addicts
As yoga styles proliferate, more programs are targeting specific niche groups who can benefit from yoga’s unique blend of body, mind and spirit. One of these groups consists of recovering addicts. In the 1970s, Superhealth, a pioneering alternative health center for the treatment of addictions in Tuscon, Arizona,
offered heroin addicts recovery services based on kundalini yoga, di…
Iyengar Yoga Promotes Well-Being in Cancer Survivors
Last year alone some 213,000 women were diagnosed with breast cancer. The good news is that 2 million women have survived. Many women with breast cancer seek complementary interventions that will enhance their quality of life. However, research is lacking about whether programs such as yoga also benefit immune function.
Survey Finds Personal Training on Top; Aerobics on Decline
SAN DIEGO-Personal training still is the most successful program for retaining newcomers, according to a survey by IDEA Health & Fitness Association.The survey showed a growing trend toward putting people first before choosing the mode of exercise, which is reinforced by the variety of programs now available to meet a wide range of consumer needs regardless of age or physical condition, say…
Wet workout
When you think of using the pool for fitness, you probably imagine swimmers doing laps. Although swimming is a fantastic workout, it's time to rethink the pool as another frontier of fitness, a liquid athletic training ground, if you will.So say goodbye to aqua aerobics, and make way for a new generation of water-based classes.This summer, instructors across the country have been exp…
Twist the day away with Gyrotonic
Sabrina Aspesi straddles a wood and metal exercise machine that resembles a reincarnation of a medieval torture rack – complete with pulleys, chains and weight plates. Her torso bends forward and back, arms and hands pushing and pulling two large knobs in fluid, sweeping, circular movements – as if stirring a giant vat of milk.This is the Gyrotonic workout, a regimen that some fitness-in…
Teaching Restorative Yoga
Students come to a restorative class to let go of the stresses of everyday life—including the need to do things right and the constant pressure to improve or to achieve. The teacher who understands that motivation can provide a yoga practice that goes well beyond a few relaxing stretches and gives students permission to truly let go.
First Annual Symposium on Yoga Therapy and Research
Larry Payne, PhD, founding president of the International Association of Yoga Therapists (IAYT), Richard Miller, PhD, co-founder of IAYT, and 800 participants in the growing field of yoga therapy met in Los Angeles, January 18–21, 2007, to kick off the first annual Symposium on Yoga Therapy and Research.
The symposium provided a forum for yoga teachers, therapists and researchers …
Yoga and Pilates More Popular on Their Own
Although those who offer classes that
fuse yoga or Pilates with other
modalities expect these types
of sessions to grow, so far
they have not taken off.
Pilates and yoga remain
independent activities.
This section of the article is still in the process of conversion to the web….
Concern Over Yoga in Schools Is Resolved
Simply eliminating Sanskrit terms and chanting practices from yoga classes can be enough to ease concerns that yoga could have religious overtones.
Some instructors wanting to teach yoga in public schools have faced
resistance from worried parents, reports the Associated Press. According to yoga instructor Tara Guber, Christian fundamentalists and secular parents lobbied the sc…
Feedback From the Field – Fusing Yoga Styles
In the last issue of Inner IDEA Body-Mind-Spirit Review, we asked Do you teach a different style of yoga than you personally practice? What is your philosophy on fusing yoga styles? Here’s what you had to say.
Feedback From the Field – Fusing Yoga Styles
In the last issue of Inner IDEA Body-Mind-Spirit Review, we asked Do you teach a different style of yoga than you personally practice? What is your philosophy on fusing yoga styles? Here’s what you had to say.
Yoga Aids Computer Users
Yoga instructors may want to incorporate traditional vision exercises into classes in order to benefit participants who work daily at computer screens. Computer workers who practiced yoga for 60 days improved visual comfort and reduced “dry eye,” according to a study published in Head & Face Medicine (2006; 2 [46]; www….
Presence: The Power of Intention
Every person attending a yoga or Pilates class does so with an intention in mind. Quite simply, an intention is a commitment to achieve some specific purpose. The intention of an exerciser might relate directly to improving health or enhancing physical appearance ? or it might be limited to making social contacts.
Yoga Aids Computer Users
Yoga instructors may want to incorporate traditional vision exercises into classes in order to benefit participants who work daily at computer screens. Computer workers who practiced yoga for 60 days improved visual comfort and reduced “dry eye,” according to a study published in Head & Face Medicine.
