38 Ways Yoga Keeps You Fit

By Timothy McCall

Flex Time
1 Improved flexibility is one of the first and most obvious benefits of yoga. During your first class, you probably won't be able to touch your toes, never mind do a backbend. But if you stick with it, you'll notice a gradual loosening, and eventually, seemingly impossible poses will become possible. You'll also probably notice that aches and pains start to disappear. That's no coincidence. Tight hips can strain the knee joint due to improper alignment of the thigh and shinbones. Tight hamstrings can lead to a flattening of the lumbar spine, which can cause back pain. And inflexibility in muscles and connective tissue, such as fascia and ligaments, can cause poor posture.

Strength Test
2 Strong muscles do more than look good. They also protect us from conditions like arthritis and back pain, and help prevent falls in elderly people. And when you build strength through yoga, you balance it with flexibility. If you just went to the gym and lifted weights, you might build strength at the expense of flexibility.

Standing Orders
3 Your head is like a bowling ball—big, round, and heavy. When it’s balanced directly over an erect spine, it takes much less work for your neck and back muscles to support it. Move it several inches forward, however, and you start to strain those muscles. Hold up that forward-leaning bowling ball for eight or 12 hours a day and it’s no wonder you’re tired. And fatigue might not be your only problem. Poor posture can cause back, neck, and other muscle and joint problems. As you slump, your body may compensate by flattening the normal inward curves in your neck and lower back. This can cause pain and degenerative arthritis of the spine.

Joint Account
4 Each time you practice yoga, you take your joints through their full range of motion. This can help prevent degenerative arthritis or mitigate disability by "squeezing and soaking" areas of cartilage that normally aren't used. Joint cartilage is like a sponge; it receives fresh nutrients only when its fluid is squeezed out and a new supply can be soaked up. Without proper sustenance, neglected areas of cartilage can eventually wear out, exposing the underlying bone like worn-out brake pads.

Spinal Rap
5 Spinal disks—the shock absorbers between the vertebrae that can herniate and compress nerves—crave movement. That's the only way they get their nutrients. If you've got a well-balanced asana practice with plenty of backbends, forward bends, and twists, you'll help keep your disks supple.

Bone Zone
6 It's well documented that weight-bearing exercise strengthens bones and helps ward off osteoporosis. Many postures in yoga require that you lift your own weight. And some, like Downward- and Upward-Facing Dog, help strengthen the arm bones, which are particularly vulnerable to osteoporotic fractures. In an unpublished study conducted at California State University, Los Angeles, yoga practice increased bone density in the vertebrae. Yoga's ability to lower levels of the stress hormone cortisol (see Number 11) may help keep calcium in the bones.

Flow Chart
7 Yoga gets your blood flowing. More specifically, the relaxation exercises you learn in yoga can help your circulation, especially in your hands and feet. Yoga also gets more oxygen to your cells, which function better as a result. Twisting poses are thought to wring out venous blood from internal organs and allow oxygenated blood to flow in once the twist is released. Inverted poses, such as Headstand, Handstand, and Shoulderstand, encourage venous blood from the legs and pelvis to flow back to the heart, where it can be pumped to the lungs to be freshly oxygenated. This can help if you have swelling in your legs from heart or kidney problems. Yoga also boosts levels of hemoglobin and red blood cells, which carry oxygen to the tissues. And it thins the blood by making platelets less sticky and by cutting the level of clot-promoting proteins in the blood. This can lead to a decrease in heart attacks and strokes since blood clots are often the cause of these killers.

Lymph Lesson
8 When you contract and stretch muscles, move organs around, and come in and out of yoga postures, you increase the drainage of lymph (a viscous fluid rich in immune cells). This helps the lymphatic system fight infection, destroy cancerous cells, and dispose of the toxic waste products of cellular functioning.

Heart Start
9 When you regularly get your heart rate into the aerobic range, you lower your risk of heart attack and can relieve depression. While not all yoga is aerobic, if you do it vigorously or take flow or Ashtanga classes, it can boost your heart rate into the aerobic range. But even yoga exercises that don't get your heart rate up that high can improve cardiovascular conditioning. Studies have found that yoga practice lowers the resting heart rate, increases endurance, and can improve your maximum uptake of oxygen during exercise—all reflections of improved aerobic conditioning. One study found that subjects who were taught only pranayama could do more exercise with less oxygen.

Pressure Drop
10 If you've got high blood pressure, you might benefit from yoga. Two studies of people with hypertension, published in the British medical journal The Lancet, compared the effects of Savasana (Corpse Pose) with simply lying on a couch. After three months, Savasana was associated with a 26-point drop in systolic blood pressure (the top number) and a 15-point drop in diastolic blood pressure (the bottom number)—and the higher the initial blood pressure, the bigger the drop.

Worry Thwarts
11 Yoga lowers cortisol levels. If that doesn't sound like much, consider this. Normally, the adrenal glands secrete cortisol in response to an acute crisis, which temporarily boosts immune function. If your cortisol levels stay high even after the crisis, they can compromise the immune system. Temporary boosts of cortisol help with long-term memory, but chronically high levels undermine memory and may lead to permanent changes in the brain. Additionally, excessive cortisol has been linked with major depression, osteoporosis (it extracts calcium and other minerals from bones and interferes with the laying down of new bone), high blood pressure, and insulin resistance. In rats, high cortisol levels lead to what researchers call "food-seeking behavior" (the kind that drives you to eat when you're upset, angry, or stressed). The body takes those extra calories and distributes them as fat in the abdomen, contributing to weight gain and the risk of diabetes and heart attack.

Happy Hour

12 Feeling sad? Sit in Lotus. Better yet, rise up into a backbend or soar royally into King Dancer Pose. While it’s not as simple as that, one study found that a consistent yoga practice improved depression and led to a significant increase in serotonin levels and a decrease in the levels of monoamine oxidase (an enzyme that breaks down neurotransmitters) and cortisol. At the University of Wisconsin, Richard Davidson, Ph.D., found that the left prefrontal cortex showed heightened activity in meditators, a finding that has been correlated with greater levels of happiness and better immune function. More dramatic left-sided activation was found in dedicated, long-term practitioners.

Weighty Matters
13 Move more, eat less—that's the adage of many a dieter. Yoga can help on both fronts. A regular practice gets you moving and burns calories, and the spiritual and emotional dimensions of your practice may encourage you to address any eating and weight problems on a deeper level. Yoga may also inspire you to become a more conscious eater.

Low Show
14 Yoga lowers blood sugar and LDL ("bad") cholesterol and boosts HDL ("good") cholesterol. In people with diabetes, yoga has been found to lower blood sugar in several ways: by lowering cortisol and adrenaline levels, encouraging weight loss, and improving sensitivity to the effects of insulin. Get your blood sugar levels down, and you decrease your risk of diabetic complications such as heart attack, kidney failure, and blindness.

Brain Waves

15 An important component of yoga is focusing on the present. Studies have found that regular yoga practice improves coordination, reaction time, memory, and even IQ scores. People who practice Transcendental Meditation demonstrate the ability to solve problems and acquire and recall information better—probably because they’re less distracted by their thoughts, which can play over and over like an endless tape loop.

Nerve Center
16 Yoga encourages you to relax, slow your breath, and focus on the present, shifting the balance from the sympathetic nervous system (or the fight-or-flight response) to the parasympathetic nervous system. The latter is calming and restorative; it lowers breathing and heart rates, decreases blood pressure, and increases blood flow to the intestines and reproductive organs—comprising what Herbert Benson, M.D., calls the relaxation response.

Space Place
17 Regularly practicing yoga increases proprioception (the ability to feel what your body is doing and where it is in space) and improves balance. People with bad posture or dysfunctional movement patterns usually have poor proprioception, which has been linked to knee problems and back pain. Better balance could mean fewer falls. For the elderly, this translates into more independence and delayed admission to a nursing home or never entering one at all. For the rest of us, postures like Tree Pose can make us feel less wobbly on and off the mat.

Control Center
18 Some advanced yogis can control their bodies in extraordinary ways, many of which are mediated by the nervous system. Scientists have monitored yogis who could induce unusual heart rhythms, generate specific brain-wave patterns, and, using a meditation technique, raise the temperature of their hands by 15 degrees Fahrenheit. If they can use yoga to do that, perhaps you could learn to improve blood flow to your pelvis if you're trying to get pregnant or induce relaxation when you're having trouble falling asleep.

Loose Limbs
19 Do you ever notice yourself holding the telephone or a steering wheel with a death grip or scrunching your face when staring at a computer screen? These unconscious habits can lead to chronic tension, muscle fatigue, and soreness in the wrists, arms, shoulders, neck, and face, which can increase stress and worsen your mood. As you practice yoga, you begin to notice where you hold tension: It might be in your tongue, your eyes, or the muscles of your face and neck. If you simply tune in, you may be able to release some tension in the tongue and eyes. With bigger muscles like the quadriceps, trapezius, and buttocks, it may take years of practice to learn how to relax them.

Chill Pill
20 Stimulation is good, but too much of it taxes the nervous system. Yoga can provide relief from the hustle and bustle of modern life. Restorative asana, yoga nidra (a form of guided relaxation), Savasana, pranayama, and meditation encourage pratyahara, a turning inward of the senses, which provides downtime for the nervous system. Another by-product of a regular yoga practice, studies suggest, is better sleep—which means you'll be less tired and stressed and less likely to have accidents.

Immune Boon
21 Asana and pranayama probably improve immune function, but, so far, meditation has the strongest scientific support in this area. It appears to have a beneficial effect on the functioning of the immune system, boosting it when needed (for example, raising antibody levels in response to a vaccine) and lowering it when needed (for instance, mitigating an inappropriately aggressive immune function in an autoimmune disease like psoriasis).

Breathing Room
22 Yogis tend to take fewer breaths of greater volume, which is both calming and more efficient. A 1998 study published in The Lancet taught a yogic technique known as "complete breathing" to people with lung problems due to congestive heart failure. After one month, their average respiratory rate decreased from 13.4 breaths per minute to 7.6. Meanwhile, their exercise capacity increased significantly, as did the oxygen saturation of their blood. In addition, yoga has been shown to improve various measures of lung function, including the maximum volume of the breath and the efficiency of the exhalation. Yoga also promotes breathing through the nose, which filters the air, warms it (cold, dry air is more likely to trigger an asthma attack in people who are sensitive), and humidifies it, removing pollen and dirt and other things you'd rather not take into your lungs.

Poop Scoop
23 Ulcers, irritable bowel syndrome, constipation—all of these can be exacerbated by stress. So if you stress less, you'll suffer less. Yoga, like any physical exercise, can ease constipation—and theoretically lower the risk of colon cancer—because moving the body facilitates more rapid transport of food and waste products through the bowels. And, although it has not been studied scientifically, yogis suspect that twisting poses may be beneficial in getting waste to move through the system.

Peace of Mind
24 Yoga quells the fluctuations of the mind, according to Patanjali's Yoga Sutra. In other words, it slows down the mental loops of frustration, regret, anger, fear, and desire that can cause stress. And since stress is implicated in so many health problems—from migraines and insomnia to lupus, MS, eczema, high blood pressure, and heart attacks—if you learn to quiet your mind, you'll be likely to live longer and healthier.

Divine Sign
25 Many of us suffer from chronic low self-esteem. If you handle this negatively—take drugs, overeat, work too hard, sleep around—you may pay the price in poorer health physically, mentally, and spiritually. If you take a positive approach and practice yoga, you'll sense, initially in brief glimpses and later in more sustained views, that you're worthwhile or, as yogic philosophy teaches, that you are a manifestation of the Divine. If you practice regularly with an intention of self-examination and betterment—not just as a substitute for an aerobics class—you can access a different side of yourself. You'll experience feelings of gratitude, empathy, and forgiveness, as well as a sense that you're part of something bigger. While better health is not the goal of spirituality, it's often a by-product, as documented by repeated scientific studies.

Pain Drain
26 Yoga can ease your pain. According to several studies, asana, meditation, or a combination of the two, reduced pain in people with arthritis, back pain, fibromyalgia, carpal tunnel syndrome, and other chronic conditions. When you relieve your pain, your mood improves, you're more inclined to be active, and you don't need as much medication.

Heat Treatment
27 Yoga can help you make changes in your life. In fact, that might be its greatest strength. Tapas, the Sanskrit word for "heat," is the fire, the discipline that fuels yoga practice and that regular practice builds. The tapas you develop can be extended to the rest of your life to overcome inertia and change dysfunctional habits. You may find that without making a particular effort to change things, you start to eat better, exercise more, or finally quit smoking after years of failed attempts.

Guru Gifts
28 Good yoga teachers can do wonders for your health. Exceptional ones do more than guide you through the postures. They can adjust your posture, gauge when you should go deeper in poses or back off, deliver hard truths with compassion, help you relax, and enhance and personalize your practice. A respectful relationship with a teacher goes a long way toward promoting your health.

Drug Free
29 If your medicine cabinet looks like a pharmacy, maybe it's time to try yoga. Studies of people with asthma, high blood pressure, Type II diabetes (formerly called adult-onset diabetes), and obsessive-compulsive disorder have shown that yoga helped them lower their dosage of medications and sometimes get off them entirely. The benefits of taking fewer drugs? You'll spend less money, and you're less likely to suffer side effects and risk dangerous drug interactions.

Hostile Makeover
30 Yoga and meditation build awareness. And the more aware you are, the easier it is to break free of destructive emotions like anger. Studies suggest that chronic anger and hostility are as strongly linked to heart attacks as are smoking, diabetes, and elevated cholesterol. Yoga appears to reduce anger by increasing feelings of compassion and interconnection and by calming the nervous system and the mind. It also increases your ability to step back from the drama of your own life, to remain steady in the face of bad news or unsettling events. You can still react quickly when you need to—and there's evidence that yoga speeds reaction time—but you can take that split second to choose a more thoughtful approach, reducing suffering for yourself and others.

Good Relations
31 Love may not conquer all, but it certainly can aid in healing. Cultivating the emotional support of friends, family, and community has been demonstrated repeatedly to improve health and healing. A regular yoga practice helps develop friendliness, compassion, and greater equanimity. Along with yogic philosophy's emphasis on avoiding harm to others, telling the truth, and taking only what you need, this may improve many of your relationships.

Sound System
32 The basics of yoga—asana, pranayama, and meditation—all work to improve your health, but there's more in the yoga toolbox. Consider chanting. It tends to prolong exhalation, which shifts the balance toward the parasympathetic nervous system. When done in a group, chanting can be a particularly powerful physical and emotional experience. A recent study from Sweden's Karolinska Institute suggests that humming sounds—like those made while chanting Om—open the sinuses and facilitate drainage.

Vision Quest
33 If you contemplate an image in your mind's eye, as you do in yoga nidra and other practices, you can effect change in your body. Several studies have found that guided imagery reduced postoperative pain, decreased the frequency of headaches, and improved the quality of life for people with cancer and HIV.

Clean Machine
34 Kriyas, or cleansing practices, are another element of yoga. They include everything from rapid breathing exercises to elaborate internal cleansings of the intestines. Jala neti, which entails a gentle lavage of the nasal passages with salt water, removes pollen and viruses from the nose, keeps mucus from building up, and helps drains the sinuses.

Karma Concept
35 Karma yoga (service to others) is integral to yogic philosophy. And while you may not be inclined to serve others, your health might improve if you do. A study at the University of Michigan found that older people who volunteered a little less than an hour per week were three times as likely to be alive seven years later. Serving others can give meaning to your life, and your problems may not seem so daunting when you see what other people are dealing with.

Healing Hope
36 In much of conventional medicine, most patients are passive recipients of care. In yoga, it's what you do for yourself that matters. Yoga gives you the tools to help you change, and you might start to feel better the first time you try practicing. You may also notice that the more you commit to practice, the more you benefit. This results in three things: You get involved in your own care, you discover that your involvement gives you the power to effect change, and seeing that you can effect change gives you hope. And hope itself can be healing.

Connective Tissue
37 As you read all the ways yoga improves your health, you probably noticed a lot of overlap. That's because they're intensely interwoven. Change your posture and you change the way you breathe. Change your breathing and you change your nervous system. This is one of the great lessons of yoga: Everything is connected—your hipbone to your anklebone, you to your community, your community to the world. This interconnection is vital to understanding yoga. This holistic system simultaneously taps into many mechanisms that have additive and even multiplicative effects. This synergy may be the most important way of all that yoga heals.

Placebo Power
38 Just believing you will get better can make you better. Unfortunately, many conventional scientists believe that if something works by eliciting the placebo effect, it doesn't count. But most patients just want to get better, so if chanting a mantra—like you might do at the beginning or end of yoga class or throughout a meditation or in the course of your day—facilitates healing, even if it's just a placebo effect, why not do it?

Block Steady

By Maty Ezraty with Melanie Lora

Many of us come to yoga to build strength. There's no question that when you're physically strong, you're better able to handle the demands of your day with grace and ease. But you can build endurance and power through almost any athletic pursuit. The beauty of practicing yoga is that it builds inner strength—which you need to ride life's emotional currents with faith and equanimity—even as it tones your body.

One way to build inner strength is by practicing regularly, whether you're feeling inspired or not. That simple act develops your capacity for commitment and for not letting the rest of life get between you and what you know to be essential to your well-being. By being true to yourself in your yoga practice, you enhance your ability to be true to yourself in other situations.

Of course, maintaining a consistent home practice is, in itself, an exercise in strength. At home, the notorious obstacles of procrastination, distraction, and skepticism come up all the time. To help dispel these stumbling blocks, choose a regular time and create a sacred space for your practice. It also helps to have several sequences on hand for those days when you're unsure of what to do next.

This sequence was designed specifically to build both physical strength, especially in your arms and upper back, and the mental strength you need to go upside down. (It's also good for enhancing the flexibility in your shoulders, which you'll need to get into Handstand.) Regardless of your ability to get into each of these poses, let this sequence be an opportunity to notice and experiment with your areas of strength and weakness. After practicing this sequence several times, you'll probably find that you can hold each pose a little longer. Enjoy each baby step to a stronger you.

Yoga for headache management

ayushveda.com

Yoga is a safe and alternate therapy for ensuring the overall well-being of a person as it is endowed with physical and spiritual healing powers. Taking out some time from one’s hectic daily schedule, one can practice the relaxing asanas and breathing exercises of yoga to achieve a rejuvenating and a healthy experience. Moreover, yoga helps in connecting a person with his inner energies thereby leading to physical, emotional and psychological well being of a person. Headaches are a common ailment in today’s world and they can be caused by various factors like stress, exhaustion, eyestrain, allergies and others. Instead of getting addicted to analgesics, one can try the harmless and effective therapy of yoga which can help in the effective treatment and prevention of headaches.

There are various yogic asanas and breathing exercises available for the problem of headaches. One of them includes Adho Mukha Svanasana which includes pushing one’s butt up towards the ceiling. Then one should push one’s hands and heels of feet into floor and let the head hang downwards. Pull belly button up into spine and breathe deeply. This helps in relieving pain and discomfort associated with headaches. Another exercise which can help during headaches is one which is known as the reclining pose. In this, one should gently roll one’s torso back to floor and close eyes and breathe deeply. Then one should close one’s eyes tightly followed by wide opening of one’s eyes. Roll eyes up and down and side wards. Rub heels of palm together until warm and place it gently over the eyes. This helps in relaxing your mind thereby removing all tensions and worries which might be leading to headaches.

Along with yogic asanas, one should also practice the simple inhalation and exhalation breathing exercise to calm and relax one’s mind. Performing alternate nostril breathing can be quite effective in subsiding the problem of headache. Thus, one can follow some simple yoga steps to relieve one from the discomfort of headaches.

Warrior II Pose

by Yoga Journal

Virabhadrasana II

(veer-ah-bah-DRAHS-anna)
Virabhadra = the name of a fierce warrior, an incarnation of Shiva, described as having a thousand heads, a thousand eyes, and a thousand feet, wielding a thousand clubs, and wearing a tiger's skin

Step by Step

Stand in Tadasana. With an exhalation, step or lightly jump your feet 3 1/2 to 4 feet apart. Raise your arms parallel to the floor and reach them actively out to the sides, shoulder blades wide, palms down.

Turn your right foot in slightly to the right and your left foot out to the left 90 degrees. Align the left heel with the right heel. Firm your thighs and turn your left thigh outward so that the center of the left knee cap is in line with the center of the left ankle.

Exhale and bend your left knee over the left ankle, so that the shin is perpendicular to the floor. If possible, bring the left thigh parallel to the floor. Anchor this movement of the left knee by strengthening the right leg and pressing the outer right heel firmly to the floor.

Stretch the arms away from the space between the shoulder blades, parallel to the floor. Don't lean the torso over the left thigh: Keep the sides of the torso equally long and the shoulders directly over the pelvis. Press the tailbone slightly toward the pubis. Turn the head to the left and look out over the fingers.

Stay for 30 seconds to 1 minute. Inhale to come up. Reverse the feet and repeat for the same length of time to the left.

Protect your knees and build strength and stability with this crucial standing pose.

By Julie Gudmestad

You'll probably never need to lunge forward, thighs burning, to desperately thrust a sword at a charging enemy. But the thigh and hip strength that ancient Indian warriors relied on is still useful in all sorts of everyday activities: climbing stairs, swooping to snag a wayward toddler, or bending your knees to lift a load of laundry without straining your back. Just as important, strong thighs and hips can help protect your knees from arthritis, injury, and chronic wear and tear.

Few poses beat Virabhadrasana II (Warrior Pose II) at strengthening your hips and thighs. As you might guess from the way your legs burn in a long Warrior II, the pose strongly works your quadriceps muscles, which make up the front of your thighs.

But Warrior II is not just about strength: It can also correct a common misalignment that can lead to many knee problems. To see if you have this misalignment, stand barelegged in front of a mirror. If your alignment is healthy, your kneecaps will point straight out over the midline of your feet. But you may find that your thighbone rotates inward in relation to your shinbone and that your kneecap points slightly inward, too. This position is bad news: It torques your knee, putting uneven pressure on the cartilage and straining the supporting ligaments and tendons every time you bend it.

Alignment First

Whenever you hear a yoga teacher say, "As you bend your knee, point your kneecap directly toward your middle toe," she's reminding you to stabilize your thighbone and knee in healthy alignment. But that's often easier said than done. Even if your alignment is fine when you're standing with straight legs, you may collapse your front knee inward when you come into Warrior II.

To correct this misalignment, you need to focus on two actions in Warrior II. The first is stretching your hip adductors. This large muscle group, which fills your inner thighs and pulls your knees toward each other, includes the pectineus, adductor brevis, adductor longus, adductor magnus, and gracilis. To get a good long passive stretch for these muscles, practice this pose lying on your back: Lie perpendicular to a wall, with your feet on the wall and your knees and hips each bent to 90 degrees, as though you were sitting on a chair that had tipped over backward. Then open your knees to the sides and move your feet farther apart so your shins remain perpendicular to the wall and parallel to the floor. Stay in this position for four or five breaths and allow your inner thighs to relax and stretch.

Next, still lying on your back, create the shape of Warrior II: Leaving your right foot where it is, straighten your left leg out to the side, turning your foot in slightly as you ground your sole on the wall. Place your left foot so that a line drawn between its arch and your right heel would be parallel to the floor. Stretch your arms out to the sides at shoulder height, and—voilà! —Warrior II. Stay for a minute or two, and then repeat to the other side.

Up Against the Wall

The other secret to proper alignment of the bent leg in Warrior II is engaging and strengthening the muscles that externally rotate your thigh. The main external rotators are the gluteus maximus and the six deep rotators that lie underneath it—the piriformis, obturator internus, obturator externus, gemellus superior, gemellus inferior, and quadratus femoris.

To get in touch with and build these muscles, stand with your back near the wall and your feet 4 to 41/2 feet apart. Turn your left foot in slightly and your right foot out 90 degrees, parallel to the wall, and set yourself up so your right hip is touching the wall. (Don't force your left hip to the wall, or you'll force your right knee out of alignment.) Watch your thigh and knee as you bend your right leg into Warrior II: Make sure your right thigh is parallel to the wall and your right knee points out over the center of your right foot. Next, place a tightly rolled yoga mat between the wall and your bent knee. Pressing your knee firmly into this prop, press through your left foot, keeping your left knee straight and your left thighbone pushing back toward the wall. You should feel your right hip rotators working deeply to hold your right knee and thighbone in proper alignment.

Now apply the lessons you learned at the wall to Warrior II in the middle of the room. Make your pose "all in one plane": Firm your right buttock and tuck it into your body; press both knees, but especially your right one, toward an imaginary wall at your back. Move in and out of the pose, taking care that your knee doesn't wobble inward as you make your transitions.

Defying Gravity

Once you start to open your hip adductors and strengthen your external hip rotators so you can align your thighs and knees safely in Warrior II, you can intensify the work on your quadriceps muscles. Filling the whole front of the thigh, the four quadriceps converge into a single tendon that attaches to the patella (kneecap) and then connects, via the patellar ligament, to the upper tibia (shinbone); three of the "quads" originate on the upper thighbone, while the fourth comes from the pelvis, above the hip socket.

As soon as you bend your leg, your quads have to contract, or gravity would pull you to the floor. To work your quads even harder in Warrior II, bring your front—leg thigh parallel to the floor—but don't let that knee collapse inward or the back-leg thigh and knee collapse forward.

Practice Makes Perfect

Warrior II gives you a perfect opportunity to practice good biomechanics over and over, consciously and slowly. Training the quads and hip muscles to support your knees in their optimal, nontwisted alignment while you're bending your legs in yoga means you'll be less likely to hurt or strain your knees. But you can also extend these lessons to your daily life. Look down at each knee as you walk up stairs. As you place your right foot on the next step and begin to shift weight onto it, make sure you keep your knee centered over your foot. Also check to see whether you're using good alignment when you go down stairs, pedal your bike, or half-squat to pick up a child.

As you practice good alignment in Warrior II, you can learn healthy movement patterns with your body, not just with your intellect—so you'll be more likely to use these patterns in everything you do. And since Warrior II builds stronger quads, you'll have more leg power for when you need to lift a heavy load at the grocery store or in your yard—and that will help prevent back injuries caused by poor body mechanics. All in all, Warrior II can set the stage for a healthier yoga practice and a more active life for decades to come.

Ayurvedic Food Fighters

By Alice Lesch Kelly

Researchers point to nutritional imbalances as a possible cause of chronic fatigue syndrome. Many CFS patients find they are sensitive to foods and drinks they were once able to tolerate. They may also find that a variety of foods and food additives—caffeine, alcohol, chocolate, dairy products, and dyes, among other things—trigger CFS symptoms.

Ayurvedic practitioners go one step further, suggesting that by making food choices in the Ayurvedic tradition, CFS sufferers can find greater relief. Robert Svoboda, an Ayurvedic physician, says Ayurvedic dietary changes help restore energy, and he advises people with CFS to eat a vata-controlling diet. "They need to drink soup and eat food that's very mild—not too hot, not too cold," he says. "It should be spiced, but mildly spiced. Also, they should not consume anything that's cold, especially cold water and ice cream. They should drink hot water only." He also recommends a diet low in protein, because protein demands great quantities of energy to digest and produces heaps of nitrogenous wastes. "You want a small amount of protein and a balance of carbohydrates and fats all cooked into one soup or a juicy one-pot meal, so your organism doesn't require a lot of energy to digest."

Svoboda also recommends avoiding foods that contain caffeine or concentrated sugars. "These are so concentrated that they cause your system to go into a tizzy, overreact, and make the fatigue worse."

Eat, Drink, and Be Healthy

By Niika Quistgard

A little indulgence is natural at holiday parties. But get carried away and you'll end up bloated, tired, and bummed out. According to Ayurvedic principles, there's a physiological reason for this: When you eat in moderation, your body and mind are happy. But when you eat too much, you overwhelm your agni (the digestive fire), creating chaos in your belly and inviting unpleasant imbalances such as gas, weight gain, and depression.

Thankfully, you don't have to possess superhuman strength to tame your urge to overeat. Even as your favorite dessert beckons, a few simple strategies can help you resist. Be mindful of multitasking, for instance, and try to avoid too much stimulation. If you find yourself mingling, chatting, noshing, and sipping all at the same time, you're less likely to enjoy your food, which will leave you hankering for more. What's more, you probably won't recognize when you're full.

So take a few moments to let someone else be the life of the party while you eat silently. There's nothing wrong with enjoying delicious food-the key is finding ways to be present so you can enjoy but not overdo.

Tips to make standing poses a breeze to master

By Jason Crandell

Standing poses are the foundation of many contemporary styles of hatha yoga. They're accessible, easy to modify, and extremely thorough: They cultivate strength,suppleness, and awareness in your feet, legs, pelvis, torso, shoulders, and arms. They also increase vitality, counteracting the effects of a sedentary life.

Standing poses can provide insight into your restrictions, illuminating areas that feel particularly tight and bound, sensitive and vulnerable, or weak and unstable. When the going gets tough in these poses, you can observe your reactions and habitual responses to dif½cult situations. While the shapes of the asanas may differ, these tips apply to all standing poses.

WAKE UP YOUR LOWER HALF The legs are the workhorses of the body. They support, stabilize, and propel you with vitality and ease. Your feet are, by design, beautifully intricate, complex, and responsive. When your legs and feet aren't taken through their natural range of motion, they become stagnant and dull—imagine a horse never taken out of its stable. Standing poses stretch and strengthen the legs and feet so they function optimally. Working your legs thoroughly also improves circulation, supports digestion, and energizes the entire body.

STAY STRAIGHT Standing poses increase your awareness of body alignment. You can observe how your feet align with your legs and pelvis, how your arms align with your shoulders and chest, and so on. As you refine this awareness, you cultivate greater physical integration and develop increased physical stability.

STAND YOUR GROUND Many of us are overworked and overstimulated mentally but out of shape physically. Our bodies are lethargic and dull. Standing poses ask us to focus intensely, yet quietly, on the body. This type of attention soothes the mind, lessening psychological tension and grounding you emotionally.

FIND BALANCE Standing poses require an even distribution of weight between both legs. You must also root evenly through the front, back, and sides of each foot. When you establish this, you can more easily find your center. This makes it easier to find your balance in other poses, and perhaps even in life.

ARM BALANCE Different standing poses stretch, align, and strengthen your arms in different ways. When you practice a series of them, you take your shoulders through a range of movements, which increases mobility and releases tension in the upper body.

GO FORTH Since standing poses create stability, suppleness, and awareness in your legs, hips, torso, and shoulders, they are the perfect poses to prepare your body for other asanas.

Yoga Remedy for Colds

by Anmol Mehta

To help fight off colds and better still, to help prevent them in the first place, practice Kapalbhati Pranayama. This pranayama is one of the best ways to boost your health and immune system. It also generates heat in the body to offset the Kapha/Vata imbalance and helps clear of system of congestion.

For Kapalbhati pranayama sit up in a comfortable position and then breath putting force on the exhalation, while leaving the inhalation passive. So you will sharply exhale through the nose, allowing the navel to naturally contract inwards, then follow it up with a passive inhalation.

Another pranayama that is great for battling colds and the flu, boosting internal heat, detoxifying and building your immune system is the potent Kundalini Yoga Breath of Fire Breathing Exercise.

To practice Breath of Fire, sit up in a comfortable posture, keeping the back straight and then begin to breathe rapidly through the nose putting equal emphasis on the inhalation and exhalation. The stomach will pulse on it's own. The key to breath of fire is to focus the breath at the tip of the nose and not force the breathing using the diaphragm. It is like very fast sniffing.

A Woman's Balance: Inversions and Menstruation

Mary P. Schatz, M.D. 6/25/2002

Yoga teaches us balance: balance of the body in relation to gravity; balance of the mind between action and observation; and balance of the neuroendocrine system between stress and relaxation. Through a regular yoga practice we learn which poses are effective in re-establishing balance in some aspect of our existence. In this ancient discipline as taught by B.K.S. Iyengar, there are poses that are particularly useful during the menstrual period. These poses ease menstrual cramps, heavy bleeding, pelvic discomfort and the low back pain associated with menses They are also effective in smoothing out the emotional rough edges some women encounter at this time of their cycle.

Geeta S. Iyengar, Mr. Iyengar's daughter and a yoga teacher at his Ramamani Iyengar Memorial Yoga Institute in Poona, India, has a particularly strong interest and great experience in yoga for women. Recommendations on the poses in this article are from Geeta's basic principles.

Just as some poses are helpful at period-time, other poses should be avoided. Many women ask if these recommendations stem from a cultural tradition that is sexist, and yoga teachers are often reluctant to tell menstruating students not to participate in parts of the class, lest they feel singled out and ostracized. These guidelines are not sexist, however, they are based on sound physiologic knowledge and time-tested applications of yogic principles to women's special needs. We are cyclic beings. Denying that we are does violence to the basic principles of self-understanding we seek through yoga.

The menstrual period should no longer be dreaded as "the curse." Instead, in combination with a special menstrual yoga practice, it can be welcomed as a time for going within, for allowing ourselves to be in low energy. Use this time to experience different aspects of your nature and your yoga practice. So often we are drawn to the exhilaration of the standing poses, arm balances and backbends. These are great fun and immediately rewarding, as they suffuse us with energy. But a practice that is always high-energy needs to be balanced by the quiet and peace low-energy yoga can offer. The menstrual period is a perfect time to vary one's practice and turn inward.

Poses to Avoid During The Menstrual Period

Inversions: Inversions are not recommended during the menstrual period for philosophic as well as physiologic reasons.

During the menses, the pelvic vascular bed contains more blood than at other times of the cycle. The uterine blood supply enters the uterus from the right and left sides of the pelvis. These blood vessels are located in the broad ligaments that suspend the uterus from the pelvis. The uterine arteries are thick-walled and muscular. The uterine veins are thin-walled and easily collapsed.

During inversions, the uterus is pulled toward the head by gravity, causing the broad ligaments to be stretched. This can cause stretch and partial collapse or occlusion of the thin-walled veins, while allowing the uncollapsed arteries to continue to pump in blood. Thus, more blood enters the uterus via the arteries than can be carried away by the veins. The vascular congestion that results can lead to increased menstrual bleeding.

Hindu philosophy teaches that during menses the direction of energy is down and out of the body. This flow should not be obstructed or reversed as it is in inversions.

There have been numerous misconceptions about why to avoid inversions. I would like to dispel two of them:

Endometriosis : Endometriosis is a condition in which small areas of endometrial tissue (uterine lining) develop on the surface of the pelvic and abdominal organs. This tissue responds to the hormones of the fertility cycle. When menstruation occurs, these foci of endometriosis break down and bleed just as the uterine lining does. But since there is no exit for this flow, scarring and adhesions result. This can cause pain and infertility.

It was once thought that endometriosis resulted from the escape of small bits of menstrual endometrium through the fallopian tubes into the pelvic cavity. It was postulated that these fragments of tissue implanted themselves on the surfaces of the pelvic organs and proceeded to grow. If this theory were true, it would certainly be reason enough to avoid inversions during the menstrual period. However, this is no longer thought to he the origin of tendomeriosis. It is now known that endometriosis arises from the presence of cells in the pelvic lining that are capable of developing into endonietrial-type cells.

Infection: It has been suggested that inversions during menses increase the incidence of pelvic infection. This is not the case. Conditions for the ascent of bacteria up to the uterus are not more favorable during menstruation- or inversion. Bacteria move in the layers of fluid on the surface of the vagina and uterine lining, essentially free of gravitational effect. If inversions did cause pelvic infections, then they would be contraindicated in women regardless of the time of the cycle.

Free-Standing Poses and Non-supported Backbends

In general, poses requiring the use of exertion and great energy are not recommended during menstruation. Physical strength may be somewhat diminished at this time, causing one to be shaky or off balance; therefore, standing poses in the center of the room and strenuous backbends may be difficult and exhausting. Attempting such a practice when energy is low can lead to injury or further depletion of energy supplies. This is a time to allow yourself to rest.

Poses Recommended During The Menstrual Period

The following guidelines are provided for your exploration. They are not presented as restrictions on your practice, but suggested as a way to more deeply experience and enjoy your natural cyclic rhythms.

1. Forward Bend Series

• Paschimottanasana (Full Forward Bend Pose)
• Janu Sirsasana (Head to Knee Pose)
• Triang Mukhaikapada
• Paschimottanasana (Three Parts Forward Bend Pose)
• Modified forward bends in chair with fists pressed into lower abdomen

These poses are calming. Lower abdominal and pelvic compression aids cramps and heavy bleeding.

2. Supported Standing Poses

• Parivrtta Trikonasana (Revolved Triangle Pose)
• Parivrtta Ardha Chandrasana (Revolved Half Moon Pose) Done with the support of a wall or chair.

These poses are helpful for backache associated with menses.

3. Twists

• Lying Knee to Chest Twist
• Seated Chair Twist
• Pose of Child Twist

These twists are helpful for cramps and backache.

4. Supported Setu Bandha (Supported Bridge Pose)

This pose is calming, It also relieves pelvic discomfort.

5. Supported Viparita Dandasana (Upward Turned Staff Pose).

This pose is helpful for pelvic discomfort.