Discovering Yoga!

            This week was good to practice yoga. I felt particularly stressed in terms of school. It seems like none of the professors are empathizing with the fact that we are all stuck at home doing immense amounts of school work. In fact, it seems like they are actually giving MORE work just because we are at home. Well, I was happy for one of those assignments to be yoga. It gives me time for myself and only myself, not time to do something to satisfy another person.  This week I did a meditative style of yoga. The beginning was focused on sitting still and getting into a quite mode of stillness. The practice soon moved into light stretches. The series of stretches helped to emphasize on the importance of stillness rather than pushing the body. I enoyed the calmness as well as the light music in the background. The duration of the video was 60 minutes and I felt ebery minute of it.  Overall, Im happy I had the opportunity to practice this week at my own pace. I am glad I did no

  I have always considered yoga to be a member of the holistic health heaing family in my time studying health sciences. It always seemed to be low on the risk and high on the reward for many people which convinced me of its healing powers even before I ever got to practice. Once I practiced for the first time on my own, I realized all that it contained. Though it seems different than what it would be if I had an actual yoga studio to go to every week, I still am able to realize all that yoga contains.  This goes back to the idea of a sacred location to practice. It's about the surroundings, what brings a zen idea into the room. This especially rolls over into a healing practice toward the end of most practices. In all of the class practices we have done there has been time set to decompress at the end, emphasizing on the healing properties of yoga. This rolls over to show the healing potential becuase that is when I notice the most significant difference within practicing. The fiv

  Okay… Here's the thing… I LOVE ASHTANGA YOGA!!! I did not expect to like it even close to as much as I really did. Yoga was a problem for me in the beginning when I was just learning what it was all about because I didn't know how to think of anything else but everything I had to do… this was completely different. I think I loved it so much because it was actually physically demanding. I found myself sweating within the first 5 minutes because of much more the pace picked up compared to the other yoga classes I have attempted.  My favorite part of the class was the balancing it involved. We did many postures that my coach used to guide us to do in gymnastics, and I had no idea they were from this. It reall yours into perspective how much yoga can spill over into everyday life. Our teacher, David Garrigues, is a man who clearly knew what he was doing. He emphasized on the importance of breathing as each part of the body is manipulated to form a new shape. I really enjoyed th

     Community brings people together. Period. It's just the way it is. I mean… how many times have you felt like you didn't fit in with something until you realized you had more in common that you thought. It brings a sense of reassurance and calmness when once you feel like you truly belong somewhere. Yoga gives that to people. Yoga is another method of finding happiness in life much like a book club, or a baking crew or even a “mom” walking committee. A community brings people of all different backgrounds together to enjoy one another. A community gives people the sense that they have a backing in life… this idea that no matter what, if all else fails, these people will still be here when I am done. I know for me, yoga gives me the sense of a community. My practice space, though it is online, still gives me the sense that I belong to something greater than just a 60 minutes class to center myself. Being part of the yoga community gives me the opportunity to discuss it with o

Though I had trouble accessing the Nevrin article, I do know a ritual is considered a solemn ceremony consisting of a series of actions in a specified order. Knowing this, I realize every yoga practice up to this point is a “ritual.” Performing actions with the intent of reaching some higher ground. It is now known to me that yoga is a ritual to completeness. Every movement has the intent of reaching a new pinnacle of realization in the yoga world. Realization of the mind and all it possesses, the body and each muscle, and the world as I am just a small speck on a large rock. A ritual does not always need to be as great of an action as yoga, it could even be as small as going for a run, but it is something that needs to be carried out on a daily basis to get the full effect.  I guess… once I realized that more things in my life are considered rituals I had a different view on each action. Though it's small I realized I had rituals before every lacrosse game in high school and eve

The best definition of yoga I have ever heard was, funny enough, said by Nick Rosen who is the subject of the film we watched, Enlighten Up!. The end of the movie is quoted by him claiming, “Yoga has no simple definition and that's the beauty of it.” Yoga is simply yoga. It is what you view it as in your life, and what it means to you only. Whether you practice yoga to get your mind off of the bad or use it simply for strength and flexibility, it goes beyond what a jog would do for the body. Yoga involves the mental aspect of exercise the entire time you are practicing, and even after in everyday activities. Yes, there is a mental strength involved in continuing to run when you really don't want to, or do those extra push ups, but yoga forces you to bring all of that up and completely push it out. To acknowledge, yes life is life, but right now you are here and you are doing this. Yoga moves beyond just physical exercise and emphasizes, more importantly, mental toughness.