Sun Salutation

Here is the sequence I've been practicing this week:

It's a simple sun salutation and has been a great way to wake up in the morning and to do before going to sleep in the evening. It can be found in the magazine Yoga Journal (this was a special edition for beginners). The poses they chose are basic and there are many variation to make this flow more challenging. This sequence leaves me feeling peaceful and flexible.
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Wheel

I will always be the first to admit I have little to no arm strength. Growing up I was an Irish Step dancer (think Riverdance). The only arm strength needed in this practice was to hold your arms firmly at your sides. Later, when I got into team performance we would have to hold our arms up for minutes at a time, but this worked our backs more than our arms. All this is to introduce why I chose wheel as my first challenging pose.

This fall I attended some Yoga classes at the college rec center. At the end of each class we would do an inversion pose. I finally worked up the courage to try plow:

but I was still terrified to try wheel and not be able to do it. Turns out, I can do it, it's just staying in the pose which is hard. To prepare and gain confidence in this pose I have been doing arm exercises and bridge pose:

to strengthen my back. My goal is to hold wheel pose for 10 full breaths.

I'll update later with the sequence I've been doing this week!
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New Beginnings

I'm not calling this a New Year's resolution because those are notorious for gaining more weight and pressure in one's life than needed. So, this is just a blog of lifestyle changes that just happen to be occurring in January.

Yoga has been in my life off and on since I was very young. Throughout the years, it has remained a great outlet for stress relief. I feel wonderful when I walk away from a class, video or just a simple sun salutation sequence. Thus, with all this positivity from Yoga, why wouldn't I include it in my everyday life? From now on I'm hoping to do just that. This blog will be a place to post weekly sequences and discuss development of more difficult poses.

Another thing I've learned from Yoga is that you cannot contain it to a class; it seeps into the rest of your life. This winter I'm determined to spend more time cooking real meals, instead of just throwing something together at the last minute. I'll try to post favorite recipes on here as well.
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