What’s Up with Mala Beads?

  We’ve all seen them- small beads with various colors and textures wrapped around the wrists or draped along the neck of yoga practitioners, sometimes with a tassle, other times without. These beads are known as malas, but what exactly are they? A yoga accessory?  A fashion statement? A fleeting trend? The truth is mala …

Five Books for the Curious Yogi

I love reading books. Sometimes I shift toward scientific books, other times fluffy romantic novels- it all depends how I am feeling and what my mind needs. The following list is a diverse collection of books related to yoga to spark curiosity and bring yoga off the mat and onto the page. Reading books regularly …

Five Things That Happen with a Regular Yoga Practice

I’ve written quite a bit about how your yoga practice is a tool that you can use to guide you through the varying ebb and flow that is life. Yoga may start out as a simple exercise regimen, but it can lead to changes in your life on physical, mental and social levels. This is the …

READY. SET. SANKALPA!

In every yoga class, I like to either “theme” the class around a word or idea to help create a story that we can interweave through the practice.  When ideas are presented in this way, it can be relatable and therefore powerful, helping students relate ideas to experiences through yoga practice both on and off …

What is a #Yogi?

#Yogi is a popular hashtag for yoga professionals and enthusiasts on instagram. In fact, the hashtag currently has nearly 8 million posts on instagram alone. But the term “yogi” existed long before social media. So what exactly is a yogi? A yogi is a person who is proficient in yoga. That’s it! Just a person …

Reflection of a Yoga Student: 10 Years of Practice

I first began my yoga practice with a Rodney Yee DVD in my parent’s basement. It was 2008, and I had just graduated college with a degree in psychology, but unsure of future career prospects. Peppered with uncertainty, as well as the bleak reality of the 2008 economic downturn, I knew it was time to …

Seeds of Discipline: How Eating a Pomegranate Embodies My Yoga Practice.

Yoga does not change the way we see things. It transforms the person who sees. -B.K.S. Iyengar When I first started practicing yoga, it is fair to say I didn’t know anything about yoga philosophy, or really what I was getting into. The year was 2008 and yoga was starting to get popular, and with …

The Savasana Struggle: Exploring the Challenge of a Powerful Pose

Savasansa is one of the most powerful poses in a yoga sequence- do you practice it? When I was living on the West coast in the US, I regularly attended a hot yoga class. The classes were challenging due to the heat of the room and the heat of the body brought on by a …

Playing with Proprioception

We all have yoga poses that challenge us a bit more than others. For me, it is virabhadrasana I. The pose sometimes feels like a struggle to me, like my mind gets in the way of what my body wants to do. I second guess myself and struggle with alignment. Entering the pose is almost …

Enhance Your Yoga Practice with the Bandhas

Bandha translates to lock, to hold, or to tighten. I was first introduced to the concept in a Forrest yoga class, where the teacher instructed us to engage the uddiyana bandha, a lock located in the abdominals and extending to the diaphragm. As a fairly novice yogi, I interpreted this action as simply “sucking in” …