Butterfly Pose is a much needed pose for tight inner hips and hip opening. This article is about how to get the most out of the pose to open your spirit and welcome in a new season.
Plus, good exercises you can do daily to help open your butterfly pose hips when they don’t want to fully (or you simply want to keep them flexible). 🧘🏻♀️
…Which btw, our bodies are natural wonders and so is the total eclipse that gave solar chills and happy tears this week, that I’m still reeling over and you can too days later.
…Even if you’re not spiritual, the palpitable feeling can be deeper than even seeing the phenomenon. And if you want the lasting effects, you can make and enjoy a healthy chocolate cake that celebrates the moon and eclipse. 🌘
This is a healthy chocolate cake representation of the moon where you can add your Baily’s beads too.
But first things first: when you have tight hips, you know it immediately when you move around. And I didn’t know about this because I didn’t feel it until one day.
And like the Butterfly name implies, the Butterfly pose looks like opened butterfly wings.
Or if you speak in chef language like I often do, you know what butterflying means on a plate. Butterfly pose looks also like an open lotus flower. 🪷
Opening your hips this way is a metaphor for opening yourself up and while you’re sitting still in patience and peace.
In life, butterflies wait before they can flutter about. It’s one of the fascinating creatures out there in nature I think and a symbol of transformation. They are fragile like we are. 🦋
Similarly, we start out as caterpillars in life crawling along and hopefully like most, make it to adulthood.
Then we transform into our adult butterfly bodies in new seasons.
As sweet reward, we get tastes of honey along our journey and feed back honey nectar to our community.
We contribute to the environment we’re in where we spend time. And this is a metaphor for making our individual impact in the world that’s one of our highest callings.
From caterpillar to adult butterfly is a natural transformation And seeing them together one day is a phenomenon. Can you see the butterfly in the photo?
Butterflies are unique in colors and design patterns like the Peacock Butterfly commonly found in Europe or Asia, or a Monarch Butterfly that I see often in North America.
They are something we can globally appreciate like the sun, the moon, and the solar eclipse.
Butterfly Pose As a Metaphor For Opening Up
Phyiscally, Butterfly pose helps to open in tight hips. You’re a lotus flower ready to blossom and sometimes your mind-body can get stuck. 🪷
Giving it time to open up and bloom when ready is part of patience in Life.
In your Butterfly pose, if it’s not easy, do it gradually. Don’t force it along.
Pain is never good in yoga. Unlike physical sports and fitness, that says, “no pain, no gain.” Yoga is completely opposite: pain means no gain.
Because you’re doing something you shouldn’t be doing to your body.
Pain is a warning signal from your body.
In yoga, it’s good to challenge the body with stretching further and higher, but only when it’s in tip-top shape.
And with all the muscles, tendons, joints, and crevices in our bodies, sometimes there are places that need broken mending.
So we want to add stress to those parts. We want to work on other parts while our weak spots heal. And with Butterfly pose, you know whether or not you have a weak inner hip injury.
If you’re feeling tentative, then be gentle.
One thing I like to do is raise myself off the mat.
You can use a block or a towel to raise your thigh above the mat until your hip loosens up (one side is usually tighter) and you can get to your ideal Butterfly pose.
So you can still do a modified version of the Butterfly pose without stress and repairing your bottom wing. 🦋
And then when ready, maybe someday your knees and top half of your leg touch down on the mat, or they don’t.
Either is great.
For beginners, it doesn’t matter how cool it looks.
All that matters is you feel good. Maybe that’s why my Vata loves yoga for the comfort reasons. 😊
You’ll find what you’re comfortable with and then you’ll have a baseline for what your body can do in those areas, and what the limitations are.
The limitations are there to help you lean in on your unique body and SELF. Create goals that are good for your body. 🎯
In Butterfly pose, a good goal would be to not feel any tension or pain in the hip muscle, inner hip, or groin areas.
Both men and women seem to have this common issue.
If you sit a lot this could be a reasonable cause. And if it shows up one day, it could be a new habit position you were sitting in that simply needs to be adjusted so you can restore.
In the meanwhile, you can complement Butterfly Pose with Triangle Pose and Pigeon Pose that are other yoga poses that will help open up in slightly different angles.
Also try the Seated Spinal Twist.
As usual in yoga, one side is usually tighter than the other for different poses, so workout a little longer for the side that needs more TLC.
Balance and alignment comes from asymmetrical efforts. So if for balance ⚖️, this means intention or laser focus on the side or area that needs attention.
Another yoga pose that can really help is a 5 star yoga pose on the mat with your legs straddled open to each side, and arms under and through your legs.
If you’re not familiar with the more common star pose, your head arms and legs make up the 5 points.
Doing this stretch faced down on the mat will also give you a good stretch through your legs and arms.
And combining physical therapy type exercise that you can do at home will help. These often use repetition vs. weights. And repeated repetitions.
One of the best exercises I found is the side hip abductor exercise that you can do on your mat.
You turn to one side and bend your knees and then lift the top leg up and down for 10 repetitions or more at a time.
A second exercise is: sit on the side of a regular height bed or a chair that allows a hip-leg to anchor straight down on the floor either straight up perpendicular or slightly shifted to the back while the other hip-leg (the tight one) is on the bed or chair.
Take the tight hip-leg (on the bed) and bend, so that you can see the bottom of your foot. You should feel a light stretch (that does not hurt) in the tight hip area that’s slightly different than on a mat.
If there’s any pain, you should stop as you may have injured the area somehow.
Remember, we’re fragile like butterflies. 🦋 We’re also resilient.
And if you don’t feel anything in your hips, that’s something to be grateful for.. and now you’re more aware of what to do and what people (aka older people) are talking about when they say they have tight hips…
Not feeling your hips is something else to celebrate. And Butterfly pose is a gratitude pose 🎉
How to make easy coconut cookies below (that are so easy that NO recipe is needed!)
Our necks vary in length even though we have the same number of neck vertebrae as giraffes. 🦒And our neck sizes vary as do our Adam’s apples that are larger in males than females.
Our necks serve us to not just help support us in eating apples. 🍎Without our neck, we couldn’t use our brains. And we wouldn’t be connected to our body.
So regularly doing neck yoga exercises protect this vital body part and can work out some of the kinks from our bad computer postures and pillow sleeping habits.
Restoring your neck is a gentle way to get your groove back. And if you haven’t been in your yoga routine recently, this could be a good way to start again. Plus you can do it anywhere and everywhere. That can’t be said for many yoga poses.
And yoga is a great way to get your relaxation and breathing space back. 🧘🏻♀️
Sometimes all you need is just 5-10 minutes of yoga to reset your day and how you feel. So let’s begin… ⏲️
Take baby steps, Child’s pose is a great way to begin if you have floor space and a mat. It’s a calming move to set your relax neck intentions.
For neck yoga benefits, instead of tucking your neck down, try an Active Child’s pose where your neck is upward and out forward like the neck of a plane at take off ✈️
You can look at your pointed hands and fingers stretched forward on the mat. The intention can be to focus.
FYI, beginner poses like this are healthy good for anyone Advanced or Beginner.
You can use balancing (Hatha) poses. And go with a flow (Vinyasa) where you insert a Downward Dog in between the face down mat and face up poses… or anything you like if that’s too much or intimidating.
Yoga is flexible and hopefully when you do any yoga, you’ll become more joint-muscle flexible as one of the main benefits.
You’ll feel less soreness all around if any, and hear less joint cracking when you bend a certain way. Usually you’re benefitting more than one area at a time.
And the neck is no different.
But if you want to isolate the neck yoga exercise, moving your head side to side and from shoulder to shoulder like sunrise to sunset is a good regular practice. 🌅
It’s a healthy mantra to get you loose and let go of the unhealthy or tricky areas of your life situations. And yoga is great to manifest new habits and old thought patterns that don’t serve you any longer.
Making a tradition a habit is not a good idea if it keeps you stuck. And making a good habit a tradition is!
So now that you’re warmed up for neck yoga, here we go:
Front facing down mat:
1.Active Child’s pose
As mentioned start with the Active Child’s pose. If your tendency is looking down most the day, then this will carry a good stretch in your neck. Look as far up to the ceiling or sky as you can.
2. Table pose
This is a neutral pose that you can take into standing or front down poses. In Table pose, look up to the ceiling. Feel the back of the neck yoga stretch.
Besides yoga habits, another habit you can do is when you’re waiting in neutral, look up.
I do this when I’m waiting for the warm water to brew for tea making. Or when I’m filling the water filter with water.
Habit stacking neck yoga with waiting is a good idea. Even when you’re looking at your phone, try to get in the habit of holding your device up.
3. Mountain Pose 🏔️
You can ease into a Downward Dog and then stand up in Mountain Pose with hands in the air or prayer hands, and look up to your hands or ceiling.
3. Bow pose
Torso body facing down on the mat, bend your knees. With legs up in the air that you can move around, send your arms to your back and grab your ankles.
You’ll feel a nice stretch along your torso and back, and if you look up you really get to take advantage of the neck yoga bend.
Then transition to a seated position with Downward Dog if you like.
Bottom on the mat:
4. Boat Pose
Look up and legs up in the air so you’re in “V” shape with your bottom as your anchor. Your neck gets a nice stretch.
Instead of counting breaths, when you hold the pose, you could think of something today that you’re grateful for that you otherwise would’ve missed in a busier moment. That’ll add stress-drop points to your day. 🌻
5. Fish pose
This is a fun water animal pose. On your back, arch your back and let your head dangle downward so you’re looking at the wall behind you and upside down.
This is something you can do on your beach towel in case you’re on vacation 😉 And you can roll up your towel to use as a temporary pillow so your head drapes over the rollup (mimicking your neck yoga pose in Fish) that takes the pressure off your neck.
6. Seated Leg stretch
And finally to finish off, while seated you can stretch forward to touch your toes in front of you or as far as you can stretch.
Look up (and out as far as the eye can see) and you’ll feel the effects.
And after doing these 6 look up neck yoga poses, you’ll feel lighter.
And you could be ready for a treat like these summer light delights that are suprisingly healthy with superfood coconut goodness.
Coconut Cookies 🥥
Coconut lover? Move over macaroons (and macarons!). You’ll love these healthy, lower-fat cookies that need NO recipe or butter…
These healthy coconut toasted cookies are so easy to make with 4 ingredients and even less steps 👣: coconut flour (plus about a TBSP of AP flour), coconut oil, an egg, and shredded coconut.
Mix these ingredients together by hand and make a loose cookie dough that will have falling crumbs.
Shape into small circles, and bake on a no-stick baking sheet. Bake until sides are lightly toasted brown.
For the toasted coconut, if you want to be sure they don’t over toast while your cookie is still toasting 🥠, you can use this ‘lil trick:
Add shredded coconut to cookie tops about 5 minutes before the cookies are done. Then flip the cookies upside down on the baking sheet.
They look like crab cakes as an illusion. They’re coconut cookies.
And after you’ve been looking down on your baking tray, habit stack back to your look up neck yoga 🙆🏻♀️
Yoga accessories are a must for good yoga form, comfort, and help with balance for your Vata, Kapha, and Pitta. So is a recipe for hot water pastry and adding your balancing good foods below.
Yoga accessories like a bolster, a block or two, and a blanket are classic. The yogi tea adds to pampered yoga wellness. 🫖
Using yoga accessories or props on a lazy day can really help boost your mood.
And a peaceful mood is one you want to stay in daily whether you’re feeling busy and active before the holidays or lazier after Christmas has come and gone.
You may teeter back and forth. And eating well is one ingredient that can help restore balance.
Like this well-spiced open-faced savory pastry I made half with spinach, chickpeas, oni0ns, and a punchy five-spice blend (cinnamon, fennel, star anise, cloves, peppercorns) to balance Vata, Pitta, and Kapha. And the other half is a balanced mix of carrots, potatoes, scallions, and tarragon. Maybe this inspires you and puts you in a better mood?
Hot water pastry with veggies. Recipe below. ⬇️
And speaking of mood balancing…
When I used to visit malls on the weekend as a downtime pastime, after a while I’d get bored… the look-forward to anticipation feelings turned to drained and uninspired energy. I couldn’t wait to exit…
Then there usually was a line to get out of the parking lot and into traffic, especially during the holidays. Sound familiar?
We didn’t have online Black Friday shopping so it was a sheer annual mayhem event.
Since those days, our world has evolved and so have we. And these days I steer away from malls like the Black Plague.
…But whether you do or not, you know the feeling of too much of a good thing becomes numbing to the mind-body.
That can be how you feel about some adventures and projects you’d rather stay away from even if they started out okay. You can avoid some, but others require you and your endurance, like certain work tasks and travel stress.
Those growing tired moods can sink in and take a while to lift, especially if they’re our regular routines in life.
…like sweeping kitchen crumbs for the 10th time or chores you hate doing. And if we ignore them and feel lazier than usual, that can turn into a Kapha imbalance.
Or if we feel irritated and uninspired…. then not making a change can lead to burnout. It doesn’t usually happen overnight but it can happen one day if you reach your snapping point. That’s more of a Pitta imbalance.
With both types of imbalances, lazy yoga poses can help you get your active balance and peaceful mood back.
(Corpse pose is a great one to relax your body and calm your mind.)
I know when I find time to just be still, sitting in silence, that’s when I feel the most peace. Maybe that’s how you feel?
The reason is centering allows you to focus on the calmness of this moment and the body can stop working so hard.
And by focusing on the silent moments, and not focusing on the busy activities like shopping or even watching Netflix (that can be good when you need a ‘lil downtime break), the quietness helps your mind to relax and to feel good again.
And in the silence, if you find your mind is racing, that’s a sign of an anxious Vata mind.
Sometimes we feel that way and to feel balanced, in my life journey, I found that getting a peaceful mind is easier when you tune into the right source for at least 8 waking hours a day and make it your habit in life.
Our lives are constructed in 24 hours of which 8 is good for sleeping, 8 for working, and 8 for doing everything else.
So during that everything-else time slot, that’s when it’s good to build in time to recharge, working on passions, and focusing mostly on less external influences (and maybe disconnecting from the world for minutes at a time).
And it’s good to find time to take breaks during work and about a weekend day’s worth off to rest. Not everyone can take all of Sunday off.
And I find staying in that rhythm is how you can stay balanced, happy, and in a peaceful mood year-round so you can show up in life as your best.
That type of lifestyle years ago would have been laughed at or not taken seriously by my business and corporate worker companions. But now they are reconsidering too as wellness is part of the discussions.
Our world is changing for better health and wellness, thank goodness!
Because having consistency and wellness routines in your lifestyle and mind helps prevent life burnout or waking up one day unhappy or depressed.
Feeling those ways can take more time to backtrack and restore, and they usually have an aftermath of sorts. It’s better all around to take time out daily to restore and prevent.
And if you like the idea of preventatively restoring daily, then one small way is with lazy yoga moves. That’s what I call it anyway. Those are perfect on the days when it’s hard to move quickly, you had a rough night before, or it’s dreary weather outside.
On those days, you know intense exercise is out of the question. But you can use that more tiring day for your lazy exercise day that still helps to invigorate your body and restore your mind.
We know that exercise is good for cognitive and physical fitness. So to stay in the game (of active life even when you’re not feeling it), you can use yoga props to help you engage and maybe even get off the couch if that’s what you find yourself doing and want to change that (…and your heavy Kapha mind may want to resist).
And those days would be a good time to do core work. When you have yoga accessories, doing ab work is not as challenging once you get moving… and maybe along with the right entertainment in the background.
So, here are a few yoga accessories and ideas that you can try and maybe build into a new habit:
Yoga Accessories:
A yoga block (or two), or a Yoga Wheel
Blocks are great especially in Bridge pose where you can turn the block vertically so that the longest side helps raise your back up to build a bridge higher than you can go without a block. This can really help you feel better instantly.
The evovled yoga wheel yoga accessories work in similar ways in a Bridge pose. I’m a bit old school as I prefer the block that raises up a new building structure without moving on you… and maybe a bit burned out from 90s fitness and turn-of-the-century gadgets and props that never got used more than a few times. 😉
Straps
Straps are great for keeping you focused on the guiding strap lines and that support your legs to various angles in the air when you’re laying flat back. These are great for helping you with flexibility that becomes more important as you grow wiser (and older too).
Bolster Yoga Pillow
Bolsters are pretty practical pillows to have around. And if you don’t have one, sometimes you can get creative and find lumbar pillows that some couches come with. And you can use other pillows and cushioned furniture pieces to be very effective.
I actually use an IKEA cushioned cube that I can rest my calves on when I’m laying back on my mat, and then do easy-ab roll-up work. And still, get all the benefits.
And then I can turn around and use the cube as a table or an ottoman. Now that’s usefulness! (No more ab roller devices and machines that take up additional space!)
Breathe device apps
I like the Apple Watch where you can feel the inhale and exhale vibrations of the Breathe app. It’s great for getting centered and intentional on your breath.
Another great prop (that you can add to your yoga accessories):
Wall
Legs Up the Wall pose is a great resting pose. You scoot and seat yourself as close to a wall as possible, and then lay back. Your legs are straight up against the wall. That should feel really good as you release tension from your legs.
You can rest your arms straight out and turn your head from side to side and be intentional to see different perspectives.
This can feel really good on lazy yoga days. The point is to never give up on yourself in any season of life!
Be the tortoise in Aesop’s fable. 🐢
You can be just one good move or pose away from getting you back into a good swing and crossing the finish line.
And people are back in yoga classes. …maybe that’s you or just what you need to keep your calm through the holiday and into the new year. Btw, are you counting down the days?
In addition to building a better Bridge yoga pose, I have my baking calendar on my mind. I’m coming up with building a better Yule log swiss roll this year from peppermint inspiration. 🍥
For savory hot water pastry, you can be inspired by this recipe.
It’s celebrational Easter holy week. I’m also happy to announce (my and) this 100th blog post lands this week. Double holy cow! I thought it’d be fun to celebrate by listing 100 best yoga poses 🎉
Easter and 100 blog posts deserve confetti sprinkles 🧁
But before mentioning the 100 yoga poses, I just wanted to wish happy birthday to anyone who already had a birthday celebration this year. I try to find an excuse to send a cake whenever I can 🎂
Even if it’s just an emoji. But sentiment and kidding aside, these days, it’s easy to be reminded with showering confetti “Happy Birthday!” emoji messages that bring us a ‘lil joy.
I think of the ultimate birthday as those who have reached the 100-year-old mark, who I think deserve their own special confetti emoji. That milestone is definitely worth commemorating. You’ve got to admire Centenarians who have endured and thrived through life’s marathon.
Besides seeing and participating in what their friends and families (young and old) are doing, some of the longest-living people have been naturally active and practicing yoga all their lives.
In some cultures, they get up and off the floor (or out of their sitting position) on a daily mat in one fell swoop as they did in younger years. And that’s just another reason for them to get back up and go out and appreciate the day.
Some Centenarians can even still remember facts and figures that younger decade folks can’t. And they can retell stories of their youth like a historical tale.
They breathe purpose daily (…and have breathed about 1.4 million more breaths than a 30-year-old).
And whatever age you’re at, you can too with your purposeful breath and yoga moves.
Here’s a list of 10 yoga articles to inspire your specific moves and journey:
Yoga is amazing because of the benefits for the mind-body connection: where the mind and body “talk” to each other. If we’re lucky and focused we pick up on the cues as a witness to our mind-bodies.
This is an area that traditional Western doctors aren’t necessarily trained on. It originated from Ayurveda, an eastern life science perspective, that’s made its way slowly to the Western world (and I started practicing in 2008 when I became aware).
Over the past decade, we’ve learned that the prevention of chronic diseases and inflammation in the body is connected to better mental health and less stress we carry.
And we can often tell by our anxious, irritated, or lethargic moods.
Sometimes it’s hard to do yoga until we get in a balanced mood, even though we know if we did yoga, we’d get there sooner. We can get in our way.
So, in case you need to overcome that or need a dose of moving or getting going inspiration, I’ve listed 100 best yoga poses that are timeless reminders, challenging, and fun (I think so anyway!).
I included some quick encouraging words for each pose that come to mind. They include thoughts of when to do the pose, reminders, or intentions that could be useful for you as they are for me. Some poses are better done when you have more energy.
And it helps if have a known purpose for doing the pose, to help be motivated. We can all use a good metaphor reminder in our daily lives.
So here we go…
Standing best yoga poses:
1. Sun salutations – reminder: life is constantly changing, and you keep moving. This is a good series of poses to start the day with, like just before you have your first glass of water for the day
2. Warrior I – reminder: feel empowered to take on the day
3. Warrior II – reminder: take up more space
4. Warrior III – reminder: focus on moving forward
5. Sun Warrior – reminder: don’t forget to look up and stay open
6. Dancer pose – reminder: you’ve got this day with your calm and grace, and letting go of the past. Today is a new day 🌱
7. Tree pose – reminder: you’re resilient and unshaken even in uncertain times
38. Staff – do when you want to straighten your back and remind yourself that your back is an important part for your body’s support. (reminder: build strong abs)
Side best yoga poses:
39. Side angle – do when you need a break or stretch
40. Extended side angle – intention: stretch your mind
41. Side crow – do when you feel adventurous; one side is probably easier than the other and that’s your strength
42. Side plank – do when you feel strong
43. Falling Star – tip: like half-moon is great to do against a wall when you’re first starting out so you can lean further. Intention: feel free and creative
Front face down best yoga poses:
44. Cobra – reminder: you’re making progress
45. Sphinx – reminder: you can do anything you want
46. Upward Dog – reminder: you’re almost there!
47. Turtle – reminder: stay steady on the course
48. Bow – reminder: your hands, head, and feet are all closely connected
Lay down poses (starting with back flat on the mat):
49. Bridge – tip: use a block on the small of your back and feel grounded
50. Fish – reminder: relax and let go of heavy problems
51. Lay down spinal twist to one side – when you do this on each side, you see a different part of the room or space you’re in and is a good reminder that you have different options from different perspectives
53. Knees to chest (knee hug) – reminder: of self-love
54. Half locust with one leg slightly lifted: reminder -it can feel strange but still be helpful
55. Through the hole stretch – do when you feel tight like from driving or sitting, or when you feel uptight
56. Spider laying down – intention: holding onto your purpose but letting go of how you’ll get there
On all 4’s:
57. Inverted plane – reminder: great for bringing your shoulders back in mindfulness
58. Downward dog – intention: feel the day in earthly roots
59. Downward dog with one leg lifted – intention: enjoy the day by doing something new
60. Cat – do when you’re feeling fearless
61. Cow – good for feeling balanced
62. Balanced cat reaching out one arm and opposite leg
Back challenge: you can arch backward relying on all 4s
63. Backward Bend – do when you’re feeling energetic and youthful
64. Wheel – and you go higher to see and feel new possibilities
Front challenge: you may never do a full handstand, but you can get both feet off the ground
65. Crow – intention: strength (you’re stronger than you think)
66. Crane – and you can stretch higher
67. Peacock – reminder: you can get over the limitations you have
68. Firefly – reminder: you can do something different to light up the world. You may feel like a kid again doing this one (one of my fave poses and I have happy memories of catching fireflies )
Inversion best yoga poses:
69. Shoulder stand – do when you’re feeling moderately energized
70. Half shoulder stand – do when you want to feel energized
71. Plow – reminder: encouragement that you can take two steps back and come out ahead
72. Legs up the wall – intention: feel supported by the environment around you
Resting best yoga poses:
73. Child’s Pose – reminder: you don’t have to be doing something every minute of the day. It’s not how busy you are (something I had to unlearn)
74. Hare – intention: purposefully resting
Other inspirational best yoga poses:
75. Inclined plane – when you’re feeling like you want to get off the ground or you’re excited to start a new project
76. Plank – intention: building daily strength for any trials or difficulties you’re going through
77. Camel – reminder: let go
78. Dolphin – reminder: we’re born with natural abilities
79. Splits – intention: flexibly grow daily and watch progress
80. Happy Baby – do when you want to feel safe and carefree
81. Swan – reminder: have daily grace for those areas you can’t change
82. Hero – reminder: we can all be a hero in our ways in our lives serving and doing what we do
83. Neck rolls – intention: calming and releasing mind tension
84. Neck side to side – intention: take a moment to relax
85. Shoulder shrug – intention: be less stressed (letting the weight fall off your shoulders)
86. Frog – intention: feel youthful and free to spread out
87. Garland – reminder: take a break; good for when you’re feeling unsure or in between energetic and tired
88. Locust – reminder: try something different or take on a new project
89. Wild Thing – intention: let go of worries and enjoy more
90. Goddess – intention: feel ready for the world
91. Swan dive – intention: go with the flow
92. Cactus arms – reminder: take time off
93. Airplane – intention: feel free and in control at the same time
94. Spider with feet and hands on floor – reminder: you’re a beautifully unique creature
And then these sounds and breathing pair well with yoga poses and intentions:
95. Om – making the sound clears nasal passages along with mind and body. Try a variation by using your mouth to create an ah-oh-mmm sound sequence. Intention: peace and living stress-free
In yoga, breathwork is super important and great for calming. If you get heart palpitations from anxiety, these are good breath exercises to refer to and do.
For all of us, staying mindful of breath gets us in a good reminder habit to be healthy-minded. And when you get a good breath of air you can send that energy through your mind and body, to help improve both mental and physical health.
Your nose acts as a natural filtration system. If you regularly breathe through your mouth when you sleep or if you have nasal congestion and obstructed nasal passages, you may want to look for solutions to help you breathe out of your nose regularly.
And these are the special breath exercises you can do with yoga:
96. Sounding breath – this includes long and slow breaths while laying down, so is good to do when you’re getting in and out of bed. Reminder: you’re alive and able to take purposeful breaths
97. Breath of fire – while sitting, exhale out short and quick breaths from your nose (like a fire-breathing dragon that doesn’t exist) until all your air from your diaphragm feels expelled. And then fill back up gradually like a balloon. Daily reminder: you’re a miracle with automatic breaths. You can control your breathing using your respiratory muscle, your diaphragm, that sits just below your two life-giving organs: your heart and lungs
98. Bellows breath – do this one when you’re in standing mountain pose with hands at heart center (optional). Full inhale/exhale from the mouth. This is a good one to do in the morning when you’re first waking up
99. Sufi Mother’s Breath – this is a simpler version than the Pranayama 4-7-8 version. Exhale through your nose, then inhale through your nose for a count of 7, and then exhale again for a count of 7. This is great and simple to do on a walk where you’re staying present and observing your surroundings
100. Alternate Nostril Breath – take one hand and rest a middle finger on the forehead, thumb from the same hand rests on the closest nostril temporarily closing the airway, light ring, and baby finger on the opposite nostril. Then, inhaling through the open nostril. Intention: notice details about how each side feels as the air circulates more intently to one side of the body from your head to your feet. Reminder: how the air affects our body at and in this moment and how we affect others and the community around us with our breath
So there you go… those are my best yoga intentions and recommendations.
And one last thing that I wanted to mention…
Each week I bake and participate in an inspiring home baking challenge with a community of enthusiastic bakers.
And some could probably go on The Great British Baking Show.
As for me, Iwon’t be applying to be a contestant anytime soon, even though I’m pretty sure I’m one of their biggest fans in my area. 😊
But since watching the show, I’ve learned a thing or two.
Like this last season with German Week…
I’ve learned a sweet bun or two from The Great British Bakeoff show 🧡
And so, this week’s challenge is Hot Cross Buns, an egg-cellent choice for Easter. 🐇
I’ve never made the buns before, but I did make cinnamon buns for the first time this year. No matter how these hot buns turn out I’ll show you a photo in an upcoming blog post.
…And since I’m putting myself out there, maybe that’ll encourage you to stretch your mind-body and challenge yourself to a new yoga pose or two if baking isn’t your thing.
And if you need a ‘lil more gentle nudge, just send me a note (on the blog home page under “Contact”) letting me know what muscle pain or soreness or intentions you want to work on, and I’ll send back 5 yoga poses that would be good for you this season to bring back some fun. 🧘🏻♀️
Sometimes body injuries happen outside our control that come and go. And when you’re slightly injured, say with a common sprain, you can still do light work around home workouts being careful, and then gradually restoring back to regular exercising and good fit health routines.
For a light strain or sprain, you can be out for a few weeks before you’re back to regular activities. If you have a more serious injury, it can be a few months before you’re mobile, and that’s when you may want to come up with a different strategy so the rest of your healthy body doesn’t have to wait. It’s easy to get out of a regular workout routine with a good excuse!
…I want to encourage you to keep doing home exercises year-round no matter what (unless your doctor tells you not to or you’re sick), as your mental health and happiness improve — a fact we all know about the happy hormones and endorphins that release in working out.
As you get the blood circulating into your brain and body, you gain more energy from working out and that can help you sleep and eat healthier. If you have a foot sprain injury, for example, you could still do simple arm exercises to keep moving (a good body goal to maintain).
With common inflammation, you probably know it’s good to rest and ice your injury first, which can take a few days or weeks (everyone is different).
If you’re an athlete, you’re usually less fragile as your body is strong compared to someone who doesn’t work out as often.
In either case, when you’re back on the road to body recovery, you can think about strengthening other body parts. You don’t want to not do any exercise for weeks waiting for your sprain to heal completely if you can, so you can stay strong (and not get weak) both overall mentally and physically.
Physical therapy (exercises) exists, so you can rehabilitate your overall body and health back to your norm or stronger than before your injury.
If you think about it, when you do regular daily activities like brushing your teeth, cooking, or cleaning, you still need miracle muscle strength to do those common tasks. We underestimate the need for muscles unless we don’t have the ability to do what we need to do.
Even though our muscles are adaptable, we want to create progressive muscle growth, especially in our large muscle groups like our legs, buttocks, arms, and upper body so we can be independent to lift, walk, and pull or push even daily light weighted things.
Ok cool.. all makes sense so far, right?
Below I share a few of my favorite exercises, sprain injured or not, for staying toned and getting some cardio in even if you have light limitations, such as a common foot sprain.
We all have some personal fitness goals even if we don’t believe in writing resolutions. One of mine is staying the same consistent size, proportions, and weight. Since I’ve been the same size for years, measuring is not necessary but if I were trying to lose or gain weight, then measuring would be more accurate and a way to determine if what I was doing, was working.
Another goal is staying toned (or sculpted which sounds like a muscular statue). This is good no matter what your weight is… it’s obvious if you’re toned or not from a mirror, so you don’t have to step on a scale.
The tone goal is good for most women because if you’re serious about achieving good tone, you will naturally do the things in between or in the process to make that happen, like eat less and do more pushups.
Remember the “7 Habits of Highly Effective People”? – the second habit is “begin with the end in mind,” which is good for any goal setting you do. (I’m having a déjà vu moment right now where I can picture Stephen Covey who wrote the 7 habits. I was in a class of his decades ago where he taught his principles… I digress)…
