Friday Q&A: Marijuana and Yoga

Q: With the legalization of marijuana in the news I thought it would be a good time to bring up the question of marijuana use during yoga practice. I find that if I smoke after work that I suddenly become much more aware of my body and that I am more motivated to do poses to counteract what my body has gone through throughout my working day (I am a housekeeper). Also, when I want to commit to a good lengthy home-practice session, using marijuana has facilitated holding my intention that I set before practice throughout the entire practice, and...

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Featured Pose: Easy Inverted Pose

by Nina (with a little help from Baxter)Supported inverted poses are some of the most wonderful yoga poses for reducing stress. By physically inverting yourself (having your heart higher than your head), you employ the natural physiology of your body (the mechanisms that control your blood pressure—see Blood Pressure: Talking About Baroreceptors and Yoga) to invoke the relaxation response. However, in order for an inverted pose to work its magic,...

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Yoga for Every Body: An Interview with Janet Wieneke

by NinaSeptember Photo from the Yoga for the Larger Woman Calendar“Around the same time, the thought hit me that I had been dragging this body around for all these past 50 years instead of really living in it. It came to me that I had not claimed this body, not moved into this body. I was renting it, but I didn’t live there. I didn’t want to live there—in the “undesirable” section of town. “That began to change though when I realized no...

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New Study Supports Our Personal Bias! Yoga is Good for Older Adults!

by BaxterBaxter in My Yoga Room by Nina ZolotowOne of the benefits of our blog is that we get to keep up on all the latest developments in research on yoga and aging. Just the other day, Nina came across an abstract from the National Institutes of Health that piqued my fancy, which was titled “The effects of yoga on physical functioning and health related quality of life in older adults: a systematic review and meta-analysis.” Man, is that a mouthful!...

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Authentic Yoga

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Holiday Week

Angel Watching Man by Brad GibsonThis is Thanksgiving week in the US, so the staff at Yoga for Healthy Aging will be taking the week off from posting. In Belgium, where this photo was taken, they've just celebrated Saint Nicholas' day and are preparing for Christmas. Wherever you are, we wish your holidays are happy ones, and we'll be back with you in about a we...

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Friday Q&A: Savasana Vs. Seated Meditation

Q: I've gone through all your articles regarding meditation and savasan :) What is the difference between the state of mind during the centering in the beginning of yoga practice (meditation) and savasan? The different position of the body is obvious, but what about the mind? Thank you and namaste, LindaA: What a fascinating question! And also, it turns out, a tricky one. In fact, it led to an interesting email exchange between me, Nina, and Dr. Timothy McCall. Before I share that exchange with you, I’d like to say that in comparing seated mediation...

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In Gratitude or With Thanksgiving…Stress and Digestion

by Baxter Next Thursday is the official kick-off of the holiday season in the US, or maybe more appropriately the Feasting Season, or perhaps the Excessive Cream Cheese season.  Whatever you refer to the next seven weeks as, eating is center stage, and most often, with abundant quantities of food.  And although gratitude and togetherness and love and joy are also the focus of our gatherings and feasts, which seem like lovely qualities and potentially beneficial, we can still experience an increase in overall stress this time of year....

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Arthritis of the Knee and Yoga

by BaxterWhile in Montreal for a weekend workshop, I found myself attending a modern dance performance. I’d say the average age of the performers was about 30, and all looked very fit and flexible. As part of their performance, they did a move in which they leapt forward while spinning and landed on the floor in a Pigeon-pose like stance. The first time they did this, I found myself wincing, as I imagined the impact on their knees on the firm,...

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Total Hip Replacements and Yoga

by Shari Nina asked me to add to Baxter’s post Arthritis of the Hip Joint about what the next step might be when your own self care management techniques are not as effective and your quality of life is severely impacted. I thought I would give some background about the elective procedure of total hip replacement and why people might elect to have it done. I see a lot of total hip replacements in my work as a home health physical therapist, and I...

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Home Practice: The Best Way to Improve Your Health and Well-Being

by Timothy"If you are taking yoga classes but not practicing at home, you may be missing the best—and potentially most therapeutic—part of yoga. Your personal practice is where the deepest work happens, when you go inward and go at your own pace."—from Yoga As MedicineThis quotation from my book got posted on Facebook the other day and generated quite a bit of interest. But not everyone, particularly those who only take classes, agrees with the statement....

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Friday Q&A: Eye Floaters

Q: I have several students who have “eye floaters.” They are wondering if there is anything they can do for them.A: First off, how many of you out there reading this have ever had an “eye floater”?  I’ll bet loads! Even though they are considered an age-related eye phenomenon, I had one long ago, perhaps in my twenties or thirties. But before I get too far ahead of myself, let me define what we are talking about here.According to the Mayo clinic, eye floaters are spots in your vision. Eye floaters may look like black or gray specks, strings...

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Featured Pose: Downward-Facing Dog Variation (Chair Version)

by Baxter and NinaLike Puppy pose, which we featured last week, this variation of Downward-Facing Dog is also a good variation for upper body strengthening if you have wrist and hand issues because the angle between your hand and forearm is minimized and you have a choice of two different hand positions. Placing your hands on the seat of the chair takes some of the weight off your hands (though not as much as Puppy pose) and keeps your wrists in...

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Yoga Philosophy of the Day, Part 2

by NinaAlmost immediately after I published my post on Monday Yoga Philosophy of the Day, which was about cultivating equanimity in the face of difficulty and “enemies,” I was sorry I hadn’t mentioned the United States election (post posting remorse?). Because for many of us Americans, this election has been extremely divisive, with the feeling on both sides that those in the opposing camp were our “enemies.” I even know people who stopped speaking...

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