Sunday, April 6, 2014

Yoga Practice


I'm not exactly the poster child for yoga. I've blogged in the past about being yoga-challenged. I know it's good for me, but I suck at it.

Well, right now I really don't want to obsess about my knee and whether I can or cannot run a half-marathon. So I'm going to try changing focus a bit, in an attempt to really work at getting/staying healthy.

To do that, I decided to truly give yoga a try this month, in the privacy of my own home, that is.

A few years ago I got a DVD set of Kate Potter Namaste yoga. The style is Vinyasa flow. You may have seen her on tv at one time.  that at one time was on tv, but now is not.  Each DVD set has thirteen ~23-min episodes (it was 30 min on TV, but it's shorter without commercials). That is short enough to fit into my busy day, but long enough to feel like it's making an impact. And there's enough different sessions so to keep it fresh and mix things up.  Plus I ordered season 2, another 13 episodes. Each session has the following format: warm-up, vinyasa flow sequence, cool-down, short savasana.

Why yoga?  Well, I know there are many benefits to yoga including increased flexibility, reduced stress, & better sleep.  Those three alone are enough to motivate me right now to really give this a try.

My goal is for my personal yoga practice to include at least 15 yoga sessions this month (roughly 1 every other day).  It's the 6th, and so far I have completed 3, so I'm on track.

The only thing getting in my way is myself.  I'm committed to give this a try without judgment until the end of the month.  And then decide if I want to keep with it, increase frequency, try something different, or whatever.

6 comments:

  1. That sounds like a great personal challenge - and 23 minutes is really nice. Sometimes a full hour class just seems to take way too much time out of my day, but I can never argue with one that is under a half hour. Good luck and keep us posted on how it goes!

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  2. I've never done yoga and think my body will break into many pieces if I try.

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  3. I've been doing yoga since my 16 year old was born...I found it to be a very relaxing workout at the time. I also realized how yoga's benefits translate to running. I practice at least once/week, sometimes twice. Yoga really is the perfect counterpart to running...

    Wendy@TakingtheLongWayHome

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  4. This is a great challenge. You can get huge benefits from yoga - both for your body and your mind - so it'll be interesting to read your report at the end of the month.

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  5. At least it sounds good on paper. Let's see if I can do it!

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