Effects of Hatha Yoga Practice on the Health-Related Aspects of Physical Fitness

Ten healthy, untrained volunteers (nine females and one male), ranging in age from 18–27 years, were studied to determine the effects of hatha yoga practice on the health-related aspects of physical fitness, including muscular strength and endurance, flexibility, cardiorespiratory fitness, body composition, and pulmonary function

...

Studies show yoga has multiple benefits

Yoga induces a feeling of well-being in healthy people, and can reverse the clinical and biochemical changes associated with metabolic syndrome

...

To Stretch or Not to Stretch? The Answer Is Elastic

The truth is that after dozens of studies and years of debate, no one really knows whether stretching helps, harms, or does anything in particular for performance or injury rates

...

38 Ways Yoga Keeps YOU Fit! "Yoga.Journal"

As it happens, Western science is starting to provide some concrete clues as to how yoga works to improve health, heal aches and pains, and keep sickness at bay

...

Yoga May Aid Body Image, Cut Eating Disorders

Yoga may make women feel better about their bodies, steering them away from eating disorders, a new study shows

...

Exercise and yoga improves quality of life in women with early-stage breast cancer

Two studies report that exercise and yoga can help maintain and in some cases improve quality of life in women with early-stage breast cancer

...

The Role Flexibility Plays In Improving Your Health

Increased flexibility provides you with a number of health benefits. When you are more flexible, you feel better. Your body works better. You are less likely to become injured. You can exercise without discomfort and without getting too sore the next day

...

A randomised comparative trial of yoga and relaxation to reduce stress and anxiety

Yoga appears to provide a comparable improvement in stress, anxiety and health status compared to relaxation

...

Sensory Integration Laboratory

Sensory defensiveness is a larger reaction to and less tolerance of typical levels of sound, touch, smell, lights, and movement in the environment that most others would find harmless

...

Say 'Om.' Yoga and other therapies good for chronic pain, study says

Researchers reviewed 20 clinical trials involving eight mind-body therapies for adults who suffered from chronic, non-malignant pain, to assess their feasibility, effectiveness in pain management and safety.The findings are published in Volume 8 of the journal Pain Medicine

...

Health, Hope and HIV

"Healing does not come only out of little bottles, as many people want it to," says Jon Kaiser, M.D., a San Francisco HIV specialist and author of

(HealthFirst Press, 1998). "Healing comes from inside. That's why I strongly recommend that patients with HIV take time each day to practice deep relaxation. Yoga quiets the mind, improves breathing and circulation, and reduces stress. Daily practice can help support the immune system in conjunction with a comprehensive HIV treatment program."

...

Effects of Hatha Yoga Practice on the Health-Related Aspects of Physical Fitness

Ten healthy, untrained volunteers (nine females and one male), ranging in age from 18–27 years, were studied to determine the effects of hatha yoga practice on the health-related aspects of physical fitness, including muscular strength and endurance, flexibility, cardiorespiratory fitness, body composition, and pulmonary function

...

Studies show yoga has multiple benefits

Yoga induces a feeling of well-being in healthy people, and can reverse the clinical and biochemical changes associated with metabolic syndrome

...

To Stretch or Not to Stretch? The Answer Is Elastic

The truth is that after dozens of studies and years of debate, no one really knows whether stretching helps, harms, or does anything in particular for performance or injury rates

...

38 Ways Yoga Keeps YOU Fit! "Yoga.Journal"

As it happens, Western science is starting to provide some concrete clues as to how yoga works to improve health, heal aches and pains, and keep sickness at bay

...

Yoga May Aid Body Image, Cut Eating Disorders

Yoga may make women feel better about their bodies, steering them away from eating disorders, a new study shows

...

Exercise and yoga improves quality of life in women with early-stage breast cancer

Two studies report that exercise and yoga can help maintain and in some cases improve quality of life in women with early-stage breast cancer

...

The Role Flexibility Plays In Improving Your Health

Increased flexibility provides you with a number of health benefits. When you are more flexible, you feel better. Your body works better. You are less likely to become injured. You can exercise without discomfort and without getting too sore the next day

...

A randomised comparative trial of yoga and relaxation to reduce stress and anxiety

Yoga appears to provide a comparable improvement in stress, anxiety and health status compared to relaxation

...

Sensory Integration Laboratory

Sensory defensiveness is a larger reaction to and less tolerance of typical levels of sound, touch, smell, lights, and movement in the environment that most others would find harmless

...

Say 'Om.' Yoga and other therapies good for chronic pain, study says

Researchers reviewed 20 clinical trials involving eight mind-body therapies for adults who suffered from chronic, non-malignant pain, to assess their feasibility, effectiveness in pain management and safety.The findings are published in Volume 8 of the journal Pain Medicine

...

Health, Hope and HIV

"Healing does not come only out of little bottles, as many people want it to," says Jon Kaiser, M.D., a San Francisco HIV specialist and author of

(HealthFirst Press, 1998). "Healing comes from inside. That's why I strongly recommend that patients with HIV take time each day to practice deep relaxation. Yoga quiets the mind, improves breathing and circulation, and reduces stress. Daily practice can help support the immune system in conjunction with a comprehensive HIV treatment program."

...

With the start of a new year it is important to restate the intention or meaning behind the practice of ashtanga yoga.   The practice is meant to sharpen the razor of discrimination. With sustained practice we develop razor-like attention that can be used to slice through karmic attachments both latent and active.  The discrimination developed enables one to see through the four primary forms of ignorance, these are: 1) confusing the temporary for the eternal, 2) mistaking the impure for the pure, 3) experiencing misery as happiness, and 4) believing that the limited ego self is the true Self.  Essentially discrimination allows for subtler forms of introspection which in turn shed light on why we suffer.  The first five stages or limbs of yoga hone the razor edge of discrimination, these are: yama, niyama, asana, pranayama, pratyahara.  The final three stages or limbs of yoga put the finely sharpened tool of discriminating awareness into action allowing for direct unbiased experience. Yoga, much like modern day psychology, is a systematic method for understanding the perceptual flow of the mind.  At its most basic level, discrimination is a process of sorting this from that.  The sorting process usually begins at the most primary level with our relationship to the external world.  We begin to develop discrimination as we practice principles such as non-injury, truthfulness, compassion and contentment.

With the start of a new year it is important to restate the intention or meaning behind the practice of ashtanga yoga.   The practice is meant to sharpen the razor of discrimination. With sustained practice we develop razor-like attention that can be used to slice through karmic attachments both latent and active.  The discrimination developed enables one to see through the four primary forms of ignorance, these are: 1) confusing the temporary for the eternal, 2) mistaking the impure for the pure, 3) experiencing misery as happiness, and 4) believing that the limited ego self is the true Self.  Essentially discrimination allows for subtler forms of introspection which in turn shed light on why we suffer.  The first five stages or limbs of yoga hone the razor edge of discrimination, these are: yama, niyama, asana, pranayama, pratyahara.  The final three stages or limbs of yoga put the finely sharpened tool of discriminating awareness into action allowing for direct unbiased experience. Yoga, much like modern day psychology, is a systematic method for understanding the perceptual flow of the mind.  At its most basic level, discrimination is a process of sorting this from that.  The sorting process usually begins at the most primary level with our relationship to the external world.  We begin to develop discrimination as we practice principles such as non-injury, truthfulness, compassion and contentment.

Q: Why don’t you talk philosophy more when you teach? Don’t you think it would be helpful to give students an idea of what they should be focusing on or thinking about while they are practicing?

A: A Yoga practice is like a Rorschach inkblot test in action. It is important to give students plenty of time to really sink into the thickness of their own thoughts. As they do this they will project a great deal of their own internalized struggle and resistance onto the experience (the practice). If a teacher is always “proselytizing” or espousing beliefs, then students will ultimately not have the “thinking” space to befriend their own mind and gain a deeper understanding of their own very personal mental habituation. Simply put, there is a significant difference between having someone tell us we are stuck, or being reactive, versus reaching that conclusion in our own time. We are far more likely to take ownership over our own realizations! I also believe that most of us tend towards taking life far too seriously and we bring that limitation with us onto our mat. We turn our yoga practice into another way to avoid the sometimes heartbreaking inconsistencies and injustices of being mortal humans. I believe that learning to truly be uncomfortable and...make it through to the other side of that discomfort is a big part of what yoga has to teach us. Having someone croon dogmatic pleasantries while we are attempting to pull our senses inward seems counter intuitive at best, if not wholly egocentric. What about inspiration? One of the most profound concepts I was ever exposed to in my life is that motivation comes from within. A good teacher learns to step out of the way so that students are able to find their own inner cheerleader.

This isn’t to say that the philosophy of yoga is unimportant. Certainly it is possible to fill in some of the shadows cast by one's own mind and gain a much deeper understanding of the overall yoking process by slogging through an original source like the Yoga Sutras. However, unlike other philosophies, yoga is relevant only to the degree we are willing and able to put its ideas into action in our practice. It is primarily for this reason that I continue to practice Ashtanga yoga, it is philosophy in action and in many respects an artful recipe for living a rich and delicious life.

-John Merideth • Director and Owner of onlYoga

Swim Smart

Stepping to the front of the mat and attempting to surrender to the idea that for the next 90 minutes we are going to practice "relaxing effort" can present something of a conundrum in our practice. Since yoga is at least in part a physical experience we often assume that without struggle we wont reap its many flaunted benefits. So we hold on tight, contract our mental muscles and launch ourselves into the "work" of making it happen. Instead of floating, we bang and stumble our way from one practice to the next. I refer to this as the "hard work" paradigm and it is mostly about affirming what we already know about our physical experience? Since the effort we exert sometimes allows us to muscle our way through yoga postures that seemed unreachable a few months ago, this paradigm can be difficult to shake. Inevitably though we hit a plateau and begin to wonder why we are working so hard all the time. We begin to wonder if this is it...and for some of us it is. We have simply affirmed what we already knew - our bodies are finite structures.
When I was swimming competitively one of my coaches, Jack Nelson, used to go on and on about how important it was to swim smart. He employed many “fascinating” techniques to make his point (most of which ended with a fairly large portion of the team treading water). I thought I understood his point then but it wasn't until I began suffering through my yoga practice a few years later that his words really clicked into place. “Muscles can help you float or they can drag you down. Brute strength and effort don’t win a race. Efficiency and awareness can make a mediocre swimmer great. Swim smart!”
In life we often approach a situation with our full compliment of attachments, habits and preconceptions about who we are and how we are. Before we say a single word, take a single breath or make our first move we have predetermined the outcome of the experience. Pema Chodron calls it our story line - the self-perpetuating tale we weave to maintain the status quo. Relaxing effort means that we allow the story line and its limiting internal definitions to fall away. Essentially we attempt to move or love or breath or eat or work with intelligence. The key to this form of intelligent action is nonjudgmental observation. We watch, we notice and we make small adjustments that keep us asking questions about where we are. The real practice then is in learning how to allow the experience to live us so that ME stops getting in the way. I have found over the years that intelligent action can infuse an otherwise stale, flat practice with new life and tons of fresh energy. Suddenly we are like children again curiously exploring and playing through what we previously identified as “work”. So the next time you step to the front of your mat don't try so hard to be who you think you are, instead relax the effort and swim smart!

Namaste • John Merideth • Director onlYoga

Light - The God Of Generosity

For longer than recorded history, native cultures living in the northern hemisphere have recognized that December brings with it ever increasing darkness.  The days grow steadily colder and shorter and the age old drama in the war of light against darkness takes on a particularly poignant significance.  In late December (this year December 21),  the sun seems to hover in the sky in its lowest arc of the year.  The winter solstice (meaning standing still sun) brings with it the shortest period of daylight during the year and historically has been the most hopeful and conversely the most dreaded time of the year.
Cultures from across the globe watched and recorded the movement of the heavenly bodies to assure they would be prepared for and able to predict the time each year when darkness would appear to rule over light.  Humans have struggled with the darkness during the winter months for millennia.  Complex and often lengthy rituals were developed to ensure the triumph of light over darkness.  To this day the Hopitu Shinumu, or The Peaceful Ones, a native culture from the pacific northwest, practice the Soyal ceremony.  The ritual begins on the shortest day of the year and is a time for offering prayers and wishing prosperity and health in the coming year.  During the Soyaluna ritual, the most powerful humans of the Hopi, the warriors, intreat the Sun God to turn around and return to the earth.  This ritual represents, among other things, the start of another cycle of the wheel of the year and is one of the most important periods of purification.  Prior to the Christian era the Roman solar cult had its major festival on the winter solstice, December 25th.  This date of the invincible sun was carried into the iconography of Christianity as the birth of Jesus and the story of a brilliant star that lit the sky symbolizing life over death...light over darkness.
Although science has given us a precise and clear way for understanding the decline of the sun during the winter months, light continues to play a significant sub-conscious role for us during December.  We continue to mimic age old customs of building bonfires, burning candles and celebrating festivals of light by wrapping our homes in glittering reminders of the transition taking place during this season.  The lights of December are an invocation of the coming warmth and brighter skies of Spring.  This time of year is a reminder that just as light follows dark, great joy often follows and flows from deep sorrow.  Satisfying some primal instinct within each of us, light, the Giver God, brings with it comfort and hope for life’s renewal. 

Namaste • John Merideth • Director onlYoga

“Taken by itself, each language is auto-familiar: it has its own concepts, its own system of thought which, within it, condition the thinkable. The way we think and speak arises out of decisions our language has already made for us: language discreetly dictates to its users - in an invisible manner - self-evident assumptions and proscriptions that are inscribed in its grammar (which is, by definition, imperceptible from inside the language.) In order for grammar to appear as such one must dislodge one's language from its self-presence, from its assumptions and proscriptions, by subjecting them to the otherness of a different grammar, by putting them in question through the medium of a foreign language.”

Felman, Shoshana.

. pp 18-19.

Our ability to see into things, to see the truth, is intrinsic. We can extract happiness and meaning from life despite our awareness of our own mortality. This is a universal quest that crosses time and culture. By practicing yoga we learn to rein in the tendency of consciousness to gravitate toward the impermanence of external things. As consciousness settles, it takes on a transparent quality and our experience of time becomes more spacious and less personal. With more time and space the drama of life becomes less compelling. At this point consciousness begins to experience a less personal way of seeing and a problem emerges. We are faced with a conundrum - the very action and energy propelling us to seek clarity is itself an obstacle on our path. The more force we use, the more it feels like we are doing something. It is at this point that we must develop the ability to rest in the stillness of the moment. However, first we must learn to identify the point of focus. Once we can identify the stillness, we can learn to return to it without exertion. There are many important issues that allow us to reach this juncture but two stand out above the others. The first is motivation or the genuine energy we bring to liberating our mind (effort). The second is intelligent orientation or our willingness to continually place our consciousness before the divine mirror of life (effortless). Motivation requires energy but truly seeing the sublime beauty in a sunset is intrinsically effortless.

John Merideth • Director