Category: Yoga Actions

Not everyone can do yoga poses, but everyone can do yoga actions. For some, yoga appears to be a pretzel-bending physical practice for those with flexible bodies. This is far from the truth. Yoga postures emerged in response to an understanding that tension, tightness and painful suffering can be alleviated and eliminated by tapping into the body’s cellular healing capacity. Our bodies always tell us the truth about what we are experiencing. Unfortunately, we are often too busy or too blind to pay attention. To better utilize our body’s innate ability to heal, we must awaken to how it speaks to us. Yoga poses (asanas) help us to discover where our pain and tension lie. Yoga actions, such as release the thigh bone back and the shin bone forward, take us deeper into our inner experience thereby bringing us ever closer to the source of our suffering. Yoga actions also help us to concentrate our awareness in the present moment. Through this intimate mindfulness of our direct experience, we learn what truth is. The body must tell one what to do, not the brain. BKS Iyengar YOGA ACTIONS began as a creative collaboration between two friends and yoginis, Candace Propp and myself, Helen Maupin. Our original intent was to write one book in an attempt to capture even a small portion of the knowledge and wisdom we gained from practising yoga. That modest intention mushroomed into — 1. six yoga actions books focusing on specific areas of the body, 2. two teacher training programs (A 200- and 500-hour) complete with facilitator manuals and student handbooks, 3. a bi-monthly yoga column in the Winnipeg Free Press, and most importantly, 4. a deeply-rewarding sisterhood filled with peace, love and joy. As always, journeys of creation and discovery, whether on or off the yoga mat, take us beyond the scope of our imagination into the Universe’s intentions and gifts. Below are some of the gifts that emerged from our collaboration.

A Yoga Teaching: Truth Telling

The Yamas are the fundamental renunciation of a life based on fear. They are the change. The Niyamas are the fundamental practices that sustain a life based on love. They sustain the change.Rolf Gates & Katrina Kenison The five yamas…

Engaging the Subtle Body: Pelvic & Diaphragm Tension Bands

The seven myofascial tension bands universally situate in all human bodies, which arguably could be proof that we are all one. These connective tissue bands are unnatural straps holding tension just under the skin’s surface in the outer layer of…

A Yoga Teaching: Who Am I NOW?

A while back, I blogged about this very question: Who Am I? From a yoga perspective and my own personal experience, I recognize the importance of re-evaluating my understanding of who I am on an ongoing basis. Given that change…

Engaging the Subtle Body: 7 Myofascial Tension Bands

7 Tension Bands or Straps: Myofascia is the flexible network of tissue that surrounds, cushions, and supports muscles, bones, and organs. It acts as a riverbed containing the flow of interstitial fluid. Interstitial fluid fills the spaces between cells and…

A Yoga Teaching: The Power of Positive

I recently read the following quote in a 2005 book written by Mary Doria Russell — When the preponderance of human beings choose to act with justice and generosity and kindness, then learning and love and decency prevail. When the…

Engaging the Subtle Body — Whole Spine Practice

Over the past several weeks, I shared Yoga Actions focused on creating space in the major spinal joints — sacrum-tailbone, lumbar-sacrum, thoracic-lumbar, and C7-thoracic. Using your awareness and breath to expand the space between these spinal vertebrae brings greater ease…

Engaging the Subtle Body — Cervical-Thoracic Joint

Over the past several weeks, we practiced asanas utilizing yoga actions that engage the subtle body — Pranamaya Kosha (energy body), Manomaya Kosha (mental-emotional body), and Vijnanamaya Kosha (wisdom/intuitive body). As you may have discovered personally, the holistic impacts dampen…

A Yoga Teaching: Stillness and Silence

Stillness within one’s body and silence within one’s mind are outcomes of a dedicated yoga practice that includes asanas (postures), pratyahara (sensory withdrawal), pranayama (breath regulation), and meditation (absorption). There are many wholesome reasons for choosing such a path. Primarily,…

Engaging the Subtle Body — Lumbar-thoracic Joint

In two previous posts, Tailbone-sacral and Sacral-lumbar joints, I wrote about the significance of moving beyond our physical reliance on the Annamaya Kosha (muscular-skeletal flexibility and strength). In our youth, our bodies can respond and heal more readily from the…