Yoga For Urbanites: Get to the Root of Upper Back Tension

Barbie Levasseur is a new (and awesome) teacher at yoga mayu. Here's her advice on dealing with upper back tension! Sign-up for one of her classes to learn more!

"You may be surprised to know that tight chest muscles are often the culprit behind aching shoulder, upper back, and neck muscles. Writing e-mails, texting friends or driving to work, we spend most of the day in one position: seated with our shoulders slumped and our arms out front. With our body in this shape, our chest muscles are at their shortest, and over time they tighten to stay this way. In turn, when the chest muscles are shorter, the we tend to slouch even more—it's a vicious cycle. In response, the muscles in the upper back, shoulders, and neck compensate, becoming tired, sore, tense, and overstretched.

Want some proof in your own body? Take a moment to get up from your computer and find a doorway. With a 'cactus arm' (your upper arm parallel to the floor at shoulder height, and your elbow bent at 90 degrees so your finger tips point up toward the ceiling), press your palm and forearm against the door frame then shuffle forward until you feel a stretch across the front of the shoulder and chest. Hold this for 20-30 seconds. When you release the stretch, notice the relief you feel in your upper back, shoulders, and neck. Next time you feel like stretching your upper back at work, try this instead!

For lasting results, become a regular at my 8:15pm Mellow Flow classes on Monday and Thursday evenings, in which we take the time to stretch deeply into the chest muscles and to strengthen the upper back muscles that support healthy posture. As you bring the body back into balance, you'll put the kibosh on that vicious cycle of slumping shoulders and shortening chest muscles, you'll notice yourself sitting taller, and you'll enjoy more ease around the shoulders, upper back and neck."

Practice Supta Baddha Konasana at Home

Feeling a little out of sorts today? Let Caroline Kelley walk you through Supta Baddha Konasana, a gentle pose you can try at home:

"This pose has numerous benefits and can be practiced with all the props demonstrated here, or if your back and knees feel happy without support you can simple practice without support.

Physically, this pose can help relieve lower back pain, tense abductor muscles on the inside of the highs can distort the pelvic in such way that causes lower back pain. This pose also helps relieve menstrual cramps and indigestion. Another wonderful benefit is that this posture is a great way to relieve stress and anxiousness. If you are feeling anxious, I recommend laying blankets over you to reduce any feeling of vulnerability.

Practice this in a quiet place, where you can rest for ten or so minutes. Make sure that the cushions behind the ribs are positioned so that you can tuck the tail bone gently towards the heels and therefore relieve any discomfort in the lower back.

Once here take a deep breath into your belly, filling it up like a balloon, as if taking the breath deep down into the lungs, and then relax completely as you exhale. Do this exaggerated practice until you are able to find an easy, relaxed and soothing motion of breath.

Let your eyes and tongue relax, you will notice that the whole body relaxes even more with just those two simple things. Feel the motion of the breath and let it soothe you into deep surrender.

If you feel on the verge of an anxiety attack child's pose will be more suitable, bringing the head and heart down to earth along with abdominal breathing helps calm the nervous system."

Come try it out with Caroline at Yoga Mayu, Tuesdays and Thursdays from 7:30am to 8:30am.

Dhanurasana: Caroline Kelley's Pose of the Month

If you head to one of Caroline Kelley's vinyasa classes this month, you can expect to get a little extra emphasis on her asana of the month: Dhanurasana.

Here's what Caroline has to say about this heart opening pose:

"This month we will explore Bow Pose in varying forms and of course suitable modifications for Beginning level and Yin practice

Benefits and effects of this asana:
Strengthens and balances the spinal muscles. Relieves hypertension in the hip flexors. Opens the chest and encourages an upright posture, as well as healthy breathing patterns."

Come try it out with Caroline at Yoga Mayu, Tuesdays and Thursdays from 7:30am to 8:30am.

What's in a Word?

Here's what yoga mayu teacher Sara Levine has to say about the importance of words:

"I have spent the first month of 2012 trying to be more clear and concise with my language. You could say that it is my New Years Resolution. I find that there are a lot of words being thrown around carelessly these days and it seems to me that the more we speak, the less weight our words hold. This concept also holds true in my teaching. When I am clear and direct in my speech, rather than meandering along with flowery imagery, it allows my students the room to create their own perspective of their practice. There is a great deal of depth in silence.

One word in particular, that I have been robotically repeating for many years, is beginning to sound less and less clear each time I say it. Have you ever repeated a word so many times that it begins to sound unlike a word at all? This word, INTENTION, was beginning to have that effect. And so, of course, I decided to google it.

This is what I found:

Intention:
The healing process of a wound. 
An aim or plan.
Plan that something function in a particular way.
Plan that speech should have a particular meaning.
ORIGIN Middle English entend (in the sense [direct the attention to]), from Old French entendre, from Latin intendere ‘intend, extend, direct,’ from in- ‘toward’ + tendere ‘stretch, tend.’

I have to say, I am very pleased with this new definition I have found. It feels as though there is fresh life in the intentions that I set on my mat every day. The healing of a wound, the clarity of speech, the reaching toward - it all seems so appropriate. My hope is that you will find some gem in this definition so that you might bring it with you onto your mat the next time you set up to practice."

Want to find out more about intentions? Sign-up for one of Sara's classes at yoga mayu, Mondays and Wednesdays at 5pm and Sundays at 11:15am

Jody's Quote of the Week

"Our anger and annoyance are more detrimental to us than the things themselves that anger and annoy us." Marcus Aurelius

I want to point out that he uses the word "our" which to me is a reminder that it's "our anger" and "our annoyance" not the world's. The world is not in charge of how we feel or how we react to things. We have to own our actions and reaction. There is no "He/she made me_______." That make us victims of the world because we believe everything happens and we have no power to do anything about it. But that's not so. We are interactive with the world and we choose our actions and reactions especially as we become more aware.

I also want to point out that he says that it's "detrimental." Chemically speaking the body takes on the emotion we are feeling. So angry emotions have a different chemical composition in the body than happiness emotions do. Anger and annoyance chemistry is the chemistry of stress and fight or flight. Happiness chemistry is stay and play.

Here is a blogpost about the effects of anger on the body: Enjoy.

Jody Quotes Are Back!

Every week Jody Hahn starts and ends her classes with a thought-provoking quote. Here is one of her recent quotes:

"We tend to think that being unhappy leads people to complain, but it's truer to say that complaining leads to people becoming unhappy." Dennis Prager

Jody says:

"We always get to choose our viewpoint. By complaining we are choosing to focus and bring into view those things that we don't like. When we are constantly thinking of things or people or situations that are unhappy then it stands to reason that we are feeling unhappy. Try to notice when you complain or when those around you complain. How do you feel? You can think unhappy thoughts and the emotion will follow so do the opposite, think happy thoughts so that emotion will follow."

Release Tension with Malasana

If you head to one of Caroline Kelley's vinyasa classes this month, you can expect to get a little extra emphasis on her asana of the month: Malasana.

Here's what Caroline has to say about this beneficial pose:

"This asana is a great way to release tension in the lumbar spine, you may also know from experience that tight achilles tendons limit ones ability to get the heals down to the floor.

This pose has many benefits. As usual there will be variations so that this pose can be used therapeutically and also as a stepping stone into more advanced postures such as Bakasana."

Come try it out with Caroline at Yoga Mayu, Tuesdays and Thursdays from 7:30am to 8:30am.