Every year, Lululemon Athetlica, organizes a program called “Salutation Nation.” As part of this program, thousand of communities of yogis worldwide come together to practice as one. The Tuscaloosa yoga community joined them for the first time. Over 30 people splayed out on their mats, in complete silence in savasana, – corpse pose- at the UA recreation Center at 9:54 p.m. on Saturday Sept 12.

The purpose of the event was to observe National Yoga Month, created by the United States Department of Health and Human Services. September is the Month for National Yoga.

During the event, Jess Smith – senior year in communicative disorders, – Lead the University’s Salutation nation proceedings. “We are doing karmic yoga, which is all about sending out good intentions.”  She also said the main purpose of the event ws to promote positive feelings and sense of unity. Smith instructed the group to slow down and breathe 4 times during the practice, as she reminded them to envisage their gratitude within as well as globally.

Another participant also felt the good vibe:

“It was neat to know that we were doing yoga at the same time as people all over the world,” said Diana Jones, a yoga instructor at the Recreation Center.

Lynn Andrews, a resident at Tuscaloosa, was a bit worried of the event being turned into an advertisement gimmick from Lululemon but at the end felt satisfied to see a balance between the amount of marketing and yoga.

Another resident from Tuscaloosa, Cathy Elliot said. “It was a different feel to doing yoga outside.”

Smith said, “Most people start yoga for the physical aspect,” she said, “but they usually find that they can’t help but take it off the mat and apply the benefits to the rest of their life. They keep coming back for the mental and emotional benefits that yoga promotes.”

To end the Tuscaloosa first session of Salutation Nation by encouraging everyone to take “gratitude off the mat and into the rest of the day.” She is one of the yoga instructors with 200-hour yoga teacher training.  Like her, you too could be a yoga trainer! Join us at Yandara for your trainning and a beautiful retreat.

There’s more hotel chains ready to deliver any type of workout and meditation equipment – one of them yoga videos.- as a way to make their guests feel at home, while distressing for that business conference they may be attending to.

“Probably fitness equipment is the biggest request we get from guests,” said Vivian A. Deuschl of the Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company. “It’s the biggest preoccupation of business travelers besides getting their work done, so we try to make fitness available on any basis they ask for.”

In-room fitness options aren’t limited to Pilates DVDs and yoga mats, although both are in high demand at most of the company’s 78 hotels worldwide, according to Deuschl. “We do folding treadmills and folding recumbent bikes,” she explained. “The only things we can’t bring to the rooms are heavy weights.”

As their guests are making more requests for fitness and meditation equipment, more hotels are joining the initiative of Ritz-Carlton Hotel. While it is great marketing idea for hotels across country to make themselves more flexible to their guests’ request, this is of great benefit to that stressed out business man, or that that casual guest that feels the best way to relax after visiting a new town is to do a session of yoga, or Pilates.

Now you know you can call the hotel you will be staying at and ask if they have yoga mat ready for you! In some hotels, there are even personal trainers, which we think may also be a good and new industry to belong to.  Be a yoga teacher for a hotel maybe the call for you. Imagine being able to share such a wonderful practice that promotes great health management principles, while having the pleasure of meeting people from different places of the world, if you are ready to become a yoga teacher: visit us!

Yoga offers the same benefits to children that it offers to adults: the gain of flexibility, self-confidence and, the channeling of emotions. Children, have the ability of picking difficult poses faster than the average adult practicing yoga.

Children often do not know how to express what they are feeling; yoga helps with the stress experience by the young people in such as fast world we live in. Busy parents, various extracurricular activities, communication tools they are exposed to like the Internet, emails, and social networks. Constantly rushing a child through life can have a negative effect on the child.

Yoga creates a state of consciousness of the body, calmness while increasing the flexibility and relaxation. Children play and exercise, connecting deeply with their inner self and developing an intimate relationship with the natural world around them.

“Those who practice yoga faithfully experience new found strength, flexibility and peace of body, mind and soul. It is our sincere intention to see you achieve similar results and we are here to help you in any way that we can.”
- Eight Stones Yoga

As we’ve mentioned in previous blogrolls, yoga means to join – to obtain the union with the divine, universal intelligence, God – whichever concept you are more comfortable with-. Whether you believe in the existence of a “God” or not, -for the purpose of this blog- lets allow the possibility of “god” or a “higher power” to exist in you. Once you begin to practice yoga devotedly, the goal can be achieve by anyone.

At the time yoga was developed, yogis lived very close to nature and used animas as well as plants as part of their inspiration and we can see it in some of the poses: the grace of a swan, the sting of the Scorpio…

While teaching children, the instructor needs to remain open minded to the idea that some adjustments may have to be done to his/her routine. If you are looking into becoming a yoga teacher, visit us at Yandara Yoga Institute.

Usually, yoga is found to be more popular on the coasts and metropolitan areas of the United States, there are smaller towns that are becoming yogis.

One small town we’ve come to learn about is Hutchinson, Texas where Jade Piros de Carvalho learned about Yoga a few years ago through Xiaofeng “Joya” Li. Li Moved to the U.S after getting married and taught classes in most local gyms, and in churches.

According to Jade, she tried yoga during a very trying period of her life. She had previously attempted to overcome anxiety and grief of losing an aunt who committed suicide. For little over seven years, yoga helped Jade to cope with many other challenges like the stress experience when she had to go back to school, the changes of majors, the loss of her grandmother and it has also eased her aching muscles that resulted from her training for her marathon. Jade has also found other benefits in yoga like the weight loss, minimization of chronic pains, lowering of her blood pressure and gain of flexibility.

Jade was inspired to become a Certified Yoga teacher by her instructor “Joya” and is now a great yoga Teacher in Hutchinson. She has found an even greater joy from sharing the gift Joya shared with her and her classmates every time she teaches yoga.

You too could obtain learn yoga and share this great gift with those around you. Yandara Yoga Institute provides you with all the tools needed to become an outstanding yoga teacher under mesmerizing sunsets! Visit us for more information

September is considered the “National Yoga month,” designated by the Department of Health and Human Services to create awareness of yoga’s proven health benefits providing people with tools to improve their well-being.

What is Yoga, What does it mean?

It is a Sanskrit word that means “union” or to “unite mind, body and spirit.” The purpose of yoga is to create a balance in the body by developing strengths and flexibility through the poses. Many make the mistake of thinking that yoga is just another type of exercise. However, the reality is that it is a system designed to create a clarity and harmony within.

A yogi or yogini – one who practices yoga – does a series of poses while controlling and synchronizing his or her breathing. Some yoga types bring the yogi (ni) to meditate and to chant. If practicing it regularly, the yogi (ni) will experience a slimmer, more flexible and stronger body. Other benefits found are greater amount of patience, a sharper mind, and a more relaxed.

Yogis (nis) usually have lower blood pressure and cholesterol, yoga provides them with pain relief, while increasing their flexibility, strength, helps them loose weight and keeping it off, improves circulation and cardiovascular conditioning. To find out more about the Yoga Month and how Yoga can improve your life, visit www.yogamonth.com. There may be some Yoga Programs available near you!

Yoga has increasingly become more popular amongst athletes, who are looking to improve their performance when adding yoga to their daily workout routine as supplement. A “mind- body” connection can fix imbalances within the body and improve the performance of those athletes’ practicing sports such as golf, basketball, tennis, or football.

Yoga helps with the development of correct breathing skills and techniques, crucial in the success of many sports, and often ignored by many athletes. Yoga integrates the connection of mind and body through correct breathing patterns, helping build stamina and endurance in the yogi, or yogini. Focus, attention and the sharpening of one’s intuition are other great results found in yoga and its breathing techniques, which helps an athlete gain advantage over his or her rivals.

Yoga counts with many poses that create strength in the core. Its several types of contractions and movements create a diversity of resistance levels for the body, similar to the typical gym- workout. Unlike a gym session though, yoga can be practiced at home, work, and even outdoors. Here in Yandara, we do yoga at with the wind and sounds of waves of Baja California, with the gorgeous scenes of the sunset and the beach as our background.

Frequent practice of yoga increases flexibility and range of motion. Tennis and gold players often notice improvements in their swing because of the flexibility in their muscles and joints. This is particularly important for athletes as regular weight training practiced at a gym help develop some muscles, but ignores others. Yoga takes care of this imbalance by developing those much-ignored muscles through contractions used in the different poses.

Another benefit of practicing yoga is that yoga breaks with repetitive training that often causes boredom. It is also important element in recovering the body from a hard session of workouts like aerobics, since yoga can be adjusted to either high or low intensity based on the yogi or yogini’s needs.