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Found 8 results

  1. Hello everyone, First off: I realize that all I can get from Internet advice is an educated guess on the issue, but that is my only option as I have pretty much no access to medical professionals of any kind. —— A few weeks ago I started practicing the half lotus (after a year of working with Kit's material including the lotus video and many others) since things were coming along especially in the hips. From the start there was light pain in the knee cap area during the pose. I figured it wasn't a big concern since it was not on the meniscus side, so I started trying it for a few minutes at time. One morning, soon after I held it for about 15 minutes on each side, and after coming out I noticed that my knees had become quite sore. The pain subsided quickly after getting up, but it would come back whenever I tried to bend the knees a lot, including in the usual burmese pose I always used to do with no issues. It has gotten slightly better, but it's been about 3 weeks. The pain is now limited to the left leg only, which has always been my tightest, especially since I've always sat right-first in Burmese pose. Any strong bending at the knees where hip abduction is involved seems to be a problem (Cobbler's Pose, Janu Sirsasana Burmese Pose), and deep squats too. Apart from this there is no pain. Pigeon Pose is fine. Interestingly, I can do the lying quad stretch (or hero pose) where the knee is bent almost maximally without discomfort. Here of course there is no external rotation nor abduction at the hip. Also, my cossack squat on the left leg has always been more unstable, and less deep than on the right, sometimes with a little bit of pain too. Right now I wouldn't even try a cossack. So I was just wondering if all this rings any bells to anyone here. My guess so far had been tightness in the quads, but the seemingly crucial role of the hip confuses me. Should I continue to stretch the quads (or something else) or rather refrain from it? Other things that might aid both recovery and prevention? Any insights appreciated.
  2. Hello, I need some advise here on strength training. My background is ballet dancing and swimming as a teenager, racquet games and yoga as a adult. I am pretty flexible, and have no problem getting into bridge, pancake, front and side splits. I have recently started Taiji and found that has improved my lower body strength substantially, not to mention stablisiing the knees. My problem is getting upper body strength. While practising yoga, I always have problems with stablising my hyper extended elbows in downdog and all the arms balancing poses. I can't do a downdog without feeling strain on either on my right wrist or elbow. I can't do Chaturanga without feeling the strains on the neck and deltoid. Somehow, handstand gives much less problems. For the past one year, I hardly do any these poses but been focusing on gaining better range on my shoulder with Stretch Therapy Exercises. The exercises are great. They have settled quite a few of my issues on neck and shoulder and importantly learned to deactivate overused muscles on the neck, shoulder and arms... . I am currently running a centre teaching others ST. I am small-sized, 5 foot 1 and 99% of students are bigger than me! I wish to gain sufficient upper body strength correctly by using my own body mainly. I need the strength to assist students in class as well as doing simple household chores like lifting a heavy pots. I am currently doing some simple wall planks, getting the shoulder to protract and using the core. On the floor, I still feel the strain on wrist and elbow. Any suggestions to improve are welcome.
  3. Came across this article (the link to the full article is at the end). Here are some extracts - "Yoga celebrity status is something that many young teachers aspire to achieve. From a broad perspective, branding your approach to teaching yoga and commodifying your image as a yoga professional is seemingly one of the only ways to make a "comfortable living" teaching the practice. Endorsements, brand ambassadorships, spokesperson contracts, book deals, and corporate advertising opportunities are all big-business ways to make a profit in the yoga industry. Unfortunately, achieving stardom or making that comfortable living as a yoga teacher only happens for a select few." ... "Top "yogalebrities" have very specific brand images. The majority of individuals catapulted into the stratosphere of "yoga superstar status" gain their traction in mainstream pop culture based on the ability to make sales. As a result, the main qualifier for celebrity status ends up being physical appearance, rather than the quality or the substance of the individual’s teaching, or even their professional work within the yoga community. The better looking you are, the move value you have in mainstream yoga culture. Your message and your words hold more influence if you fit a specific idealized aesthetic....." "At the top of the yoga celebrity culture is the homogeneous image of thin, fair-skinned, flexible women. We see very few men and almost no people of color, bigger-bodied individuals.... achieving stardom." etc, etc, etc. In spite of the explicit condemnation, I got the impression that there is an underlying endorsement (or possibly envy) in the article for those who achieve yogalebrity status. If we have any STlebrities, the nearest we have is Kit, but nobody would think he was a thin, fair-skinned, flexible woman. First mistake, Kit. Just wonder what it is like living in a world where these things are issues (by the way the founding lebrity of modern western yoga was Iyengar, who was male, of colour, and, in later life, rather bigger-bodied.) Nice to teach stretch in a dingy old hall to a few people who are there just to learn and do exercise. Some people make life so difficult for themselves. Jim. Link to article: https://yogainternat...the-yogalebrity
  4. https://yogainternational.com/article/view/10-hamstring-myths-debunked (I cant correct the spelling of Hmstring - hope you work it out.)
  5. Many of you will have seen (and maybe marvelled at) videos of Kino from Kino Yoga. Here's an interesting article, for those interested in overworking themselves, commercialisation, narcissism, and a few other things. https://yogainternational.com/article/view/kinos-hip-reflections-on-extreme-practice-and-injury-in-asana (hope you can see it; you may have to set up a - free - account). Jim.
  6. Those who think their teaching is veering towards yoga, might like to look at these trailers. Thank you for ST! (in contrast, I might add in case I am not making myself clear.) http://www.namastebitchestheseries.com/
  7. An article worth reading, for all types of practitioners - some ideas that apply to all forms of exercise in there: https://yogainternat...2027e3-88681249 Wow! That was a long URL! (goes on for 3 lines in its original version) Jim.
  8. While trying to figure out why the standing leg limbers in the pancake program weren't being felt in my hips, I went looking for some other sources on the move. I ended up finding Ray Long and his site/books Bandha Yoga and his blog http://www.dailybandha.com/. They bill themselves as giving "scientific keys to unlock the practice of yoga." Long's approach is really complementary to the interests Kit and the community here have here in the focus on anatomy and the musculoskeletal physiology. A particularly great part of what they've got is an illustration technique that shows clearly how each muscle is supposed to be contracted or relaxed in any given pose. For instance, check out this image of a pancake-like pose (Uppavishta konasana -- blue is contract, red is relax, note the dashed arrows showing driving the feet out): http://www.bandhayog...onasana_TFL.jpg I've already found a few gems here and there about what the sensations should be in a given stretch. He also gives a good account of "facilitated stretching" (same as C-R), reciprocal inhibition, and co-activation--not that any of that is novel to people here. I don't have any of his books yet, but I'm planning to get one or two soon. Check it out! I'm sure everyone here will find something interesting in either the books or the blog. and you don't have to be a yoga person to appreciate it (I'm not one... yet!).
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