Yoga, Health, and Wellness Articles + Recipes

Students who love Ustrasana praise the pose for the way it opens the shoulders, chest and upper-back. And, they’re right. Ustrasana is hard to beat when it comes to extending the thoracic spine. Students who loathe Ustrasana invariably complain about discomfort in the neck and lower back. They’re also right. It can be tough to do Ustrasana without creating excessive compression in your lower back and neck.

These days there are so many articles and courses and books out there trying to teach us how to be happy, how to love ourselves, and what we have to do in order to feel free and successful. And don’t get me wrong, I love this- I love the way we as a collective are beginning to focus on self-growth, self-knowledge, and self-love. What I don’t love though, is that there is often a step that is missing from these books and articles and courses. A step that is absolutely crucial to take on the path of self-love and learning to love ALL parts of you.

There's many people who used to keep diaries and journals when they were teenagers. It was a way of expressing your anxiety and issues with the world at large. Why, then, do most of them drop the habit when they grow up?

These chickpea burgers are similar to a Middle Eastern falafel. This isn’t like the Americanized version of falafel that resembles carnival food deep-fried in some unhealthy oil. That’s a culinary crime, because falafel done right is so delicious and nutritious. It’s all in the blend. Here the secret ingredient is basmati rice, which holds the chickpea mixture together and creates a complete protein. I love the mini-burger concept; the whole wheat bun is like putting falafel in a top hat and tails, perfect for folks who like the taste of beans when they’re broken down and combined with heady herbs and spices. Gently pan-seared or baked, these burgers are bountiful bites of health.

Did you know that the right body posture can make you look taller, slimmer, and more confident? Thanks to our hectic schedules, our mind and body are always tired. Most of us slouch over our desks, straining our backs in the process. The constant stress and pressure make it really hard for you to maintain a good posture. When your body is in the ideal position, everything else is comfortable. However, accommodating time for a workout or exercise is stressful when your timetable is blocked by work. What if I told you that without wasting much of your day, you could do a few yoga asanas that can make a difference? Read on to know more.

The novelty of yoga has been worn down to almost nothing by a multi-billion dollar industry that cares little for its tenets, like the crumbling shreds of a shoddily made pvc mat from China. But from out of the ashes of craven images and advertising schemes, a new discipline is emerging.

High Intensity Interval Training—often just called HIIT for short—is working its way into fitness enthusiast’s workout schedules everywhere, and not without good reason. In fact, Dr. Axe shares many different benefits of HIIT in addition to better physical fitness, a couple of which include its anti-aging effects and support of healthier levels of hormones like ghrelin (which affects your eating patterns) and leptin (the hormone responsible for making you feel full).

As humans, we blame ourselves for various perceived shortcomings in life. But some of us really get stuck there. We blame ourselves for not being more disciplined or not being able to do it all. We blame ourselves for not being there for a loved one. There’s an easy tool I use to practice forgiveness, but I’d like to first speak about what happens when we blame ourselves.

It is common for people to go through dry spells or feel burnt out. We all have, at one point of another, felt uninspired, overworked, wanted to check out and just plain exhausted from the humdrum of life and the prevailing idea of not ‘being enough’. We don’t always have time to go to cook healthy meals, go to yoga classes, stick to our budget or just do things ‘right’. One might wonder what it would be like to have more hours in a given day to do the things we want to do to live a more fulfilling and happy life. Yet if your evenings and weekends are spent in the same couch potato or indulgent fashion, it may be time for you to check in and recognise this as a sign that you’ve been making excuses for yourself.

Mental health is a serious subject to take into consideration, particularly as there are so many conditions associated with changes in this area. When speaking about this subject, no one takes into consideration potential lifestyle changes, which could greatly improve one’s mental health. To come to your rescue, we have gathered no less than seven lifestyle changes, destined to boost your mental health and improve your overall quality of life. Keep in mind that these changes can help you deal with conditions such as depression, anxiety or even bipolar disorders. Take action today and be healthy not only tomorrow but for the rest of your life.

Whether you’re in hyper-drive, ticking your way through the holiday to-do list or you’re feeling too depleted to get off the couch and do yoga, the sequence here is invaluable to have in your back pocket during the winter months. It’s not a high-intensity practice – it’s a healing, nurturing, immune boosting yoga practice. The poses encourage relaxation, reduce stress, and facilitate circulation throughout your whole body. These are the three most effective things that yoga asana can do to help support your immune system.

Transformation is often touted in the yoga world as an aim for which we practice. In fact, the phrase “transformation starts here” is written on the door of one of the yoga studios where I teach. But what does that word really mean? What does the process of transformation look like? How do you teach it or guide that experience for someone else?

As a yoga teacher, there may come times where you would use Sanskrit terms during class, whether you like it or not. This is because it is often the case where most Sanskrit words don’t have an English equivalent that fully explains the meaning of the terms.

Have you ever signed up for something with 100% knowing that it was the best choice you ever made? Don’t you wish you could have that kind of clarity all the time? This is one example of how raising your vibration will serve you. Your choices and the energy behind them creates our energy structure and our vibration-and when all is aligned you have the clarity that makes your choices feel divinely inspired.

Lotus Pose (Padmasana) is one you were likely familiar with before you ever set foot in a yoga studio. Surely you’d seen sculptures of Siddartha or photographs of Indian sadhus with their legs tightly folded together in a pretzel shape. It’s a pose that’s associated with serene states of meditation — and the shape of the pose really does encourage quiet.

My first internship when I got out of culinary school was in the kitchen at the Chopra Center for Wellbeing, where they had an entire wall filled with dozens and dozens of spices. I swear that wall looked like a piece of art—in the form of a jigsaw puzzle that I had to figure out. The way you knew you had earned your stripes in the kitchen was when the executive chef finally let you make their famous dahl.

Are you tired of pushing a plateful of delectable food away from you? Is the dieting getting on your nerves? Do you feel deprived? I feel you. In the quest to shed a few kilos, we all try things we might not necessarily enjoy. From gulping down bitter juices to munching on tasteless greens, weight loss is more of a task than anything else.

My most memorable and doable resolution for 2016 has been to eat more fat. Yes, you read that right: Eat. More. Fat. Decades ago, fat became the villain of the America diet and carbs were king. Now the low-fat approach to eating is being blamed for the rise of processed carbohydrates and high-sugar foods — think sweetened low-fat yogurts and splenda-sweetened Starbucks bevvies.

Are you wondering how to improve your yoga practice? It’s one of the most common questions I get from my students and clients. It’s also one of the hardest questions to answer because there is no one answer. Improving your yoga practice is not about learning how to do the postures the “right way” or learning how to hold a handstand and master arm balances. Improving your yoga practice starts with shifting your perspective, keeping an open mind, and committing to stepping on your mat, literally or figuratively, as often as possible.

As I reflect on my humble beginnings this Spring, I give thanks for my inspirational teacher-trainer, Trevor Tice who passed away suddenly in December 2016.

In the mood to travel but lost for the companion of your heart? Sling on your yoga mat and get going. Once you do, you'll find your practice is achieved through connection with the earth beneath your feet and the sun shining in a bright blue sky above. Go deeper into this rewarding experience of harmonizing with your core and the universe that has shelters you. Your strife to reach and feel the presence of the divine will deepen as you come to know the changing terrains, people, and colors of the lands you travel.

This is certainly a case for visuals drawing you to the plate. Served with salmon, this rice—an indigo delight—pops like a painting, beckoning you to come closer, closer . . . and that first bite seals the deal. The rice and bell pepper play delightfully against the creaminess of the avocado, while the mint and cilantro roll all around your mouth like pinballs, blasting taste here, there, and everywhere. This salad enchants all the senses—and the rice is a whole grain as well, feeding the mind in more ways than one.

Common wisdom tells you to work on the postures that bring up resistance and challenge you. Personally, I’m okay with this sentiment—after all, there’s plenty of value in exploring the edges of your comfort zone. As a practitioner and teacher, though, I tend to emphasize the opposite—I choose to indulge the postures that I love with egregious frequency. I encourage the teachers that I train to do the exact same thing. We love the poses that we love for good reasons: they awaken us, they ground us, they soothe us, they challenge us, and they nurture our mind’s ability to focus and settle down.

For many people, moving into a studio apartment is about more than just lowering their monthly rent: It’s a lifestyle choice. Downsizing forces you to examine your life and your possessions with an eye toward utility and meaning. Are you a bibliophile? You’ll have to choose which books deserve shelf space and which are headed for the storage unit. Are you an aspiring Julia Child? You might have to make some tough choices around your Le Creuset casseroles.

For a long time it was a running joke in my family that no matter your ailment yoga could help with that. Over time everyone understood so it was no longer necessary to say it out loud. Unfortunately yoga doesn’t help with everything. In fact, practicing asana doesn’t in and of itself make anything go away. And, the point isn’t to make things go away. The point is to be with whatever is.