Vinyasa Flow Yoga

Welcome back to my blog! If you have been following me lately and keeping up with most of my posts you will recognize that I have been mainly focusing on yoga for certain types of people. Such as runners, gymnasts and busy people. The point is, today I will be showing you a different branch of yoga that anyone can try called vinyasa flow yoga. So let's get started.


Some background information on vinyasa flow yoga is that "This style of yoga synchronizes your movement with your breath, building heat via sequence called vinyasas- mini sun salutations- which are interspersed between postures to keep muscles warm" (Woodhall and Sattin 90). One thing to remember as advised by the writers is "When people tell me after class that they feel sore after all that stretching, I know that they've been concentrating too much on how a pose should look-gripping too tightly and jamming themselves into a particular shape- rather than how they got there....I encourage students to feel movement even when they are still, by connecting to breath rising and falling like a wave. This generates a softness" (Woodhall and Sattin 92). I think what Victoria and Jonathan stated there was truly one of the greatest pieces of information I have learned from Everyone Try Yoga: Finding Your Yoga Fit so far. Yoga isn't entirely about alignments and placement but about the meditation and relaxation that comes along with it. And that is what has abled me to better achieve my yoga skills within this style.


Now, I didn't want to start off with anything overwhelming such as a pose that included the splits with difficult back bending, so I started off simple and worked my way up.


A key message the author recommended is to "Get your head down below your heart every day. Not only does it release the weight of the head, but it also allows you symbolically to let go of anything that has been weighing heavily on the mind" (Woodhall and Sattin 93). Therefore, the rag doll which is the first pose I will be concentrating on is one way to conquer that goal of getting your head below your heart. Some steps to keep in mind are "..with feet apart, knees slightly bent, hold opposite elbows with the hands" (Woodhall and Sattin 93). For those people who have trouble with alignment and proper placement you are off the hook for this one because as I said before there's no particular alignment you need to specifically follow in vinyasa flow yoga (Woodhall and Sattin 92).

Rag Doll



Next, is the wild thing (which is what the pose is called). This pose may look a little different and complicated, or at least for me at first, but remember the only skill you truly need for this type of yoga is concentration (Woodhall and Sattin 90). Make sure to focus on your breathing techniques, meaning getting your breathing moving deeply and evenly to calm the mind (Woodhall and Sattin 92). Obviously, you can't tell from the picture how I incorporated these breathing techniques but once you know what the pose looks like, the rest is pretty easy to manage yourself.

Wild Thing



As the authors said "Slowing down was, and still is, a challenge" (Woodhall and Sattin 90). But hopefully, this blog post showed you a different side of yoga and gave you some ideas and ways to slow your racing mind, especially this time of year with finals.


Question:What are some methods you use to de-stress? Has there been a time where you had to take your mind off technique and instead use concentration to accomplish a task? 

Citation:

Woodhall, Victoria and Sattin, Jonathan. Everyone Try Yoga: Finding Your Yoga Fit. London: Kyle Books, 2013. Print.