Zoom in Within: Explore the inner workings of your physiology
The beginning of a new year always gives us an opportunity to organize our thoughts about what we plan to focus on in the upcoming year. What is most important[…]
The beginning of a new year always gives us an opportunity to organize our thoughts about what we plan to focus on in the upcoming year. What is most important[…]
This year certainly turned out to be like no other. At times it felt like it was dragging on, yet it’s somehow surprising that it is almost over. Faced with[…]
I used to have a student who would quickly bounce his knee up and down when seated. The first time he caught me looking at his knee, he said: “I[…]
I did my first 200-hour Yoga Teacher Training course at Mt Madonna Center in Santa Cruz, California twenty years ago. Mt Madonna center is a residential community that was established[…]
In yoga, breathing is closely linked with the concept of prana, or life force. Prana is said to be the force that animates all living things. Prana is a manifestation[…]
With COVID-19 still wreaking havoc around the world, the race for the treatment is on. Different organizations use different strategies to combat the virus. Just last week a biotechnology startup[…]
Do you hold your breath while typing, emailing or texting? Apparently, this is such a common occurrence, that Linda Stone, a writer and speaker, had coined a phrase “screen apnea”,[…]
Time and time again I see new yoga students being confused about whether to do a certain movement on the inhale or the exhale. “How does it go?” – they[…]
The normal unconscious exhalation is a passive process, as one simply relaxes the muscles that were engaged on the inhale. However, in our yoga practice we purposefully augment the natural[…]
Many of your body’s physiological processes have a rhythmic nature: your heartbeat, blood pressure, digestive peristalsis, breathing rate and many others proceed in pulsating (or wave-like) fashion. Each system has[…]
Two years ago, my family and I went to the beautiful San Juan Islands. The San Juan Islands are an archipelago of about 170 islands in the Pacific Northwest between[…]
In college I majored in Russian literature, and I remember being fascinated by the sheer number of heroines in the Russian classics who would faint at the slightest sign of[…]
A diaphragm is the primary muscle of inhalation; it is responsible for about 75% of the air movement in normal breathing at rest (external intercostal muscles are responsible for the[…]
The last time I went to visit my mom, she asked me to show her some yoga moves because she wasn’t feeling too well. Once we got down to the[…]
Yesterday morning I was trying to do my pranayama practice, as my 9-year old was bouncing on furniture around me, my puppy was chasing his tail knocking over everything in[…]
Today I was supposed to fly to Hawaii for a part-work, part-vacation trip. I’ve been planning this trip for months, but now everything is cancelled. A lot has changed in[…]
Last week we explored three main reasons that produce neck tension. The main question is – how do we deal with different kinds of neck and upper back tension and achieve long-lasting[…]
What do you do when you are startled, or if you hear, see, smell or sense something unusual? You immediately turn your heard toward it to see what’s going on.[…]
Do you ever get tension headaches? This feeling of a tight band wrapped around your head? Or maybe a localized throbbing at the very base of your skull that you[…]
Couple of months ago my husband and I went to see a play. It ran long, we hit traffic on the way back home, and instead of being away for[…]