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I used my Yoga for Beginners DVD and did the 70 minutes Basics session. I was feeling not to "on it" today, since it's been 4 days since i had done yoga (I was attending family events). So my body fought it a little bit, as I usually do some kind of yoga each day (since the last month and a half, when i started).

Still, it felt good to push through it and the restful parts of the session were wonderful.

That's great news, Jill!

You just needed to oil the gears a little

Did the Strength and Backbends part of my DVD today with DH.

Now I will have traveling coming up - let's see how much yoga i can do in the road for two weeks!

That is awesome - that strength one alone pretty much wipes me out. That is so great that you can do it and something else!

I am just settling into my room here in DC, and have my mat and strap all ready! Plus I have two yoga DVDs. I am sure we can do some yoga tonight if you want, maybe the relaxing one

Okay, I am sick and have really only been doing bed yoga for the last week or so. Now I am going to try to branch out and do the "lying down and breathing sequences yoga" on my yoga DVD.

I am also going to see if my hubby likes the Shiva Rea DVD that we are borrowing. I don't remember if there were any sequences that were not moving much - i think the first one was mainly breathing, so we can try that too.

I cough violently just by going up the stairs, so i have to take it easy on myself right now. But I would feel better if I could do some more yoga than the bed stuff. I miss my mat.

Take care of your health, that comes first! If you really want to, how about the relaxing session? I think that was all lying down.

I did the half hour "rejuvenating" today and it was nice

So last night we did the 30 minutes rejuvinating session. I don't know why it's called that - it was all lying down and breathing. it should be called "relaxing."

Then we did the first session on the Shiva Rae DVD, which was a lot of Victorious Breath and then some moving (a few chatarangas and down dogs). It was about all i could take, being sick, but it felt good to be back on my mat.

Then we rewatched the final episode of Buffy and i just blubbered as usual. I love Spike.

Ah but the relaxing one is even more relaxing At least with rejuvenating you get some legs-up poses and such! But you're right, it's rather mellow

That's so great that you were able to do some yoga! You are getting better!

huh, Lisa, that's interesting. To me the Rejuvinate IS the relaxing one. The only other one i can think you are talking about is the Quieting, which is "full on" yoga - it's 45 minutes of standing poses and seated hip openers, followed by only five minutes of lying down and breathing.

Am i missing something?

Still sick. I will try to see a doctor tomorrow.

Today I did the 30 min Rejuvenating session on my main DVD, and then the (i think) 15 minutes Relaxation Flow with Shiva Rea. So that was very nice.

Maybe this evening I will try something else restful, like the Seated Hip Openers session.

Okay, i did see the doctor and my infection has moved to my ears and sinuses, so the throat feels better. I spend my days pretty much sleeping.

But I am really enjoying my 'easy yoga' evenings. Last night I did the 45 minutes from Shiva's Flow for Beginners (Foundation Flow, Beginner's Flow, Backbends Flow, Relaxation Flow and Shavasana). I skipped the 'hard part' of the standing flow sequence. So What I did was mainly breathing and twisting and knees to chest - real easy stuff for when sick.

The expansive breaths (Victorious Breath) seems very helpful for giving me a little bit of energy after being sick for like 12 days.

I will probably do the rejuvenating stuff on my main dvd tonite.

You poor thing you really got whalloped with something serious! I'm so glad you made it home OK to get through it there.

It is great that yoga is helping you recover and gain strength!

Yes, the big problem was the flight home while being deathly ill - it made my ears pretty vulnerable. It was two flight, since i had to make a connection. Talk about ow! Then the drive home was from sea level to 5,000 feet...that was the final nail in my ears, so to speak. I should really have gone to the doctor right away. Actually, it was Jeanne IMing me, telling me to go to my doctor, that even made me go. By then, it occured to me that i probably DID need antibiotics. But it was ncie to have someone "mother" me and tell me to get to my doctor!

So, today I did 35 minutes - Seated Hip Openers and Savansana. Was nice and gentle.

It really is amazing that yoga can include a range from seriously hard to extraordinarily easy. And it all counts as yoga. I really like that.

That sounds great! Hopefully I will have some time for yoga tomorrow, once this forum gets itself all settled.

And here I thought you were going to the doctor the day after you landed!! You said you were

Right. It kinda didn't happen b/c DH didn't take me in and I was too out of it to push the mater. I just lived on Nyquil.

When my ears started hurting I realized it had gone beyond self-medicating. Actually, Jeanne made me go. It's nice to be "mothered" by a friend.

Okay, tonite I did the Rejuvenating session, 30 minutes. So nice. If I could make my brain shut down in savasana i would like that, but i guess it's something to work on.

Jeanne is good at that!

That is great that you are doing the 30 minute runs! Take things one day at a time, your body needs to heal first

I did the 40 minute re-energizing one today. I actually tried to be enthused about the sun salutation announcement at the beginning I do think my arms are getting a *little* stronger, although I definitely have to keep working at it.

My shoulders were killing me earlier and they feel better now, so that's good!

I did 45 minutes of Shiva's Flow for beginners stuff today. Still not feeling well enough for the intense part on the beach but everything else is a-ok.

did 40 minutes on my beginner DVD and then 30 Min on the Shiva DVD. I could tell I had missed a few days!

You guys are really inspiring me to do much more practice than I do. I'm setting goals!

Good to hear you are feeling better, Jilly.. I had no idea you'd been so sick - and flying when you are congested is just /the worst/.

Ugh indeed - i almost blew out my eardrums. They were dangerously infected after flying and driving up 5k feet from the airport at sea level. I am actually 'trapped' on my mountain now, since I can't drive back up without making my ears worse.

There are worse places to be trapped.

Thanks for the wellwishes.

LIs, what are your goals that you are setting?

MIne is to do at least some yoga every day, even if it's just bed yoga or ten minutes of easy, relaxing stuff. Anything I do above and beyond that I will just consider a bonus. For the large part i have been sticking with this goal.

Today I am thinking I will either do standing or strength on my basics DVD or the harder beach flow one with Shiva. I have not done any of those since I got sick in DC.

That sounds like a great goal, Jill - keep it simple and heal up!

Bob asked for me to give him a hand today so I went over and started clapping. So in return he did the fast clapping like with Flamenco dancers. So I then did some hands-up-in-the-air Flamenco dancing. So then he clapped again. So then I danced again. Then I clapped for him and he got up into tree pose (since it has the hands over the head just like the Flamenco dancers) and started hopping around in tree pose without falling over!!

The show off

But see, yoga is addictive!!

Lisa, you two are way too cute! I wish i could have seen that!

Yesterday I took a yoga class, my first time (i am discussing it in another thread). Was hard but satisfying. That was an hour and half, which surprised me as the class sheet said it was to be an hour. I don't like surprises. Throws off my mental clock. But i really enjoyed that class.

Then in the evening, dan and i did a super easy 20 min neck relaxing segment on my new Yoga for Stress Relief DVD (Barbara Brenaugh). It was pretty much just lying down and turning your neck and body to the sides. Very soothing.

That is odd that they had it longer than stated. I'm completely with you on that - if you mentally prepare for 1 hour of effort, it's disconcerting for them to keep going past the hour and you're thinking "WHEN WILL THIS EVER END!!!!" It's part of why I love the visual timer I have, with the red "pie chart" getting smaller and smaller. I know exactly how much time is left.

Good for you for doing even more yoga after that though!! Soothing is good

That is exactly what my mind was saying, in those words, and in caps too!

The visual timer is a nice idea. do you leave it by the tv, then?

My log: yesterday did 20 mins Sun Salutes, and then 20 mins of the easier stuff on Shiva's Fluid Power.

I am still sore today from that class on tuesday.

Yes exactly, I leave the visual timer right under the TV. Although I also use it down with my dance dance revolution so sometimes I leave it down there by accident. I'm thinking of getting two of them ... I'm trying to simplify my life

For the past four days I've been doing the WiiFit yoga, plus their strength and aerobic activities. It's about an hour a day although today I think I did an hour and a half. The "games" are a lot of fun! Skiing, snowboarding, fish-gathering (as a slidy penguin) ...

I am really very intrigued by the wii fit!

Yes, you should have two timers - it's simple thing to do to make your life simpler!

Okay, yesterday I did yoga in bed to try to relieve my cramps. The backbends and hip openers seem to work the best, along with down dog and child's pose.

Tonite I will try one of the Shiva sets with Dan.

okay, we did 52 minutes of rather hard yoga tonite. Shiva can move fast in her intermediate stuff. No resting in child's pose! Keeping up was a challenge but it was fun and I got sweaty.

Wow that is great! It sounds like that is an awesome workout

Last night we did a Tai Chi DVD - parts were very hard to figure out what he was doing, so I interspersed our hour of it with yoga - did some sun salutations (got me a bit sweaty, even).

Some of the tai chi stuff was reminiscent of yoga (mountain pose, standing forward bend, but not called those, for example).

Here is my review of the tai chi dvd we have in the martial arts forum:
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That's interesting, I wonder if they have a common base to them! Or maybe it's just that a human being's body has certain moves which are good for them

Hard to know. Dan says Tai Chi is based on actual combat movements. The whole Karate Kid thing with "paint the fence," i guess.

But I imagine that balanced stances are probably the same for every body and discipline. I really have no idea but that's my guess.

Anyway this morning I took a local yoga class and wrote about it on this thread:

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All i did yesterday was a few downward dogs. felt good but i am feeling like i should be doing much more.

We ripped up the carpet and have plywood full of staples on our main floor for the last few weeks. It's kinda icky to put my mat down on it so have not felt inspired.

tonite dh and I did the Rodney Yee Yoga Burn DVD. It was an excellent hour long workout - i felt very strong and fluid - it built up a warmth inside.

I love that DVD! The pace is unhurried and you really get to feel every pose. I did the Level 3 of the Total Yoga Flow Series yesterday...that is a little too fast for me. They rip through poses so fast that I find myself just leaving out some of the Chattaranga - Down Dog transitions because I'm still coming into the previous pose! But maybe some day I'll keep up, a challenge is always good.

Jilly that's great! How long until your floor is back to normal?

Claybird that's very true, it's something to work towards!

We *finally* got the living room vacuumed and such this morning, which is nice. The floor is actually clean! So maybe I can yoga later on

We have no idea about our floor. We are waiting on someone to come and give us an estimate on how much lying some sticky tile would cost. Who knows when he will appear? (it's that kind of town)

And we are waiting on our rental manager to ask the house owner if he will pay for half of this.

It could be months, the way this is going.

At least the yucky carpet is out. It stank.

Yeah the Yoga Burn was a nice DVD. Not as much burn as I would have thought - all the poses were easy. I guess the idea is to reeeeeally slooow it down. I will be slower next time.

Rodney has a great voice for this and the Zen sand garden studio was quite pretty.

Today i did 35 minutes of tai chi and then 45 minutes of yoga - the Serenity in Stillness from Barbara Benagh's Yoga for Stress Relief. Then parts of Shiva Rea's Flow Yoga for Beginners.

I felt pretty good - nice and wiped after.

I am trying my utmost to squeeze even random yoga poses into my day - doing the tree pose while I wait for the microwave, doing stretches before I get out of bed. I figure every little bit helps - but I really do want to carve out a half hour for a real workout!

Random poses is good Lisa! me too. The thing that's hard is remembering to DO them. new habit-forming.

Today I did 45 minutes of bed yoga with my Yoga in Bed book. That was very relaxing.

You are so inspiring Jilly!! We are in the final time-crunch making our origami cranes up. I'm taking a break from that and catching up on my email project while Bob does a lot of stringing - that part is a one person job. So I really do think after delivery on Tuesday that I *will* do a yoga session. I promise!!

Lisa, you are doing so great on your projects!

I think if you took a break each day and just put your legs up the wall (five minutes) you'd be getting all the benefits you need to be refreshed and drain the icky toxins.

Took my hour long library yoga class today. Was super relaxing.

I am starting to enjoy the sun salutations - the big part is that I can finally get my leg up between my hands now with the lunge (without having to use my hands to get it up there).

Wow that's awesome Jilly!! I have problems with that, getting the leg up between my hands

I will have to do some inventive yoga today to maintain my promise, our TV died. I'll figure out a way to do something!

Bed Yoga? DS yoga?

Cool, I got in two more yoga DVDs from my library to try in the next few days:

Yoga for Beginners (by Elements with Elena Brower)

and

AM/PM Yoga with Ravi Singh and Ana Brett

I think I will try the yoga for beginners first. I am a little sore after my yoga gym class last night and am not sure what the other one will be like, since it's Kundalini based. Does that mean it's more dance-like?

Wow at this point you'll review every yoga DVD known to the world!! Very neat

Kundalini seems to be more of an energy / aura style of yoga - here's the Wikipedia page -

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yep, that's a good goal, huh? I am having fun with it.

Well I need to return my kundalini yoga DVD to the library tonite so that means I HAVE to try it today. it's been very hot so I have not been motivated to do yoga in my living room, but now i have an actual deadline, so that will help.

Oh, and I slept in and missed my library yoga class today. So the DVD will fill the niche perfectly.

I did 90 minutes of the Kundalini yoga DVD. It was a bit bizarre but an intense workout. I reviewed it in it's own post.

Yesterday I did lots of yoga! I had my library yoga class in the AM and then played around with my new yoga books in the PM. I did some harder variations of plow, shoulderstand and bow and wheel and some others.

Slightly sore today.

well i crushed my finger in my car door while camping today, so i will have to try doing yoga that does not require weighting my left hand.

Ouch! You poor Jilly! I have a jacked up fingernail from the same thing--when I was four years old. So, take care of it!

I'm still modifying my yoga for my neck/shoulders. I can do downward dog (just a few), but not yet planks or anything really weight-bearing.

Thanks Deb. It's all about the Ice, Compression, Ibuprofen, Elevation and Rest for me. So RIICE. My first responder training serves me well.

I hope your neck and shoulders improve. What mods did you come up with?

I have library yoga tomorrow - i will tell the teacher about my finger and will try to modify things. I will treat this like research to keep myself from feeling frustrated.

For about a month, I didn't do much at all. Some stretches after walking, but not really much yoga. Then, I started with some seated twists & bends, then standing stretches & a couple of warriors, and some easy balance poses.

Only after about a month did I feel okay to be doing quick downward dog poses. Still don't do planks. I am doing some strength training with light weights to help build up some muscle to hopefully help my bad ones. Just started those last night.

So, lately, I've been doing a few minutes each day of standing poses and balances, and a couple of sun salutations (without holding planks or lunges for very long at all), seated twists (love that for the spine) and lots of bending forward to stretch legs & hips.

Oh, and a supported sort of fish pose I found in a book for healing--you put a block down under your bra strap area (wide side up) and lay on your back on the block and put another block under your neck (long side up). And just lay there for awhile! It does seem to be helping, and it feels good to do that--it's sort of a counter pose to all this computer hunching I do all day.

Oo, deb, that does sound relaxing. I will have to try that. i like the heart openers.

Last night I did a variety of yoga stuff - office yoga during work, PM yoga before bed, and some sun salutes and misc poses after my treadmill workout. I worked on a backbend from standing (I can get one arm down to the floor but not the other), tried to get into a handstand, and then did headstand and elbowstand against the wall.

I was so happy with how easy the headstand was! I felt like I could hang out like that all day. Of course, it's easy against the wall. But my legs just kicked right up there and it felt delicious.

Yesterday I had my library yoga class. My main instructor was on vacation so we had Jenny, our backup instructor, teach. She had very nice transitions and i enjoyed the class so much. We might be getting Jenny to do library classes on Mondays now, which would be great - we's have Michelle on Thursdays and Jenny on Mondays. We also talked about having a class outside at some point soon - probably on the shore of Lake Gregory.

We are up to three fans blowing on us in the library now that it's so hot out.

In the evening i messed around with Wheel pose, Headstand, Elbow stand and Crow. Still can't hold crow for more than a second but i will keep working on it. I did the rooster pose (full lotus and holding your weight up on your hands). I worked on getting my headstand away from the wall. It's only a matter of time.

I really enjoy headstand. it feels so neat to just hang out upside down.

I need to try Handstand again. I don't know if i am strong enough in my arms for it but will keep trying.

Today's yoga consisted of poses on the bed and the mat to relieve PSM cramps.

I also had a nice hot bath with milk powder and ginger/chamomile tea while *reading* about yoga.

Hi Jill,

I could never do crow either till one day in class with one of my favorite teachers who talked about crow being all about the core. Really focus on your low abdomen and think about drawing it in and up. Concentrate on lifting from there, instead of from your feet and/or tipping forward. It was the magic instruction that helped me find the pose.

Martha that is good advice. I will give that a shot.

Today i did 40 minutes of yoga - the Trance Dance Only section from my Trance Dance DVD and then some other sessions from the intro section - Body Blessing and then Fluid Flow Movement Meditation. (those were both very nice).

I had not been doing my DVDs so it was nice to get back on them. I have been just doing mat stuff w/o the DVDs, which is fine but i missed my DVDs.

I finally am getting the living room back in order - and just steam cleaned the carpet in there again - so I should be able to start yoga again there!

We were testing out Guitar Hero Aerosmith over the past few days so I was doing tree pose while I was playing the guitar. It was great fun!

Lisa,

Guitar hero with tree pose.....sounds like great fun! I wonder what the sanskrit translation for that would be?