Yoga, training and health inspiration for you

This is the fourth and final part of the theme month on yin yoga. Yin yoga places you in positions that are challenging for joints, ligaments, and muscles; positions that can hurt you if you leave them too quickly or aggressively. In this part I will give you some final advices so that you can continue your practice when this theme month ends. Let me educate, guide and inspire you to a more balanced life where yin yoga plays an important part.

This is a part of the four week yin yoga theme in BEYOGA365, with the purpose to guide you to a more relaxed and balanced month of December. Read the introduction of the month here! 

Week 4 (of 4) -  Integration, individuality, intelligence

When you come out of a position, do it very slowly and use your hands to support your legs, gently contracting the muscles you’ve just been releasing while in the pose. It’s also beneficial to add a countermovement. For example, if you have been bending forward, sit upright and stretch backwards gently.

In yin yoga you challenge deep tissues that the body normally protects from getting stretched, since they’re easily damaged by force. You may experience some discomfort, some shaking, or a slight feeling of instability. This is normal, especially when you are new to the practice. However, if a position causes severe pain or makes you so uncomfortable that it affects your focus or breathing, then you’ve gone too far and need to slowly come out of the pose.

Other warning signs that you’ve pushed too far are feelings of extreme weakness or instability, muscle spasms, or misalignments that you can’t correct. If you exeprience these things, take a break to breathe and then, if it feels right to your body, begin again, slowly and very carefully, stopping when you begin to meet your edge. Props are very helpful here, you'll find a great selection of props in Yogobe Store.

To continue reading and learning more about this week's topic: integration, individuality and intelligence, read the entire text in a separate blog post.

This week's challenges

This week, we are working with trying to respect the body and its intelligence. And here I want you to start sensing the body, beyond the mind. When a thought or emotion comes along, pause, breathe and don't move. Just breathe and move to a space in the body you feel safe. When that ruffle has passed, you can go ahead and release your mind just to be an observer. I know it is hard, but I can reassure you of one thing.

Yin yoga is like this: You do it, again and again and again and it is like: ok, maybe, no, yes, why, I don't like it, I like it, please, no, yes, why, how come, tell me etc... it will be like this for a while when you practice. Then somewhere after like a dozen sessions (different for everyone) there is like you step over a threashold and there your are: AHA! I SO got it. WOW. So this is what yogis mean by being in the NOW. Awesome. Wanna do that again.

Don't expect answers to come, don't inquire in the left brain. Move into the right brain and into your body. Step away from trying to know it all, understandning. Aim for trying to help your body, mind and nervous system to release tension and just do the practice. The rest will follow. Trust me on that. 

This week I recommend you to do mine, Satu's or Johanna's yin yoga classes twice and follow up with one of the recommended meditations right after. The other days, keep working on balancing these classes with some stability classes.

I also invite you to ask yourself and inquire around the following questions during the week when you have a moment before, during and after your practice:

• Can I try a little yang practice after yin one day? Like a brisk walk, a jog or some gentle weight lifting?
• Can I maybe treat myself to a massage?
• Can I list four awesome things about life and living here and now?

Video recommendations

Yin yoga sequences

Guided meditations

Stability, flowing and strengthening classes

I wish you the best of luck this week and see you here on YOGOBE again I hope!
MERRY CHRISTMAS!!

For our Swedish followers, join our Facebook community BEYOGA365 where we aspire to inspire you to practice and being yoga throughout the year. We share knowledge, insights, love as well as empowering you to inspire yourself and others with and through yoga - on and off the mat. For us, yoga is an attitude, a way of life. Share this lifestyle with us. Join our community on Facebook and engage anytime, anywhere! 
For our Finnish followers, join us on Facebook.

Being a yogi doesn’t mean you don’t have problems; you just have more tools for dealing with them. This is the third part of the theme month on yin yoga. In this part I will inspire you how to work with your practice and what to think about. The demands of Western culture can easily lead to low self-esteem. Let me educate, guide and inspire you to a more balanced life where yin yoga plays an important part.

This is a part of the four week yin yoga theme in BEYOGA365, with the purpose to guide you to a more relaxed and balanced month of December. Read the introduction of the month here! 

Week 3 (of 4) -  Stay A While

The illusions, attachments, and habits of our daily lives and limited day-to-day awareness create blocks in our bodies that impede the free flow of prana and the working out of our karma. Through the interconnectedness of mind, body, and spirit, we can encounter, affect, and release these blockages by working on physical, mental, and energetic levels.

Meditation in particular allows us to step away from the patterns and challenges of our karma and see our greater roles, feel our places in the universe, and return to daily life with that new perspective. The expansion of ease, awareness, and prana that results from yoga is an expansion of our ability to live and follow our karmic path with ease and grace.

Before I started doing meditation and yoga, I identified myself with my thoughts and feelings. Today, I have learned to view them more as patterns and reactions coming from my mind and soul. In looking closely at them in meditation, I learn a lot about myself in the now and how I function; and I begin to see what takes me out of balance and out of reach of myself.

Yin yoga is a more mindful practice where one can look at and relate to reality and understand one’s relationship to it. Paying attention to something can be done in several ways. The practice of yin yoga creates understanding, both of our current condition and of the reluctance or avoidance of being in what we perceive as negative or unpleasant experiences. To continue reading and learning more about this week's topic: stay a while, read the entire text in a separate blog post.

This week's challenges

In yin yoga it is often advised to start with 3 minute holds and up to five minutes for more advanced practitioners. If you like, you can use a stopwatch to monitor the time. Use each pose to practice staying in the moment. Rather than giving up when you begin to feel anxious, see if you can experience the stillness as being valuable in itself, an opportunity to breathe evenly and freely and connect with your body.

Since you are working with the fascia in your body in this practice, I cannot stress enough the importance of slowly coming in and especially out of the pose. Also, do not miss out on the juicy feeling just seconds after a pose. Sit for a moment, close your eyes, breathe gently and feel the aftermath of the pose. It is usually very pleasant. If you move too quickly, you miss out on the endorphin rush and you risk the tissues drawing back together too fast, which can hurt.

Classes this week
This week I recommend you to do mine, Satu's or Johanna's yin yoga classes below twice and follow up with the recommended meditation right after. The other days work on balancing these classes with some stability classes like mine or Sarah Fingers ISHTA class or any of the other lovely teachers that you find inspires you.

I also invite you to ask yourself and inquire around the following questions during the week when you have a moment before, during and after your practice:

• In my yin yoga practice - can I find a space where I can just be - connecting to just the breath?
• Can I increase my Savasana time by another 5-10 minutes? At least 1-2 times a week?
• Have I told people I love that I love them?
• Do I need to apologize to someone?
• Can I give myself time for just being with myself doing something I really love, as a christmas gift?

Video recommendations

Yin yoga sequences

Guided meditations

Stability, flowing and strengthening classes

I wish you the best of luck this week and see you on the mat and here on YOGOBE next week!

This text in its entirety has been inspired by content from my book: Yin Yoga – An individual practice. If you like what you read you can buy it here.

OUM

For our Swedish followers, join our Facebook community BEYOGA365 where we aspire to inspire you to practice and being yoga throughout the year. We share knowledge, insights, love as well as empowering you to inspire yourself and others with and through yoga - on and off the mat. For us, yoga is an attitude, a way of life. Share this lifestyle with us. Join our community on Facebook and engage anytime, anywhere! 
For our Finnish followers, join us on Facebook.

We are all battling stress, tension, and mental challenges. Yin yoga is the theme for this month and in this second part (of four) you will learn more about how you can reduce stress and tension in your life. I, like most people, have a long list of tasks to accomplish every day and many roles to juggle. Let me educate, guide and inspire you to a more balanced life with where yin yoga plays an important part.

This is a part of our four week yin yoga theme in BEYOGA365, with the purpose to guide you to a more relaxed and balanced month of December. Read the introduction of the month here! 

Week 2 (of 4) -  Connection, stillness and the art of releasing tension

I run my own company; I’m the mother of two small children (whom spending a lot of time with is important to me), I work as a yoga teacher, writer, lecturer, coach, and dramatist. I teach yoga and meditation to groups and to individuals; and I conduct trainings and workshops and coordinate various events. But in between, I try to just to be still and be me. I constantly reflect upon how I can reduce tension and stress in my life. And I have, together with my family, made many conscious decisions in order to achieve greater space so I can stay attuned to what life has to offer. I want to actually live and be a present parent, wife, human being, and yogini, and not have my life be solely about tasks and mastering them.

Most of us spend nearly every waking moment connecting to the world around us, as experienced through our five physical senses of taste, touch, sight, smell, and hearing. As we grow up and move through life on this physical plane, we identify more and more with this physical mode of existence, defining ourselves by how we look, what we wear, where we go. But we are so much more than this.

In yoga, we deal with aspects of tension through a wide-lens objective. We understand that if one part of a person is tense, other parts are too. If the mind is tense, so is the stomach, and if the stomach is tense, then the whole circulatory system is too. Therefore, yoga empasizes the importance of releasing tension. Inner tension can manifest in unhappy life chaos and disorder in the social life, as well as in aggression and warfare between cultures and nations.

Yoga claims that peace can only be achieved from within. I would say this is accurate, since we have tried for thousands of years to achieve peace in the world through religion, law, police forces, armies, and governments, and it still eludes us. In order to create a more peaceful world, we need to learn how to relax and balance our bodies and minds. 

Dive deeper - further reading
To continue reading and learning more about connection, stillness and the art of releasing tension read the entire text in this separate blog post.

This week's challenges

Continue to practice yin two times this week. Do the one you did last week once and the other one, or one from the video library (where you'll find both longer and shorter sequences) once. Follow up with the recommended meditation right after. The other days work on balancing this class with some stability, flowing or strengthening classes.

I also invite you to ask yourself and inquire around the following questions during the week when you have a moment before, during and after your practice:

• Is my life very yang – oriented? Can I start to find a daily space of 20 minutes in silence, with a cup of tea just reflecting about my life?
• Can I do something kind to myself daily?
• Can I help someone?
• Can I take 5 minute "longer than I use to" Savasanas? With no music?

Video recommendations

Yin yoga sequences

Check out the video library for more yin classes, in English, Swedish and Finnish and different length.

Guided meditations

Stability, flowing and strengthening classes
For those days you need some movement. If you wish to combine the yin sequences with these yang sequences, remember to start with the yin classes as you should not warm up to better connect to your fascia.

I wish you the best of luck this week and see you on the mat and here on YOGOBE next week!

This text in its entirety has been inspired by content from my book: Yin Yoga – An individual practice. If you like what you read you can buy it here.

For our Swedish followers, join our Facebook community BEYOGA365 where we aspire to inspire you to practice and being yoga throughout the year. We share knowledge, insights, love as well as empowering you to inspire yourself and others with and through yoga - on and off the mat. For us, yoga is an attitude, a way of life. Share this lifestyle with us. Join our community on Facebook and engage anytime, anywhere! 
For our Finnish followers, join us on Facebook.

It is time to pause and reboot. Welcome to this months theme: Yin yoga - Seeking serenity. In life we strive to maintain a balance between yin and yang. Both on and off the yoga mat. If you choose to follow this month during December or in a period of your life filled with a hectic schedule I wish to welcome you. Regardless of if it is the weeks leading up to Christmas or not it is important you add YIN to your life. Let me educate, guide and inspire you during four weeks of exploring. Allow yin yoga to balance you!

Introduction

If we look a hundred years back in time, our culture has undergone massive changes in the way we lead our lives. As individuals, we are experiencing higher and higher levels of stress and tension and less physical movement and mental rest. This is true both in urban environments as well as in small towns and young and old alike.

Despite advances in medicine, government, and social structure, individuals are experiencing more stress, demands, pressure, and insecurity than ever. Many of us are so absorbed in our highly competitive and fast-paced lives that we are missing out on really living and rarely pay attention to what is happening to us. When we can’t keep up any more, we fall. Fall out of health, into despair, and out of our social support systems. We give up, and our bodily systems fail since they are not programmed to keep going twenty-four hours a day. Our systems need to pause and reboot.

This month will consist of four parts/weeks
I will guide you here in the blog and in our Facebook communities BEYOGA365 with inspirational reading and video recommendations on Yogobe.

• Week 1: The Yin and Yang of yoga (this blog post)
• Week 2: Connection, stillness and the art of releasing tension
• Week 3: Stay a while
• Week 4: Integration, individuality & intelligence

Week 1 (of 4) -  The Yin and Yang of Yoga

Tensegrity
Our world’s biggest problem is not poverty, drugs, fear of war, or hunger. It is tension. All kinds of tension lead to all kinds of imbalances and insecurities. If one knows how to free oneself from tension, one has the solution to one’s problems in life. If you are able to balance your tensions, you then automatically learn how to balance your emotions, anger, and passions.

Yogic philosophy as well as modern psychology sum up three basic types of tension that are responsible for all the agonies in modern life. These are Muscular tension, Emotional tension, and Mental tension. Through the art and practice of yin yoga, these tensions can be progressively reduced. Yin yoga focuses on the fascia, the type of tissue that keeps us together. Fascia is the soft tissue component of the connective tissue that provides support and protection for most structures within the human body, including muscle. Fascia is what gives us our form and what makes it possible for us to work our amazing bodies in the ways we do.

The fascia is interlinked with our nervous system and our brain through what’s called Tensegrity, or “The Architecture of life.” Tensegrity indicates that the integrity of a structure—in this case the human body and mind—derives from how all parts are wired together, not how they are stacked.

Balancing Yin and Yang
Our yoga practice should be a blend of yang/out/action/contraction and yin/in/observation/extension to make the whole balanced and to affect our entire health to move towards homeostasis (the maintenance of equilibrium). Yang yoga is a more vigorous yoga practice that targets the muscular tissue and through movement creates heat. Examples of yang-based yoga are Ashtanga Vinyasa, Embodied Flow, Vinyasa Flow, and Anusara yoga.

Through the practice of yin yoga, one targets the fascia/connective tissue in the body, which makes it a marvelously therapeutic tool for healing bodily, mental, and emotional imbalances. 
Continue reading about the yin and the yang in this blog post. 

This week's challenges

Pick one of the two yin yoga classes below and practice this twice this week. Follow up with the recommended meditation right after. The other days work on balancing this class with some stability, flowing or strengthening classes.

I also invite you to ask yourself and inquire around the following questions during the week when you have a moment before, during and after your practice:

• Where do I hold stress and tension in my body?
• Where do I hold tension in my breath?
• Is my life about only surviving each day – focused on performance?
• Is there anything I can remove that is not that important?
• Can I do something different each day than I normally do?
• How do I react when I let my thoughts move towards the idea of rest, relaxation and restoring energy?

Video recommendations

Yin yoga sequences

Check out the video library for more yin classes, in English, Swedish and Finnish and different length. 

Guided meditation

Stability, flowing and strengthening classes
If you wish to combine the yin sequences with these yang sequences, remember to start with the yin classes as you should not warm up to better connect to your fascia. 

​This text has been inspired by content from my book: Yin Yoga – An individual practice. If you like what you read you can buy it here.

AUM

For our Swedish followers, join our Facebook community BEYOGA365 where we aspire to inspire you to practice and being yoga throughout the year. We share knowledge, insights, love as well as empowering you to inspire yourself and others with and through yoga - on and off the mat. For us, yoga is an attitude, a way of life. Share this lifestyle with us. Join our community on Facebook and engage anytime, anywhere! 
For our Finnish followers, join us on Facebook.

Cultivating loving kindness can bring more peace and harmony into our hearts, in our relationships with ourselves and others as well as help to overcome both inner and outer conflicts. In this post yoga teacher Amanda Holmström leads you through a loving kindness meditation resulting in a deep feeling of love towards everyone and everything around you.

This meditation’s original name is Metta Bhavana. Bhavana translates to cultivate, to develop and Metta is best translated with loving kindness. It is a form of universal love which is free of expectations in return, a deep desire to wish oneself and others well. 

There are different ways to practice Metta Bhavana meditation and the most common form includes five stages where each stage last five minutes.

The stages of cultivating Loving Kindness: 

• Stage 1 – towards yourself
• Stage 2 – towards a friend
• Stage 3 – towards a neutral person
• Stage 4 – towards a difficult person
• Stage 5 – extending loving kindness to all living beings

Before you begin, find a timer or use a meditation app and set it for a recommended time of 25 minutes with five minute intervals. Find a quiet place where you can relax and sit in a comfortable position. Begin to anchor yourself in your body and in the moment.  Allow yourself to feel whatever you might feel or experience in the body right now and begin with the stages when you feel ready. 

1. Loving kindness towards yourself. To enter this state you can bring your awareness to the things in your life which you are grateful for or remember a specific moment when you felt joyful and loved and notice what you begin to feel in your heart center.

Anchor yourself with the sensations you begin to feel in your heart and start to breathe in and out from your chest, as if breathing with the heart and generate a feeling of loving kindness towards yourself as you focus on your positive sides or your blessings.

If this stage seems difficult, if you have low self-esteem or a challenging relationship with yourself, be patient and trust that this practice can have the effect of softening your heart towards yourself. Allow any mental blockages or judgements to exist without trying to change or escape anything, breathe with them before you bring your awareness back to your heart and wishing yourself peace and freedom of any suffering. 

2. Loving kindness towards a loved one.  Begin to visualize a good friend or family member in front of you. Bring their good qualities to mind, think of the things you are grateful with this person, or imagine him/her in a state of pure happiness to create your connection to them. Notice any feelings you develop of warmth, joy or light in your heart as you think of your loved one and visualize this feeling entering your friend, filling him or her with all the wealth you wish for.

3. Loving kindness towards a neutral person. This should be a person who you have no strings attached to, maybe a post man, someone who works in a local store, or somebody from work who you neither like nor dislike. Bring their human qualities to mind that you share with this living being and send him/her Metta by wishing wealth and happiness.

4. Loving kindness towards a difficult person. Invite someone you dislike or have a problem with at the moment, someone you find annoying or have a trouble connecting with. Stay present with the feelings that arise as you invite this person in your meditation. Meet and acknowledge your own feelings before you begin to reflect over this persons positive qualities and wish this person well beyond your difficulties. 

5. Extend loving kindness to all living beings. Bring all the people back to your awareness, yourself, your friend, the neutral person and the difficult person. Begin to expand the feeling you have cultivated even further. Extending Metta, free love, from your heart as a cloud of warmth or light over your neighborhood, town, city, country, covering the whole world and spread it into the universe, including all living being. 

After this stage bring the focus back to yourself and take your time before you move your body slowly again and you open your eyes.

This meditation can be practiced daily, weekly or every now and then. Be gentle with yourself as it takes both time and patience to open and soften our hearts. 

May you be happy, may you be peaceful, may you be free. 
Amanda Holmström 

Inspired by Johannes Vondey.

About the writer

Read more

• Cultivate an Attitude of Gratitude Through Yoga
• Meditaatio ja sen merkitys

Video recommendations

https://yogobe.com/fi/videos/f3s4

https://yogobe.com/videos/p6fc

https://yogobe.com/videos/d6a2

https://yogobe.com/videos/bcr9

https://yogobe.com/videos/86ox

Sara Lazar, at Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School, have made several studies on how meditation affects the brain. Studies show that practicing meditation not only stimulates the activity in the brain, but actually has an impact on its physical structure.

The researcher behind this study, Sara Lazar, was working out for the Boston marathon when she was ordered by her physiotherapist to focus on her stretching. She tried yoga and after some time started to notice a whole bunch of positive effects.

- The yoga teacher claimed that yoga and meditation could improve my compassion and open up my heart, Sara Lazar says. I thought “sure”. But eventually I actually noticed that I became calmer, and better at managing difficult situations. I also became more open-hearted and could easier see things from other people’s perspective. So I became interested to understand how it works.

This is how the study was conducted

In the first study, 20 people who regularly meditated were compared to a control group. They discovered that the people who meditated a lot had an increased substance of grey matter - a large part of the central nervous system that treats a lot of the information we take in - in the insular lobe and in the auditive and sensory cerebral cortex. Maybe it’s not so surprising, considering that when you're fully present, you pay attention to your breathing, the sounds around you and the present moment. They also found that the people who were used to meditate have more grey matter in the front cerebral cortex, that is linked to working memory and decision-making.

We know that our cerebral cortex shrinks when we get older – for instance it becomes harder to remember certain things. However, according to the study, 50 year olds who meditate have as much grey matter in the cerebral cortex as a 25-year old.

In the second study they wanted to find out if the people with more grey matter had it before they started to meditate. The study only included people who never meditated before. They were divided into two groups, one control group and one group who participated in a 8-week mindfulness program. The people in the mindfulness group joined a meditation class every week. They were also encouraged to meditate at home for 40 minutes every day, with the help of a sound file.

The result

After 8 weeks, the researchers could see changes in the five different parts of the brain. They saw in the people in the mindfulness group that the volume of the brain had grown in four areas. The biggest difference were seen in the back part of the cingulate cortex in the brains middle part, that receives signals from the limbic system for emotions, values and motivation. The left hippocampus, which is linked to learning, cognition, memory and emotional regulation, had become bigger. Hence, even areas associated with perspective taking, empathy, compassion as well as an area in the brain stem where a lot of regulating neurotransmitters are produced.

Also amygdala, the fight-or-flight response of the brain, that is important in regards to anxiety, fear and stress in general, changed in the group who meditated – it shrank.

Further reading

• Read more on meditation.
• Read more on mindfulness.

Read more about the studies here!

What is desire? And how do we find space to see our true desires? Sarah Platt-Finger helps us understand desires from a tantric perspective and how they are connected to our chakras. She also explains the concept of Gunas in this inspiring blog post that takes us into the world of yoga philosophy. I would love for you to come practice with me, and my husband Alan Finger, at Yoga Games Gothenburg on May 26-28. 

“You are what your deep, driving desire is.  As your desire is, so is your will. As your will is, so is your deed. As your deed is, so is your destiny." – Upanishads

The feeling of completion of desire is Samadhi. Yet, the concept of desire has traditionally been admonished from a religious standpoint.  Ascetics strived to master their mind as a means to control or obliterate their desires completely.  There are stories of the Buddha exposing himself to the harshest elements and going for days without food as a means to transcend beyond the human want for pleasure.  From a Tantric perspective, desire is what drives us to connect with a higher intelligence.  Isn’t there an element of desire to attempt to transcend all desires?  Governed by the water chakra, svadishthana, our desires are primal and innate in our being.  Without desire we would not procreate and the human race would cease to exist.  But how can we know that our desires are for our highest good and purpose in life? That is where the power of yoga and meditation lie.

The Gunas
In yoga, we talk about the gunas as being the qualities of nature that make up all things:

• Rajas is volition, or the activating force that propels us forward. Think: the inhalation, the future, and the front passage of the body.
• Tamas is inertia, or the pacifying force that draws us inward.  Think: the exhalation, the past, and the back passage of the body.
• When we are in complete harmony, or balance, we are in sattva guna. This is represented in the kumbaka (the pause between the breath) the present moment, and the central line of your spine, or Brahma nadi.

Everything in life is affected by the gunas,: our diet, our relationships, our posture, even our communication.  Sattva is the pure space that aligns us with spirit . When we rest in that space we are connected to the unified field of consciousness that is all around us. 

Through the practice of yoga and especially meditation, we fine-tune our connection to Brahma nadi.  It is like an antenna that interprets and filters the intelligence of the universe into our physical body via our consciousness.  That is why the more we practice, the more our desires shift.  

Creating the space to see our true desires
It is always amazing to watch in our Teacher Training program, how midway through the course people tend to make huge lifestyle changes: they change their careers, they decide they want to move to a different part of the country, or they cultivate new relationships.  That is because the work they are doing is connecting them to that central chord on a regular basis.  Being in sattva guna gives us the space to see what our true desires are and to respond to them from the spirit, rather than react to them from the ego. 

Rumi said: “What you seek is seeking you.” We all have our own unique, deep-rooted aspirations that propel us forward.  It is what causes us to make the decisions we make in life, from the most simple, like the clothes we wear, to the most complex, like our career. That force is called karma and it shapes our life’s purpose. When we keep the channel of brahma nadi clear, we are able to honor our deepest desires and use them as seeds to manifest the life that we are meant to live, our soul’s calling. 

Our Desires and The Chakras
From a subtle energetic perspective, our existence is made up of five main elements: earth, water, fire, air and space. The chakras are the headquarters of those elements that exist in our physical body. They govern everything from our posture, to our emotions, to our glandular system and of course, they affect our desires. The earth chakra (muladhara) governs our survival and relationship to the material world.  Too much rajas and we become excessively concerned with material things; too much tamas and we reject our survival needs. When in balance we are able to listen and respond to our physical desires appropriately. The second chakra, water or svadishthana, is where true desire stems from as this region governs our likes, dislikes, sensuality, and sexuality.  Too much rajas in this locale and we become lascivious; too much tamas and we subscribe to the “no gain, no gain” approach.  When we are balanced in this chakra we can respond to our desires gracefully and without attachment.

The third chakra is the fire center, or manipura chakra.  This is where our sense of individuality and independence stems from.  Our desire to be autonomous, to stand for a cause, and to empower ourselves is governed by this chakra.  Too much fire and we are driven by the need to dominate. Too little fire and we disempower ourselves by putting other people’s needs and desires ahead of our own. 
The fourth chakra is the heart chakra, anahata, and relates to the element of air. Here is where we start to connect to our feelings and harmonize our relationships in the world.  Our desire for connection, belonging, and love is governed by this center.  Too much rajas and we force relationships.  Too much tamas and we reject people’s offering of love and kindness towards us. 

The fifth and final elemental chakra is the throat or vishuddha chakra, governed by the space element. This is our communication center and the vortex that influences our desire to express ourselves.  When we are sattvic in this area we can communicate with honesty and clarity, knowing our own truth.  When we are rajasic, we speak excessively to fill the discomfort of silence. When we are tamasic, we are unable to voice ourselves, doubting what we have to say as meaningful.   

A common saying in Tantra is “We use the floor to get up off the floor.”  We use what is available to us on this plane of existence: our body, our breath, our mind, and our desires, to transcend beyond the limitations of this realm.  They are all made accessible to us in order to connect to the unbound field of potential that lies within: the inner guru. The inner-knowing.

Yoga Games Gothenburg

Meet Sarah along with other really amazing teachers in Gothenburg on May 26-28 - find them all and book your tickets here. 

Get a discount! 
When booking tickets for both Saturday and Sunday at Yoga Games Stockholm you get a SEK 300 discount if you use the code YOGOBE.

Sarah's classes at Yoga Games 

Saturday: Stoking Your Inner Fire 
A workshop to help cultivate and harness the fire element through asana, pranayama, and meditation.
Manipura chakra is the energetic center located at the navel that relates to the element of fire in our being. It translates to “lustrous gem” because when this chakra is in balance we radiate and glow from inside. In this workshop Sarah will integrate physical postures and breath techniques to help stoke this inner fire and tap into the power that lies within. It is from this source that we learn to trust in ourselves and in others, leading to transformation, manifestation, and unbound potential.

Sunday: ISHTA Sweat and Samadhi
Asana Class & Meditation
Samadhi is the state of yoga, or pure consciousness. This state is our true nature and birthright.In this workshop, we will burn out the impurities trapped in the physical body through a strong asana practice, including kriya techniques, led by Sarah Platt-Finger. This powerfulsession will be followed by a series of yin/restorativepostures, which will calm the nervous system and quiet the mind. The practice will close with pranayama techniques and an 18-minute meditation, to facilitate a connection to universal intelligence and unbound potential.

Sunday: Mudras, Bandha, and Kriya
3-hour Intensive Workshop with both Sarah and Alan finger! 
Mudras, bandhas, and kriyas are Tantric tools that enable the Shakti, or Mother Nature force, to move back to Shiva, All Intelligence. Mudras are hand gestures that link energetic circuits in the body. Bandhas are physical locks that redirect energy in the subtle body. Kriyas move energy from the subtle body back to the causal body, or to essence. Through asana, pranayama, and meditation techniques, Alan and Sarah will explain how to use these tools to purify the consciousness, bringing one back to a state of unbound intelligence, bliss, and wisdom.

Video recommendations

Regardless of how your day has been, give yourself a moment to wind down, reflect and let your body find peace. To go to sleep without a moment of relaxation may have a negative impact on your sleep and your body's opportunity to recover. So give yourself the chance to balance OFF and ON with a nice evening routine!

Create your own routine for a good nights sleep

Find a routine that suits you by trying different techniques. And try to keep it as long as possible. Let the parasympathetic nervous system help you to wind down and get a good start of a good night’s sleep. Pick and choose, and stay with the routines that works best for you!

• Listen to some relaxing music
  Switch of the TV and put on some relaxing music that makes you feel good. Sit or lay down for a minute and listen. Choose soft and comforting music rather than the upbeat music before bedtime, though a moment of happy dancing will boost your mood and can also be helpful in order to release tension and stress.

• Read a good book
  To read a good book can be a way to let go of nagging thoughts and let us become more present. Take a break and let the body relax.

• Keep a journal
  Make some reflections of your day. Write down all your thoughts that are running loose in your mind. Put them on paper and it will be easier to slow them down. To write down our thoughts helps us to sort our emotions, ourselves as well as what’s only thoughts and that we don’t really need to react to. It can be an amazing way to get it all out before falling asleep. Also, write down what you are grateful for that day.

• Drink a cup of tea
  Boil some water and enjoy a nice cup of tea while reading a book or listening to music. Choose a soothing herbal tea such as chamomile or rooibos, free from caffeine.

• Enjoy a moment on the mat 
  To practice yoga in the evening helps you to relax and reduces stress levels before a good night’s sleep. Even a short session of yoga, meditation or breathing techniques can be enough to calm and balance the physical and mental.
  
  

  If you choose to practice a full yoga session, long or short, gentle and slow movements are to prefer. It will slow down and not trigger the body’s system. Yin yoga is perfect as we maintain each position for several minutes without putting pressure on the body in deep stretches. In yin yoga we look for a soft and gentle stretch where we can breath naturally and calmly.
  
  You can also choose restorative yoga; select a couple of positions, use bolsters, blankets and blocks, lying down as comfortable as possible in the position. We also maintain the position longer than in yin yoga. But the goal is not to stretch out the body, but to relax and soften up.

• Legs against the wall
  If you choose one position, you should go for Viparita karani, legs up the wall. Highly recommended! It’s the most recuperating position you can practice. Lay down for 10-20 minutes and you will experience an amazing relaxation, simply a restorative pose. A few tips:

  • Put down a folded blanket or a bolster under the sacrum, just below the lumbar.
  • Put a strap around the thighs, low down and close to the hip, to be able to relax fully in your hips.
  • Place a bolster on the height against the wall to lean your leg against. If you have a strap around your thighs, attach it to the bolster as well. This is good in order to avoid overstretched knees and if backside thigh feels tight, among other things.
  • If it’s too difficult to focus, do a breathing exercise or repeat a mantra until you feel the calm inside of your.

• Practice yoga in your bed
  There are certain relaxation and yoga nidra sequences that are adapted to falling asleep comfortambly. These can be done in bed so that you can fall asleep straight after.

Foto: yogahverdag.no

Calming yoga videos online 

Relaxation exercises & Yoga Nidras

Meditation practices online

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