Category Archives: Beginners’ Yoga Sequences

7 Poses to Help You Find Home

Home is a feeling, not a place. Whether you are traveling or recently relocated, this sequence will help you find home within yourself.

Teacher Sarah Ezrin has moved constantly throughout her life, but can always find “home” on the yoga mat.

By the time I graduated high school, I had lived in seven different houses and two countries. Moving around so much meant constantly having to redefine home. As a little girl, it would feel as though I was just settling in somewhere when it was time to move again. I adapted by finding things that helped me nest quickly, like always having my special pillow (which I still travel with!) or putting out picture frames. My family and I were also avid travelers. So, in addition to moving houses, we were constantly on airplanes too. This made for an adventurous, albeit ungrounded upbringing. Even now, my life continues to be such where my karma is to move every few years or travel every few months. Even when my soul is begging to stay put!

How Yoga Brings me Home

The first place I ever really felt settled was on a yoga mat. It was as if all that traveling was really a quest to find this place. I remember thinking to myself, “so, this is what it feels like to be home.” It was not just the soothing walls of the studio or the familiar wafts of incense, but being on my mat and in my body. I realized quickly that our practice can be a way to find home within ourselves.

One of the biggest lessons we learn in yoga is the impermanence of things. How often do we think that if we just hang on a little tighter things will always stay the same? And for some …

Wind Down with a Calming Evening Sequence

Prepare yourself for deep, restful sleep with this 10-minute, relaxing sequence that stretches all the major muscles and quiets the monkey mind.

An evening practice is wonderful for calming the mind and preparing your body for deep rest. In this evening practice, you will focus on looking inward. Forward bends and hip openers help relax you and set the mood for sleep. This short practice can provide a really beautiful end to a busy day. Simply slow down and tune into your body and breath. Sweet dreams!

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Sequence for Silence and Savasana

Try this simple sequence the next time noises—external or in your head—feel overwhelming. Duck into a private space, put your phone on airplane mode, and practice moving with your breath.

About the author

Lizze Lasater translates her training in art history and architecture into carefully curated digital courses, global Restorative Yoga teacher-training workshops, and her heartfelt spirit jewelry collection. She sometimes jokes that yoga runs in the family—her Mama, Judith Hanson Lasater, co-founded Yoga Journal magazine and has been teaching yoga since 1971. Born in San Francisco, Lizzie lives in the Alps with her tall Austrian. Join the Restorative Revolution with her at www.savasana.life.

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Try this Joint-Freeing Series from Jana Long

Try this practice, which emphasizes joint health and offers movements that can be incorporated into your daily life, to help maintain or improve mobility and stability for healthy aging.

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6 Deep Hip Openers to Try Instead of Pigeon Pose

These powerful alternates will help you open your hips in all directions.

Knowing the planes helps us improve range of motion in our hips.

Many of us could use more hip opening. From sitting to standing to walking, our legs are constantly working to support our upper bodies. All this effort can make hip muscles chronically tight, especially when we’re sitting for long periods at desks or in cars.

Understanding Hip-Opening

The phrase “hip-opening” often creates confusion, as many people assume that it’s similar to opening a door or book, and therefore limited to taking your legs apart. But opening your hips means creating mobility in all directions.

Hips are ball and socket joints, which are the most mobile joints in your body. The head of each thigh bone (femur bone) forms the “ball’, which sits in the socket (acetabulum) of your pelvis.

Ball and socket joints also do circumduction, which means moving in all three planes, like when you swing your leg in a circle.

In order to stretch a particular muscle group, you must take your body in the opposite direction of that group’s movement. For example, if you’ve been sitting for long periods, which is hip flexion (taking thighs toward your chest), you’ll want to extend your hip (taking your thighs back) to release your hip flexors.

Your Hips in All Planes of Movement

We are three-dimensional beings. We move in space in many different directions. We can go forward and backward, side to side, and inward and outward. And most of the time, we move in some combination of those directions all at once. For example, to set up our front legs in Pigeon, we must both open our legs to the …

6 Yoga Poses for Athletes with Tight Hamstrings

Improve flexibility and mobility in your hamstrings for better performance and to prevent injuries.

Hamstrings are a group of muscles that run along the back of your thighs, starting at your lower pelvis and attaching to your knee and lower legs. They are often the culprit for various sports injuries and chronic pain due to tightness. Once your hamstrings are tight, it can lead to poor posture, low-back pain, and a variety of other issues. Yoga poses can be critical additions to most training programs since they can help improve flexibility and mobility in your hamstrings and set you up for better movement patterns while running, biking, and playing sports. Here, three key benefits of yoga for athletes, plus six poses to support your sport.

1. Improved Performance and Joint Health

The posterior chain (muscles along the back of your body) is vital in all aspects of athletic performance. Strong and flexible hamstrings can improve running efficiency, agility, and power. Your body will recruit other muscle groups when needing to compensate for tight hamstrings, which will require more energy and can contribute to injuries. A full range of motion will also ensure healthy joints.

2. A Healthy Spine

Tight hamstrings reduce the mobility of your pelvis, which in turn increases strain and pressure on your lower back. Your hamstrings are an essential part of your knees, pelvis, and spine health. Flexibility in this area will support a proper upright posture. Everyday movement patterns like walking, running, sitting lead to shortening and tightening of your hamstring muscles. Consistent stretches to increase flexibility in this area will counter and bring them back to a balanced and healthy state.

3. Lower Risk of Injuries

If your hamstrings are tight, it can cause the posterior (rear) tilt of your pelvis and lead to strain and weakness …

5 Yoga Poses to Overcome Burnout

Feeling exhausted and burnt out? Try this easy, do-anywhere sequence from Jules Hunt, founder of the blog Om & The City.

We met with wellness entrepreneur Jules Hunt of Om & the City in Austin, TX recently during our cross country Live Be Yoga Tour. She shared this simple practice and few tips to overcome fatigue and burnout.

Live Be Yoga ambassadors Lauren Cohen and Brandon Spratt are on a road trip across the country to sit down with master teachers, host free local classes, and so much more—all to illuminate the conversations pulsing through the yoga community today.

Watch also Jules Hunt’s 3 Tips to Fight Burnout.

Follow the tour and get the latest stories @livebeyoga on Instagram and Facebook.

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Try This Sequence to Confront Your Fears and Unleash Your Inner Warrior

I always felt that yoga offered more than a great stretch or workout. It gave me a way to connect with others and myself at the same time. You can find a bit of that feeling in this sequence.

Jivana Heyman

Do you ever find yourself clenching your jaw waiting for something bad to happen? Or waking up in the morning with a sense of dread? Whether they come in small doses or huge heart-stopping moments of panic, these feelings can be traced back to fear, which can be debilitating, producing a gnawing anxiety that sucks the joy out of life.

In my life, one particularly fearful time stands out: leading up to the moment I told my mother I was gay. I was 17 and confused. I’d found myself living a secret life and not sharing it with her. Speaking my truth was a major victory, and it made me understand even more how fear had been ruling my life.

Those of us who are marginalized tend to internalize our oppression, which can manifest as fear. During this time in my life, I was scared of being different and of being excluded from society—tossed out like garbage. Mostly, I feared disappointing my mother. My self-worth was so intimately tied to what she thought of me.

It wasn’t until I began practicing yoga regularly that I recognized I was living in a constant state of fear, even after coming out to my mother. A mild panic was always boiling just below the surface. Savasana (Corpse Pose) gave it away. I remember getting very quiet, maybe for the first time ever without the help of alcohol or drugs. I jerked awake as if I had fallen asleep too quickly. But I …