Wednesday, June 20, 2012
Love For Shiva Rea
I have a low bullshit tolerance, but I do have an affinity for yoga. After having enough of Rodney Yee and his booty shorts, I decided to give Shiva Rea's Yoga Shaki a try. It may be the great workout DVD that I own. Shiva Rea is absolutely fantastic. While she does talk about opening your heart to your inner Surya, I find her workouts challenging, beneficial and calming. Filmed on gorgeous beaches with Indian trance-like music, the DVD is easier to get into than other yoga DVDs that lack the organic experience. If you allow yourself to get into it, it is a gratifying experience.
Over the course of taking up skating, I've learned a lot about my body. I tend to carry my tension in my shoulder blades, lower back and hamstrings. I have a way of trying to control my body and tensing instead of letting go and trusting myself. Whenever I skate with my coach, I hear that I raise my shoulders when tense. This is one area that I've really been working to release with yoga. Strengthening my core, improving my flexibility and releasing my tight hamstrings are constant priorities. I like to attend Bikram yoga classes, but doing yoga at home is far more convenient.
One of the great features of Shiva Rea's Yoga Shakti workout is that it allows you to customize your own working using the yoga matrix feature on the DVD. The DVD also has four set workouts which range from 36-92 minutes in length. The Basic Flow is a good workout for beginners getting into yoga, a quick stretching session in the morning, warming up for skating or even for someone looking to get back into doing yoga regularly. The other workouts are increasingly challenging.
Who are the yogis out there? Do you do yoga in classes or at home? How much of the woo woo talk can you stand when doing yoga? Which workouts do your recommend? Has it changed your life?
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Also try yogaglo.com if you like yoga at home, great variety, kickass difficult stuff if you want that, still cheaper than taking class. Live, in NYC, loving Isaac Pena's class, aspiring contortionist I am (not totally seriously, but it's fun to push myself). No, I have no affiliation with either.
ReplyDeleteI don't do yoga because I only do real exercise.
ReplyDeleteI suggest you go to a bikram class and see how you feel after it. You are sorely mistaken.
Deletelol at the "real exercise" above- yes, I dare you to try Bikram and not call it a workout, but I also love kundalini (which focuses a lot on different types of breathing and movement to stimulate different glands, etc). My favorite dvd's are by RaviAna. They're are a husband wife team (Ravi and Ana). She does the yoga, he does the voice over explaining what each pose/breath/movement is doing for you. There is an element of "woo woo", but I tend to appreciate some of that as long as it's not over the top. It's more of a casual woo...In any case, THOSE are some great workouts. My favorite is Yoga Beauty Body, and you WILL sweat, and you will totally see your abs flatten and your butt tighten in just a few workouts. Hard, but I LOVE the results.
ReplyDeleteJust because you're out of breath doesn't mean it's a workout. It means you're out of shape because you spend all your time working out your glands instead of your muscles.
ReplyDelete