Judith Lasater's Favorite Poses

by Nina

In her interview with us (see Judith Lasater on Yoga and Aging), Judith Lasater mentioned the poses that she currently practices, citing "especially Viparita Karanai (Legs Up the Wall pose), Supported Sarvangasana (Shoulderstand) on the chair and Supported Halasana (Plow pose) on the Halasana bench." By chance—or maybe not by chance if you stop to think about it—those are some of my favorite poses, and I recently had a friend take some photos of me doing them so I could share them on the blog. Then, as it happened, someone left a comment on the interview with Judith, asking us to share two of the poses with you: the Shoulderstand in a Chair and Supported Halasana with a Halasana bench. That was the kick in the pants I needed. (We've covered Viparita Karani many times on the blog—see Featured Pose: Legs Up the Wall pose.)

Here is a photo of the Shoulderstand in a Chair. I'm doing the pose with my legs straight up because that's the way I prefer doing it. Some people, however, practice this pose in more of a backbend, with their legs supported on a bolster and their feet over the back of the chair. But I find that position less comfortable.

Shoulderstand in a Chair

And here is a photo of Supported Halasana (Plow pose), sometimes called Arda Halasana (Half Plow pose). Okay, fine, I don't have a Halasana bench (a specially designed piece of furniture), but you probably don't, either. So I use a chair for Supported Halasana, instead. Yes, the good news is that you don't need a special piece of furniture to do this pose, but if you are using a chair, you need one that has no bar between the two front legs because you need to be able to get your head underneath the chair seat. And you also need a chair that either has no back panel or that has a space between the panel and the seat that is large enough to fit your legs through (I'm on the small side, so I can use a chair that has a back panel).

Supported Halasana

If you've never done these poses before, you may be wondering how the heck you get into them. Since I practice them all the time, and teach them whenever I teach yoga for better sleep, stress management or emotional wellbeing, I can tell you! However, quite frankly the process is complex enough that I've decided to do separate posts for each of the poses (we took photos of all the steps in and out of them, which will make that easier). But I will tell you that it's like learning to drive a car; at first the process is complicated and a little stressful, but with practice you get to a point where getting in and out becomes automatic and you don't even have to think about it anymore.

So it they take so much practice to learn, why should you bother? Well, as many of you know by now, I'm a huge fan of inverted poses in general (see Just in Time for Holidays: Inverted Poses). Because you are upside down in these poses, they automatically trigger the relaxation response (see Why You Should Love Your Baroreceptors). And perhaps because these poses are slightly more physically active than restorative poses, the rest they provide feels more refreshing to me. So when I'm fatigued, a supported inversion practice is just the trick. These two poses provide the extra advantage of placing your legs higher than your heart (as well as your heart higher than your head). Having your legs higher than your heart means that gravity helps return the blood in your legs to your heart, improving your circulation and reducing swelling in your feet, ankles and legs. So these poses are wonderfully restorative for your legs when you've been on your feet all day, whether standing for your work, walking or running.

Chair Shoulderstand is one of the most soothing inverted poses because you are both supported and completely inverted. Although full Shoulderstand is considered a calming pose, the reality is that for most people—even relatively flexible people like me—the unsupported pose just is not that comfortable. Chair Shoulderstand, on the other hand, is very comfortable and you can hold the position for quite a while. I like to hold it for at least 6 minutes, because I can feel my "quiet switch" turn on after around 5 minutes. And you can do the Chair Shoulderstand in place of full Shoulderstand in any sequence. 

Supported Halasana is a very quieting pose because you fold inward in addition to being inverted. Furthermore, as you hang from your hips in this pose, the traction on your back that this pose provides feels wonderful, particularly if your lower back is bothering you. That said, I really don't think this pose is for everyone. People who don't have flexible necks can find the extreme forward bending of the neck (flexion) in this pose uncomfortable. And some people with round bodies find it very difficult if not impossible to fold their bodies into this position. In this case, turning the pose upside down into a seated forward bend with head support is great alternative.

Supported Seated Forward Bend

Typically, if you were going sequence Judith's three favorite poses, you would do Chair Shoulderstand first, then Supported Halasana, and finally end with Viparita Karani (Legs Up the Wall).

Tip: for women with large breasts, which tend to fall into your face in these poses, I recommend tying a strap around your upper chest before going into the pose.

Take Your Time: Results from Yoga Practice

by Nina

Horses Grazing by Brad Gibson

It's a running joke in our family that when Brad gets impatient with me—because I often do various household tasks a bit slower than he does—he says to me, "Take your time!" He swears that Bill Murray said this repeatedly in the movie Caddy Shack, but when we watched it again recently, no one actually ever uttered that line. Regardless, I always reply, "You take your time."

But many worthwhile things really do take time. For example, if you want to cook a really good meal instead of eating fast food, you need to shop for fresh ingredients and prepare everything from scratch. And if you want to turn a new acquaintance into a close friend, you need to spend a lot of time together, getting to know and trust each other. The same is true for seeing results from yoga practice. Obviously, one Downward-Facing Dog pose doesn't instantly make your arms stronger, though with regular practice, it definitely will increase your strength. And it also seems obvious that if you want to reduce your stress levels, you'll need to practice stress management regularly over a period of time.

So it was very interesting for me to hear about a recent study at the Feinberg School of Medicine, Northwestern University, that looked at the effect of exercise on insomnia. One of the findings as reported by Gretchen Reynolds in the New York Times post How Exercise Can Help Us Sleep Better was:

"After the first two months of their exercise program, the exercising volunteers (all of them women) were sleeping no better than at the start of the study. Only after four months of the program had their insomnia improved."

Yes, it took four whole months of regular exercising to bring improvements. That's quite a bit of time, don't you think? The women in this study were not practicing yoga for exercise, but it's likely that using yoga as a form of exercise to help with insomnia (something I definitely recommend) might take a similar amount of time. And it also makes sense to me that if you are practicing yoga for insomnia (see Yoga for Insomnia, Part 1) by using stress management techniques, you should also give that some time (though some people report that doing breath practices in the middle of the night produces immediate results). So be patient.

In general, the time you invest in your yoga practice—whether you are practicing for your physical health, your emotional health or both—is what brings the payoffs. After all, yoga sutra 1.14 tells us that equanimity is attained only through steady, dedicated, attentive practice:

Long, uninterrupted, alert practice is the firm foundation for restraining the fluctuations of the mind. —trans. by B.K.S. Iyengar

Yoga and Menopause: Frozen Shoulders

by Nina

When I was doing research for my post on menopause and headaches (see Yoga for Menopause: Headaches), I was very surprised to learn that the most common complaint that Japanese women have during menopause is not headaches (which is what I previously thought) or hot flashes (the most common complaint in the US) but frozen shoulder. As many of you probably know by now, I experienced two bouts of frozen shoulder during perimenopause/menopause. Although I knew this condition was common among women my age, no one I consulted about the condition really tied it directly to menopause, although there was some speculation that it might be related to hormonal changes. That's because they all said  no one really understands what causes this temporary (though very painful) problem. So it was very interesting for me to learn that in Japan it is considered a problem related to menopause. And because we've been focusing recently on menopause and I'm very, well, experienced, with this particular problem, I decided this would be a good time to write about it. (By the way, men also get frozen shoulders, and all the advice in this post will pertain to them as well.)

So to start, what exactly is frozen shoulder? According to the Mayo Clinic web site:

"Frozen shoulder, also know as adhesive capsulitis, is a condition characterized by stiffness and pain in your shoulder joint. Signs and symptoms typically begin gradually, worsen over time and then resolve, usually within one or two years.

Treatment for frozen shoulder involves stretching exercises and, sometimes, the injection of corticosteroids and numbing medications into the joint capsule. In a small percentage of cases, surgery may be needed to loosen the joint capsule so it can move more freely.

Frozen shoulder typically develops slowly, and in three stages. Each of these stages can last a number of months:

Painful Stage: During this stage, pain occurs with any movement of your shoulder, and your shoulder's range of motion starts to become limited.

Frozen Stage: Pain may begin to diminish during this stage. However, your shoulder becomes stiffer, and your range of motion decreases notably.

Thawing Stage: During the thawing stage, the range of motion in your shoulder begins to improve."

I'd like to expand on this a bit. First of all, your range of motion, especially if you're a fairly flexible yoga practitioner like me, is drastically reduced. Basically, at the frozen stage you can barely move your arm, in any direction. Even lying on your back, with your arms resting directly on the floor can be painful because your arm needs to be in a completely neutral Tadasana position to be pain free. And the pain is really pretty bad! Sleeping is difficult unless you prop your arm up on a pillow so it doesn't hurt, and of course if you move your arm around in your sleep, pain may wake you up. Some ordinary household tasks are difficult or impossible because you can't raise your arm or carry heavy objects, like shopping bags. Eventually lack of use makes your arm weak, so when you're over the frozen shoulder, strengthening is important.

It's essential to have an expert diagnose you for frozen shoulder because other shoulder problems, such as a torn muscle, are treated very differently. But the tests for frozen shoulder are very simple and not invasive, because with a torn muscle, someone else can move your arm for you, but with a frozen shoulder, your arm just won't move at all. So your doctor or physical therapist, will simply move your arm for you in various directions.

Once you have a diagnosis, how can yoga help? Well, first yoga provides a lot of good shoulder stretching exercises, which are recommended by the Mayo Clinic. The sequence that Baxter and I developed for tight shoulders (see Featured Sequence: Opening Tight Shoulders) was partly influenced by the routine I developed for myself to stretch my frozen shoulder. Try poses 2 through 7 from this sequence. Of course, when your shoulder is frozen, your arm will not be able to be straight up the wall as in the photos, but even if you have to bend your elbow and creep the frozen arm just partly up the wall, that will still be a good stretch. This is one case where moving into the pain is actually beneficial rather than harmful. And I actually found that stretching left me feeling better afterward, so that helped motivate me to practice through the pain. And, hey, look at me now! (See Living Proof for my testimonial about the effectiveness of shoulder stretches.)

To continue with your regular yoga practice, you'll need to modify your arm position in standing poses. For example, in Tree pose have your arms in namaste, in Warrior 2 pose have your hands on your hips, and Triangle and Extended Side angle poses, when your frozen arm is on top, just keep it tucked against your side or with your hand on your hip. In seated forward bends, you'll need to support your frozen arm, perhaps on a block, as you won't be able to reach for your feet. In restorative poses, be sure to place a folded blanket under your arms to support them so the frozen arm doesn't fall into a painful position. For poses you just can't do, like inversions or backbends, come up with an alternative. I did Standing Forward Bend and Widespread Standing Forward Bend with my head on a block instead of Headstand and Legs Up the Wall pose instead of Shoulderstand. You won't be able to do most backbends, so try practicing a passive, supported backbend of some kind to maintain mobility in your spine during this period. If you're in class, ask your teacher to help you find appropriate alternatives.

For the stress and pain associated with this condition, practice conscious relaxation in your favorite form (see The Relaxation Response and Yoga). When asana just seemed too hard for me because almost anything made my arm hurt, I experimented with a long version of yoga nidra.

Finally, after your shoulder is back to normal, your arm is going to be very weak from lack of use. Now is the time to do some arm strengthening poses! See Upper Body Strengthening the Easy Way and our featured upper body strengthening poses for ideas.

Of course, it is no fun going through this, but a frozen shoulder is a temporary condition. And with the help of yoga you can regain both flexibility and strength. Hey, I'm even back to doing arm balances!

Practicing with Pain

by Nina

Needle and Ice by Melina Meza

When a man has mastered himself,
he is perfectly at ease in cold,
in heat, in pleasure or pain,
in honor or disgrace

—Bhagavad Gita, trans. by Stephen Mitchell

We get many comments on our blog, but every once in a while there is one that makes me feel sad, like this one, which one of our readers left on a post about menopause:

This will certainly be relevant for me (65). Besides ongoing extreme irritability, yoga is not the joy it has always been for me because of joint stiffness and pain. What little stability I felt in life came from yoga, and feel that slipping away when I need it most.

My first reaction to this was to write to Shari and suggest that she write about menopause and joint pain because I knew that she, too, was currently suffering from joint problems (see Yoga for Menopause: Joint Problems). But even after ensuring that this topic was going to be addressed, I was concerned about the underlying issue:

yoga is not the joy it has always been 

what stability in life that came from yoga is slipping away

The thing is, I don't believe that physical pain means that yoga practice needs to be less joyful, or that the stability that practice brings will slip away if your asanas hurt more than they used to. And I speak from experience. Now that I'm over two bouts of frozen shoulder (which, trust me, were very painful), I'm still living with an arthritic hip that's not going to go away. So for many years, I've experienced pain when I practice asana at home or during a class. And, of course, I definitely cannot practice many of the poses I used to do on a regular basis. However, practicing yoga is still a positive, life-affirming experience for me, and as joyful as it ever was.

Because, after all, what is yoga? Definitions of yoga in the scriptures vary from "yoga is equanimity" to "yoga is cessation of the fluctuations of the mind" but nowhere is there anything about practicing pain-free asana. Indeed, as the quote at the beginning of the post tells us, being a yogi means being equally at ease in pain as in pleasure.

Both Ram and I have written about cultivating santosha as an important part of yoga practice (see Santosha: Happiness and Longevity  and Yoga and the Pursuit of Happiness ). Santosha means "contentment" and TKV Desikachar defines contentment as "the ability to be comfortable with what we have and what we do not have." And I believe that being comfortable with what we have and what we do not have must include practicing asana while in physical pain and being comfortable with that. And as for the joy, the Yoga Sutras tells us in sutra 2.42 "Perfect happiness is attained through contentment."

So the path back to joy is not through the elimination of pain, but rather through cultivating contentment. In his post Achieving Stillness in Turbulent Situations Ram told us how his grandfather taught him to meditate in a train station in India because achieving stillness in a noisy, chaotic environment was what the practice of meditation was all about. Likewise, I feel that learning how to find contentment in our asana practice, even while in physical pain, is also the essence of yoga. (Of course, you should continue to use pain as a guide to practicing safely as Shari describes in her post Yoga for Menopause: Joint Problems.)

So dear commenter and all our other readers, while I hope you may find some helpful hints on this blog that will help reduce your physical pain, we cannot remove all pain from your life  But we can offer you something more valuable. For practicing yoga by cultivating santosha inside and outside the yoga room will help see you through life's challenges in whatever form they take. As I wrote in my post Yoga and the Pursuit of Happiness, the Yoga Sutras make it clear which steps to take on that journey:

1.12 Practice and detachment are the means to still the movements of consciousness.

1.33 Through cultivation of friendliness, compassion, joy, and indifference to pleasure and pain, virtue and vice respectively, the consciousness becomes favorably disposed, serene and benevolent.

1.34 Or, by maintaining the pensive state felt at the time of soft and steady exhalation and during passive retention after exhalation.

1.35 Or, by contemplating an object that helps to maintain steadiness of mind and consciousness. 

Yoga for Menopause: Headaches

by Nina

Tough Weed by Melina Meza

My sister in law, who never suffered much from headaches before, found that menopause brought on debilitating migraines. Other women find that normal, tension headaches become more frequent with hormonal fluctuations. In fact, although the most common complaint women in the US have during perimenopause and menopause is hot flashes, in Japan (where hot flashes are less common) women complain much more frequently about headaches.

Baxter and I have already written on the blog about migraines and other headaches, both on how to prevent them (see Preventing Migraines and Other Headaches, Part 1 and Part 2) and how to practice when you have one (see Yoga and Migraine Headaches). Unfortunately we don't know of any special techniques for treating hormonally triggered headaches (in the book The Woman's Book of Yoga and Health, in the chapter on menopause, Patricia Walden simply recommends her standard headache practices for headaches experienced during menopause). However, I thought it might be helpful for those of you who are suffering from hormonally induced headaches if we provided links to our earlier posts on headaches in a central post on menopause.

In my sister-in-law's case, it wasn't yoga that helped her with her migraines (she doesn't practice yoga). Eventually, she realized that it was her diet that was triggering the migraines, and that diary was a trigger. Many of us assume that because we didn't have food sensitivities when we were young, that we must not have them now. But personal experience has taught me that many of us do develop new food sensitivities during perimenopause/menopause. So if you're suffering from headaches, it may be time to practice yoga for healthy eating. To do this, use mediation and mindful asana practice to help you tune into your body and observe how your eating habits affect your health. See Meditation and Healthy Eating and Got Mindfulness? among other posts on this topic.

And if you are having trouble avoiding the foods that turn out to be triggers for you, try using yoga for stress management to help you resist temptation and make better food choices. See Healthy Eating, Stress and Self Control for some ideas.

Take good care of yourselves, dear friends.

Yoga for Menopause: Fatigue

by Nina

Rose Light by Melina Meza

When I was going through perimenopause, the worst symptom I had was fatigue attacks. Although fatigue or exhaustion is a classic symptom of perimenopause, I'm pretty sure I made up the term "fatigue attack" because I needed a special term for how it felt to me. I'm a pretty energetic person who gets a lot of things done in a given day, and my yoga practice during that time was quite athletic. But during that period, once in a while, I'd suddenly feel so drained of all energy that all I wanted to do was collapse into a puddle on the floor. There was something essentially different about these hormonally based episodes of fatigue than normal tiredness, and I remembered that same feeling of utter exhaustion from my pregnancies (although those were combined with nausea). So I knew it wasn't something I could fight with energizing poses, such as backbends or sun salutations. Fortunately, I got some guidance from two different senior teachers, Rodney Yee and Patricia Walden, who both helped me figure out a good way to practice when I was feeling that way.

When I first talked with Rodney about a fatigue practice, he came up with a sequence of supported inverted poses (see Just In Time for the Holidays: Inverted Poses). However, the first pose in the sequence was Downward-Facing Dog with head support (traditionally the beginning pose in a supported inverted pose practice), and I complained to him (whined?) that when I was feeling exhausted, that pose felt like to much. So he changed the sequence to start with a long Legs Up pose (Viparita Karani) so I could have a nice rest to start and then move on to more active inversions. That was a revelation to me who had only done that pose at the end of a practice. Learning I could rest at the beginning of my practice instead of the end—that I could break a rule that wasn't even a really rule— was a revelation. I started to realize I had a lot more freedom to adapt my practice to my particular needs that I had known. And practicing was a good way to get through a fatigue attack and did leave me feeling refreshed.

Later I took a workshop from Patricia Walden on Yoga for Menopause. She, too, recommended a combination of restorative poses and supported inversions. Eventually, when the book she wrote with Linda Sparrow, The Woman's Book of Yoga and Health, was published, I started to practice her menopause fatigue practice on a regular basis. This sequence is quite long and some of the poses may not appropriate for many of you, but I'll list all the poses here just in case.

1. Supported Reclined Cobbler's pose (Supta Baddha Konasana)
2. Supported Seated Forward Bend (Paschimottanasana)
3. Supported One-Legged Forward Bend (Janu Sirsasana)
4. Simple Seated Twist (Bharadvajasana)
5. Downward-Facing Dog with head support (Adho Mukha Svanasana)
6. Standing Forward Bend with head support (Uttanasana)
7. Headstand (Sirsasana)
8. Inverted Staff pose (backbend in a chair) (Viparita Dandasana)
9. Chair Shoulderstand (Sarvangasana)
10. Half Plow pose (Plow pose with chair) (Arda Halasana)
11. Supported Straight Leg Bridge pose (Setu Bandha Sarvagasana)
12. Legs Up the Wall pose (with variations) (Viparita Karani)
13. Relaxation pose (Savasana)

Regardless of whether you try this sequence or not, it's worthwhile to look at the strategy behind it. It begins with Supported Reclined Cobber's pose (Supta Baddha Konasana), which is a very restful and relaxing pose. Next are a couple of supported seated forward bends, which are also quieting and restful but a bit more active than the first pose. The simple seated twist is even more active, and definitely stimulating. So now, after having a rest and being a bit energized, you're ready for the more strenuous poses: Downward-Facing Dog with head support, Standing Forward Bend with head support, Headstand, and Inverted Staff pose (backbend in a chair). From there, with the Chair Shoulderstand, Half Plow pose, Supported Straight Leg Bridge pose, and Legs Up the Wall pose, you are moving into the quieting, soothing supported inversions, ending with the most restful of the group. You are also getting a balanced asana practice, with a combination of forward bends, backbends, twists, and inverted poses. (I should say this my analysis of the sequence, not Patricia's.)

As with any sequence, you could shorten this sequence by leaving out certain poses (especially if there are ones you don't normally practice) but still keep the remaining poses in the same order. Or, you could come up with a sequence of your own that combines restorative and supported inverted poses in a way that allows you to rest in the beginning, move toward more active poses, and then rest again at the end. The important thing is to acknowledge your fatigue, and adapt your practice to your current condition, thinking outside the box as needed. And, remember, doing even just one pose (such as Reclined Cobbler's pose or Legs Up the Wall pose) will very likely make you feel better than doing nothing.

Naturally, if you aren't going through periomenopause or menopause (or aren't a woman!), you can still do a practice like this whenever you feel exhausted.

More Love for Baroreceptors: Supporting Your Head in Restorative Poses

by Nina

When I first starting taking yoga, I was confused about why my teachers were always rushing put to a folded blanket under my head when I was lying on my back. Something about the position of my head when I was lying on the floor was driving them crazy, but what was it? And why was it such a problem?

Later I learned that they were adding this support because, when my head was flat on the floor, due to tightness in my shoulders, my neck was arching up and back and my chin was tipping away from my chest. Putting the folded blanket under my head allowed me lie with my chin pointing toward my chest like this:

This was considered to be the proper--and healthy—position for the head in supine poses. So I went along with it. But secretly I continued to wonder why. In case you have already noticed, I'm like that—always wanting to know the whys as well as the hows, always wanting to dig a bit deeper. Which is probably why I ended up as a yoga blogger, but I digress.

Anyway, it was only when I learned about baroreceptors that I found a satisfactory explanation. As I mentioned yesterday (see Why You Should Love Your Baroreceptors), when your neck is slightly flexed (the position when your chin is pointing toward your chest), the position puts some pressure on the baroreceptors in your carotid arteries. And this pressure can cause the same response as an inverted pose does on your nervous system—switching you from fight or flight to the relaxation response. The opposite neck position with your neck in extension (a backbend position with your chin tipping away from your chest) can have the opposite effective, stimulating your nervous system.

Of course, this understanding of the role of baroreceptors in yoga poses is very recent. In fact, the understanding of the role in regulating blood pressure in general is pretty recent as well. So the yoga teachers, like B.K.S. Iyengar, who developed restorative yoga discovered the best position for the head through personal observation, not science. (That says a lot about personal observation, doesn't it?) Interestingly, the head position Jalandara Bandha, with neck flexed and chin pointing down toward the chest, used in seated poses for pranayama, which is much older than restorative yoga, was probably adopted for the same reasons. Yoga practitioners noticed that head position enhanced the quieting effect of the practice.

I thought I'd tell you all this not just because you might not have made this connection on your own, but because I also realized there might be some people out there who don't have teachers running to put a folded blanket under their heads every time they lie in a supine restorative pose. So that's both the how and why for you. The how is that when you lie on your back, if your chin does not easily point down toward your chest, always add some support under your head. The why is that having your chin pointing down toward your chest will enhance your relaxation due to slight pressure on your baroreceptors.

Long live head support!

Why You Should Love Your Baroreceptors: Stress Management Made Easy

by Nina

I found this nice little illustration of baroreceptors that I'm excited to share with you. Okay, I admit it, I'm a little obsessed with baroreceptors. But that's because ever since I found out how our baroreceptors help regulate our blood pressure and I understood how we can use this aspect of our anatomy to switch our nervous systems from fight or flight to relaxation mode, I've not only included supported inverted poses in my practice on a regular basis but I've been on a mission to spread the word. Using supported inverted poses for stress management is one of easiest ways—at least for me—to calm yourself down because all you have to do is set yourself in the pose and stay there for a while. The shape of the pose itself causes the baroreceptors to work their magic.

As I wrote in my post Just in Time for the Holidays: Inverted Poses, the reason that inverted poses trigger the relaxation response is due to the pressure sensors called baroreceptors that are connected to the nerves controlling your heart rate and blood pressure. Your baroreceptors are located in the wall of each internal carotid artery at your carotid sinus (the arteries on each side of your neck that carry blood from your heart to your brain).

And in the wall of your aortic arch (just above your heart).

Aortic Arch

These baroreceptors detect any changes in your blood pressure, stretching when your blood pressure is high and shrinking when your blood pressure is low. If your baroreceptors detect a fall in your blood pressure, they send signals via your nerves to increase your heart rate, constrict your blood vessels to raise your blood pressure, and switch your nervous system to fight or flight mode. Likewise, if your baroreceptors detect abnormally elevated blood pressure, they send signals to slow your heart rate, relax your blood vessels to lower your blood pressure, and switch your nervous system to relaxation mode. And now I have a picture to illustrate this!

In an inverted pose, your heart is higher than your head, the opposite of its position when you are upright. With your heart higher than your head, gravity causes more blood to flow in the direction of your head, creating more pressure than usual on your carotid sinus and aortic arch. As the arterial pressure is increased, your baroreceptors are stretched and signals are transmitted to your central nervous system as if your blood pressure was high throughout your body. Feedback signals are then sent back to your body to reduce the arterial pressure, slowing your heart rate, relaxing your blood vessels, and releasing hormones that decrease adrenaline production. This automatically switches your body to relaxation mode.

Because there are baroreceptors in your carotid sinus (the arteries on each side of your neck that carry blood from your heart to your brain) inverted or partially inverted poses where your neck is flexed (that is, your chin is pointing toward your chest), as in Shoulderstand, Plow pose, or Bridge pose, puts added stimulation on your baroreceptors, which may enhance the calming effects of the inversion.

Any yoga pose where your heart is above your head is considered to be an inversion. Inverted yoga poses include full inversions, such as Headstand and Shoulderstand, where your heart is directly over your head and the rest of your body is also fully inverted. Partial inversions, such as Downward-Facing Dog pose and Standing Forward Bend, where your heart is less directly over your head and your legs are either not fully or not at all inverted, are also considered inverted poses and will have similar calming effects. As long as you are warm, quiet, and comfortable in the inverted pose, all you have to do is let the baroreceptors work their magic. Naturally, supported versions of the poses (such as Shoulderstand with a chair or Bridge pose on blankets) are more relaxing than the versions of poses in which you must support yourself, so if you’re practicing inversions for stress reduction, choose the supported versions. See Just in Time for the Holidays: Inverted Poses for a complete list of the inverted poses.

I'm such a believer in these poses that I recently had a friend (thank you, Erin Collom) take photographs of me doing all the supported inversions, so I could write in detail about the individual poses. For now, here's a photograph of a Supported Standing Forward Bend, a surprisingly calming pose.

Caution: Inverted poses may be unsafe for those with certain medical conditions (see here).

Unclear on the Concept: Yoga as a Treatment

by Nina

Wet Handle Bars by Melina Meza

“A comprehensive review published in May in The Clinical Journal of Pain finds that there is “strong evidence for short-term effectiveness” of yoga against back pain, although whether the benefits last beyond a year is less certain.” — Gretchen Reynolds, NY Times Sunday Magazine

In this Sunday’s New York Times Magazine, there was a short article called “Spinal Trap,”
about alternatives for treating back pain. The subtitle was “How do you solve back pain? Don’t ask your doctor.” We’ve already heard from Baxter on this topic, when he confessed that he had little to offer his patients when he himself was a family doctor (see For the Young and Old: Back Care). And you’ll be hearing from him soon about the comprehensive review mentioned in the quote above.

For now, I’d just like to rant a bit about the second half of the sentence:

“strong evidence for short-term effectiveness” of yoga against back pain, although whether the benefits last beyond a year is less certain

At first, I was just confused. What does she mean it is less certain whether the benefits last beyond a year or not. If you’re doing yoga for your back pain and it helps your back pain, why wouldn’t it continue to help your back pain for as long as you kept practicing? But Brad pointed out to me the underlying confusion in this statement. He said, “She’s thinking about yoga like physical therapy. In other words, it’s like a “treatment” you get from the doctor, something you’d do for a couple of months to “cure” your back pain, but then when you felt better you’d stop the treatment. And then maybe the pain would come back eventually.”

Ah, so that's what she meant. But how completely unclear on the concept is that? Naturally, if something in your life is causing you back pain, whether it’s your posture at your desk or in your car, standing all day at your job, too much gardening, lifting your children, lack of exercise in general, stiffness in certain areas of your body, lack of strength in certain areas of your body, you can’t just go back to your old way of life and expect the results of a short session of yoga classes to see you through the rest of your life. That would be like thinking you could do a few months of weight training to get stronger, and then expecting that would keep you stronger for years to come.

Brad laughed and said, “Yeah, and it’s not like there’s a “cure” for aging.”

So, yes, we’re afraid that whether you are practicing yoga for back pain or another condition, or just, you know, for healthy aging in general, it’s going to require an ongoing commitment. But it’s free, has no unpleasant side effects, and oh, yeah, it actually works.

Yoga and Dementia: Welcome News

by Nina

A Rainbow at the Dam by Melina Meza

"Dementia Rate Is Found to Drop Sharply, as Forecast”

Now that’s the kind of headline I like to see! Yes, an article in the New York Times this week Dementia Rate Is Found to Drop Sharply, as Forecast announced the results of two different studies that showed that the incidence of dementia—in one case in England and Wales and in the other case in Denmark—was declining. And the reasons for this are very exciting to us here at Yoga for Healthy Aging.

“Yet experts on aging said the studies also confirmed something they had suspected but had had difficulty proving: that dementia rates would fall and mental acuity improve as the population grew healthier and better educated. The incidence of dementia is lower among those better educated, as well as among those who control their blood pressure and cholesterol, possibly because some dementia is caused by ministrokes and other vascular damage. So as populations controlled cardiovascular risk factors better and had more years of schooling, it made sense that the risk of dementia might decrease.”

So what they are saying here is that, along with being better educated, controlling blood pressure and cholesterol can help prevent dementia. And that means yoga can help. Foremost, yoga’s stress management tools can help you keep your blood pressure low. As I discussed in Chronic Stress: An Introduction, living with chronic stress can cause high blood pressure. So practicing stress management (see The Relaxation Response and Yoga and Stress, Your Health and Yoga will help you keep your blood pressure in check as it benefits your health in many other ways. Stress management can also help you maintain a low cholesterol diet by reducing stress eating and giving you more willpower to stay away from high cholesterol foods (see Yoga, Stress and Weight Management and Healthy Eating, Stress and Self Control). Healthy eating is also fostered by mindfulness (see Meditation and Healthy Eating) so if staying away from high-cholesterol foods is a problem for you, a meditation practice may be helpful.

For me, yoga even provides an ongoing education. Yoga philosophy is food for my intellect as well as providing inspiration for living my life with greater equanimity. Why, just this week I learned a lot from Ram’s post LINK, and the week before I learned from writing my own post Modern Yoga and Hinduism. So if yoga philosophy and history are of interest to you, a whole world of new knowledge and intellectual stimulation awaits you.

The New York Times quoted Dr. Anderson, of the National Institute on Aging, saying:

“With these two studies, we are beginning to see that more and more of us will have a chance to reach old age cognitively intact, postponing dementia or avoiding it altogether. That is a happy prospect.”

Balancing Your Emotions with Your Breath

by Nina

Close-Up of the Falls by Melina Meza

As I wrote in Your Breath: The Key to Your Nervous System, while you cannot tell your nervous system directly to slow your heart beat, digest your food more quickly or to start relaxing right this minute, you can control your breath. And because your heart rate tends to speed up on your inhalation and your heart rate tends to slow on your exhalation, this enables you to consciously access your nervous system. By intentionally taking in more air (either by speeding up your breath or by lengthening your inhalation) you can stimulate your nervous system. And by taking in less air (by slowing your breath or lengthening your exhalation), you can calm yourself down.

Last week, I wrote about emotional counter-poses that you can use to balance your emotions. You can use various yogic breath practices in the same way. You can use breath practices when nothing serious is wrong but you’re just feeling slightly hyper (see anxiety or stress) or slightly down (see clinical depression). And you can also use them as a supplement to other treatments if you are suffering from anxiety, agitated depression, clinical depression or chronic stress.

(Note that yogic breath practices have evolved over thousands of years as yogis experimented on themselves and passed on discoveries their students. And while some schools of yoga teach yogic breath practices (pranayama) to beginners, the type of yoga that I’m trained in, Iyengar style, considers breath practices to be so powerful that pranayama is introduced very gradually. So if you start experimenting with breath practices to balance your emotional condition, do take it easy.)

Anxiety and agitated depression. Because anxiety and agitated depression—which is anxiety based—are so often related to an overactive sympathetic nervous system, for these two conditions it’s best to focus on your exhalation. You can simply work on exhaling completely or lengthen your exhalation a beat or two (by pausing after your exhalation is complete). Or, you can try a more formal practice that focuses on lengthening the exhalation, such as Viloma with interrupted exhalation, where you actually pause twice during your exhalation and once at the end. This is the practice that Iyengar himself recommends in Light on Life in his “Asanas for Emotional Stability” practice.

If manipulating your exhalation causes you to feel any agitation whatsoever, stop the practice. In addition, practices that lengthen your inhalation or even that bring your awareness to the inhalation (which can cause you to unintentionally lengthen or deepen your inhalation) may aggravate your condition, so you may want to avoid them.

If you’ve noticed that you are a chest breather—a type of breathing that seems to be associated with anxiety—and it doesn’t make you feel more anxious to work with your inhalation as well as your exhalation, you could practice abdominal breathing. In abdominal breathing, you focus on slowly inhaling into and exhaling from your belly rather than your chest, as you intentionally keep your abdominal area relaxed. You could lie on your back, and place a block or other light weight, such as a 1 pound bag of rice, on your belly to bring awareness to your abdomen, and keep your abdomen relaxed as you slowly inhale and exhale. Or, if lying on your back makes you anxious, you could lie in Crocodile pose (on your belly with your arms out to the sides, elbows bent, and forehead resting on stacked hands) so you can feel your abdomen moving toward and away from the floor as you slowly inhale and exhale.

You can also use any of these techniques if you're just feeling mildly hyper and want to calm down.

Clinical depression. For clinical depression, which tends to make people feel heavy and lifeless, focusing on your inhalation or breathing more quickly can stimulate your nervous system and bring you out of your lethargy. This is one reason why an active vinyasa practice, such as the Ashtanga series or Sun Salutations, can be helpful to those with clinical depression because when you move with your breath, you tend to breathe more quickly and take in more oxygen. So for you, it may be helpful to focus on your inhalation. You can simply work with inhaling more completely or lengthen your inhalation by holding it for a beat or two. Or, you can try a more formal practice that focuses on lengthening the inhalation, such as Viloma with interrupted inhalation, where you actually pause twice during your inhalation and once after. In Yoga As Medicine, Timothy McCall recommends Ujjayi breathing, which tends to lengthen both the inhalation and exhalation, as well as the version of Viloma with interrupted inhalation

Some people who are depressed tend to have a slumped posture, with a collapsed chest, so focusing on opening your chest and inhaling into that area can be beneficial. In Yoga As Medicine, Timothy quotes Patricia Walden, who herself has suffered from clinical depression, saying:

“When you start focusing on your breath, and taking the breath into your chest and breathing deeply, you begin to feel the presence of your breath. What comes with that is a feeling of life returning, a feeling of warm that percolates throughout your chest at the beginning, but then throughout your entire body.”

You can also use any of these techniques if you're just feeling mildly depressed or blue.

Because stress is often a trigger for clinical depression, it’s possible that working with your exhalation as described for anxiety rather than your inhalation, could be helpful for you. So don’t hesitate to give it a try if you feel so inclined. As I said in my post Anxiety, Yoga and the Front Body, when it comes to emotional balance, anything that makes you feel better is working.

Stress. Because chronic stress is the result of an overactive sympathetic nervous system, it makes sense to focus on pacifying your nervous system by working with your exhalation as I described for anxiety. However, from my observations of people doing pranayama, some people find any kind of pranayama relaxing (I, myself, do not, by the way). If you do find all breath work relaxing, go ahead and do whichever breath practice quiets your mind and relaxes you. Simply slowing your breath in general, with long, slow inhalations as well as exhalations, could be helpful in reducing stress. Practices where you speed up your breath will no doubt stimulate your nervous system. So if you are doing an active vinyasa practice to burn off your excess energy, end your yoga practice with a calming breath practice or an emotional counter-pose (see Balancing Your Emotional Body With Counter-Poses) that triggers the relaxation response.

Balancing Your Emotional Body With Counter-Poses

by Nina

Last week in my posts about anxiety Anxiety, Yoga and the Front Body and Soothing Yourself With Supported Forward Bends, I discussed yoga poses to rely on when you’re feeling anxious (supported inversions and forward bends) and yoga poses to avoid when you’re in that state (backbends, twists, and Sun Salutations).

It makes sense if you’re in a crisis period to practice the poses that calm you down and avoid stimulating poses that might exacerbate your condition. However, if you’re in a state of chronic anxiety, avoiding backbends, twists, and many of the active poses for a long period of time will move your body toward imbalance. The same is true if your practice is focused on any emotion-based condition, such as agitated depression, clinical depression, or even just chronic stress.

In this case, I feel it is better to return to a more well-rounded yoga practice (see A Week of Yoga Practice) but consider how you end your practices. By choosing an appropriate counter-pose to end your practice, you can counteract any negative emotional effects of your practice without negating the beneficial physical ones. That way, you can move on to the rest of your day with your nervous system and emotions more in balance. Some people with anxiety or agitated depression even find that beginning with a very active practice can help burn off excess energy, which makes the soothing or relaxing counter-poses at the end of the sequence more effective (or even possible, as it can be hard to stay still when you’re feeling very anxious).

My post Yoga and Your Emotions describes the emotional effects different types of poses have on most people. So if you’re interested in practicing for balancing your emotions, take a look at that and consider how a given practice (standing pose, Sun Salutation, twist, backbend, forward bend, restorative) might affect your current emotional state. Then choose one or more counter-poses—especially passive poses that can be held for long periods of time—that you can add on to the end of your practice to counteract the poses that were the main focus of the practice. For example, if you’re already feeling anxious or hyper yet need to practice backbends for the health of your body, you can end your backbend sequence with a long supported inversion, such as a Chair Shoulderstand or Legs Up the Wall pose, to calm yourself down. 

Anxiety and Agitated Depression. We’ve already said that supported inverted poses and supported forward bends are the best poses to counteract anxiety. These may also be helpful for agitated depression as that is anxiety based. So at the end of a more active sequence, try resting in Supported Child’s pose for a few minutes and then practice Legs Up the Wall pose (Viparita Karani) for 10 minutes or more. If Child’s pose is uncomfortable for you or you can’t kneel for some reason, try a Supported Seated Forward Bend with a chair (see Soothing Yourself With Supported Forward Bends), with a straight back. If Legs Up the Wall pose doesn’t work well for you, try Easy Inverted Pose (Featured Pose: Easy Inverted Pose). If having your front body exposed makes you feel vulnerable, try covering yourself with a blanket. 

Clinical Depression. On the other hand, for people who are suffering from clinical depression, forward bends, with their inward turning quality, can cause you to brood. For you, therefore, a couple of mild, active backbends, such as Purvottanasana (Reverse Plank pose) or Bridge pose, would be good counter poses after practicing a forward bend sequence. Generally speaking, an active practice is best for those with clinical depression, especially one that includes backbends, because that helps counteract feelings of lethargy. But if you are tired and want to practice restorative poses, focus on passive backbends rather than forward bending poses, and be sure to end your sequence with a backbending position, rather than a forward bending one. Rather than doing Savasana flat on your back, try doing it with your torso supported by a bolster or stack of blankets, so your chest is open and your back is in a slight backbend. Or, maybe even reverse the typical pattern of a practice, begin your sequence with resting poses and moving slowly onto more active ones so you are left feeling a bit energized. Often I'll end a restorative sequence by standing in Mountain pose and inhaling as I raise my arms overhead into a slight backbend and exhaling as I return my arms to my sides. 

Stress. For people who are suffering from chronic stress, standing poses, Sun Salutations, backbends, and twists can be over stimulating. So try to end a sequence that is focused on any of those types of poses with any long supported inversion, such as Legs Up the Wall pose or Easy Inverted pose, or any restorative pose that you enjoy.

Even a long Savasana of 10 minutes or more, with a mental focus, such as your breath, would be helpful as an emotional counter-pose (see Savasana Variations) or any form of yoga nidra (see Audio Tracks tab above). Stressed out people tend to skip these ending poses because they think they don’t have time and that restorative poses are not “productive.” However, when you’re suffering from chronic stress, the most beneficial practice for you is some type of conscious relaxation (see The Relaxation Response and Yoga). As with anxiety, you may need to first burn off excess energy with a more active practice, but always leave time for conscious relaxation at the end of your sequence.

 I, myself, have been practicing like this for many years, with focused, nervous-system pacifying sequences during particularly challenging times, and balanced sequences with emotional counter-poses the rest of the time. But what if you, like many other people, do not practice often at home and do most of your yoga practice in classes or with videos? In this case, there is no reason why you can’t do just the counter-pose after the class or video. For example, if an evening backbend practice has left you feeling agitated or even just hyper (I can’t tell you how many people have told me that backbends at night cause insomnia), there’s no reason why you can’t just practice a supported inverted pose or conscious relaxation on your own before bed. This will help pacify your nervous system and may even lead to better sleep.

Soothing Yourself with Supported Forward Bends

by Nina

As I discussed yesterday in Anxiety, Yoga and the Front Body, supported forward bends can be wonderfully quieting and soothing. You can use these poses to calm yourself when you’re feeling anxious or to turn inward when you’ve been over-stimulated. However, you do need to set up for them properly. By that I mean that the poses need to be completely comfortable. If they’re not completely comfortable for you, they’re going to be irritating and maybe even aggravating, which defeats the whole purpose of practicing them.

To be comfortable in these poses, you need to:

• Pick the seated position that is best for your body (crossed legs, straight legs or wide angle legs). Experiment and see which of the three poses described below are most effective for you.
• Choose the propping (bolster, pillows, stack of blankets or chair) that is truly comfortable for you. Be honest with yourself about the height you need to be comfortable, rather than imitating a photograph.

Crossed-Legs Forward Bend

If your hips are more flexible than the backs of your legs, you might prefer sitting with crossed legs (Sukasana) as in the following two photos.

Unless you are super flexible, start by sitting with crossed legs on a height, such as a folded blanket, with the bolster, stack of blankets, or chair in front of you. Then, bending from your hip joints without rounding your back, slowly fold forward. When you reach the full extension of your spine, allow your back to gently round as you come down toward the prop. (If rounding irritates your lower back, do the version with the chair and keep your back straight.)

Fold your arms, with elbows out to the sides, and stack your hands on the prop. Then rest your forehead on your hands, gently tugging your forehead skin down towards your eye. Stay for two or three minutes (or longer if it's delicious), switching the cross of your legs half way through.

Straight Legs Forward Bend

If your legs are more flexible than your hips (this is somewhat atypical but some people—like me—have this body type), you might find it easier to do the pose with straight legs (Paschimottanasana), as in the next two photos.

Unless you are super flexible, start by sitting with straight legs on a height, such as a folded blanket, with the bolster, stack of blankets on top of your legs or chair over them. Then, bending from your hip joints without rounding your back, slowly fold forward. When you reach the full extension of your spine, allow your back to gently round as you come down toward the prop. (If rounding irritates your lower back, do the version with the chair and keep your back straight.)

Fold your arms, with elbows out to the sides, and stack your hands on the prop. Then rest your forehead on your hands, gently tugging your forehead skin down towards your eye. Stay for two or three minutes (or longer if it is delicious), keeping your legs lightly active.

Wide Angle Forward Bend

People who are relatively flexible in both the hips and legs often find wide angle legs (Upavistha Konasana) the most comfortable position for a forward bend, as shown in the next two photos. Unless you are super flexible, start by sitting with wide angle legs on a height, such as a folded blanket, with the bolster, stack of blankets, or chair in front of you. Then, bending from your hip joints without rounding your back, slowly fold forward. When you reach the full extension of your spine, allow your back to gently round as you come down toward the prop. (If rounding irritates your lower back, do the version with the chair and keep your back straight.)

Fold your arms, with elbows out to the sides, and stack your hands on the prop. Then rest your forehead on your hands, gently tugging your forehead skin down towards your eye. Stay for two or three minutes (or longer if it is delicious), keeping your legs lightly active.

Sequencing

Of course, there is no reason why you can’t do more than one of these poses or all three. And by doing more than one pose, you’ll increase the quieting effects. If I were to sequence them, I do them as follows:

1. Seated Crossed Legs Forward Bend (Sukasana)
2. Wide Angle Forward Bend (Upavistha Konasana)
3. Straight Legs Forward Bend (Paschimottanasana)

But you can sequence these poses in any way that feels good to you. Before practicing these poses, you might like to do some Reclined Leg Stretches (see Reclined Leg Stretch Sequence) as stretching your legs and hips beforehand can make the forward bends more comfortable. And if your lower back feels irritated after the forward bends, I recommend doing Legs Up the Wall pose (Viparita Karani), with your lower back supported by a bolster (tailbone hanging just off the bolster) as a counter pose. In Viparita Karani, your lower back is in a slight backbend, which will help restore the curve to your lower back, but since the pose is overall a quieting one, it allows you to maintain the quieting effect of your practice.

Finally, some people just do not enjoy the effects of a long forward bend; they find that the poses elicit an unpleasant, heavy feeling that is kind of deadening rather than soothing. If that’s true for you, supported inverted poses (see Just In Time for the Holidays: Inverted Poses) may be better options. Remember, when working with yoga for emotional wellbeing, your own reactions to the poses should be your guide.

Anxiety, Yoga and the Front Body

by Nina

I’m going to be tackling the subject of anxiety in the coming weeks, and I thought that I’d start today by addressing an aspect of yoga for anxiety that is rather, well, subjective. Much of the information we have on the blog is science based, whether we’re citing scientific or medical studies, or exploring anatomy as Baxter did yesterday in Which Way Should Your Shoulder Blades Go?. However, when it comes to the yoga and the emotions, there is very little science that we can turn to for guidance. Fortunately, when working with our emotions, our own experience is key. I mean, with emotions, it’s not like, say, cancer. As Andrew Solomon wrote in his book about depression, The Noonday Demon:

"It is my absolute belief that in the field of depression, there is no such thing as a placebo. If you have cancer and try an exotic treatment and then you think you are better, you may well be wrong. If you have depression and try an exotic treatment and you think you are better, then you are better."

The same is true for anxiety. So for people who are feeling anxious, one strategy is to start taking a look at how certain yoga poses make them feel. And this might lead to the discovery that poses that are generally considered “relaxing,” such as Reclined Cobbler’s pose or Savasana, might actually be increasing your anxiety. That’s because for many people, just lying on your back, with your front body exposed, can make your feel vulnerable. Perhaps this is a primitive, instinctive reaction because we are descending from four-legged animals, and for them lying on the back means taking a submissive position and exposing their vital organs. But who really knows? All I can say is that yoga tradition tells us this reaction is common, and I’ve confirmed this theory with many yoga practitioners who suffer from anxiety. Likewise, opening the front of your body in a backbend or twist is considered stimulating and can therefore also feel agitating and increase your anxiety.

Maybe Not So Relaxing!

So my suggestion is that when you are in a state of high anxiety or are battling chronic anxiety, consider avoiding poses where you are lying on your back or are opening your chest. Definitely avoid active backbends and twists, and consider avoiding even passive, restorative backbends and twists. In general, look to forward bends for soothing and calming effects. Supported Child’s pose is a good option.

Maybe More Relaxing....

Supported seated forward bends with your head and arms resting on a bolster or, if your hamstrings are tight, the seat of a chair, are generally very soothing. But even an active forward bend practice, especially for those who are more flexible, can be quite effective for reducing anxiety.

And instead of doing Savasana, consider doing Crocodile pose. Fold a yoga blanket in a rectangle and place it cross-wise on your mat. Then lie down with your lower belly on the blanket (this reduces the over-curving of your lower back that tends to occur when you lie on your belly). Take your feet slightly apart from each other and fold your arms so your elbows are out to the sides and your forearms are parallel with the front edge of your mat with your hands stacked. Then rest your forehead on your hands, gently tugging your forehead skin down toward your nose (an action that seems to be very calming, who knows why).

If closing your eyes in any of the forward bends or prone poses causes you to brood or worry, let your eyes remain open, with a soft, diffuse gaze.

In the end, always allow your own experiences in these poses to be your guide. What if you find that forward bends and prone poses cause you to feel more anxious rather than less so? In that case, I’d say, by all means, avoid them. And what if you were to say that backbends make you feel less anxious? To that, I’d answer, go for it. Traditionally twists are considered stimulating and potentially agitating, and therefore probably not a good solution for insomnia, but I once had a student who said twists made her sleepy. Hearing her say that was a lesson for me that I keep returning to when I teach yoga for emotional wellbeing.

Living Proof: Increasing Shoulder Flexibility

by Nina

Photo by Erin Collom

Last week, my friend Erin Collom (thank you, Erin!), a Bay Area yoga teacher, took some photographs of me doing some of my favorite stress management and anti-anxiety poses. It was kind of nerve wracking for me because I’ve never been photographed doing yoga before (I’m typically somewhere behind the camera). But I decided we needed an older woman on the blog, and I was the handiest one around, so....

When I saw this photograph of me doing Downward-Facing Dog, I was actually quite pleased. My alignment looks pretty good! Even my shoulders look good, which I wasn’t expecting. A well-balanced Downward-Facing Dog takes flexibility in both the legs (the hamstrings especially) and the shoulders. Back in the day, before I hit menopause, I had a lot of flexibility in both areas (some of it was natural and some of it was earned through consistent practice of the asanas over a period of years). But the hormonal changes brought on by perimenopause and menopause triggered a condition for me called a “frozen shoulder” that drastically limited my range of motion in my shoulder.

“Frozen shoulder (adhesive capsulitis) is stiffness, pain, and limited range of movement in your shoulder that may follow an injury. The tissues around the joint stiffen, scar tissue forms, and shoulder movements become difficult and painful. The condition usually comes on slowly, then goes away slowly over the course of several months or longer.” — from Web MD

The only quibble I have with that definition is that the “stiffness, pain, and limited range of motion” should be more like “extreme stiffness, constant pain, and drastically reduced range of motion”—yes, it’s that bad.  After getting over the first one, which was on my left side, I managed to get one on the right side as well. But through both of those, as painful as it was, I continued to do non-weight bearing shoulder openers to try to prevent the permanent formation of scar tissue and gain back as much of my former range of motion as possible. (I also did strength building, because the arm and shoulder muscles may become withered as a result of the condition.) And after the condition had cleared up, I continued to work with these shoulder openers because I noticed I still did not have the range of motion I had originally and I could actually feel the presence of lingering scar tissue. While I was not necessarily expecting that I would regain what I had lost, I thought it worth trying, and besides, who doesn’t need to keep stretching our shoulders as we go through the aging process?

This photograph made me realize how much I had accomplished. So I thought I’d share my story in the hopes that it would inspire those of you who have or have had a frozen shoulder as well as anyone with tight shoulders who wants to make some changes.

Tomorrow Baxter will be presenting a sequence for tight shoulders. Some of these poses are ones that he teaches on a regular basis. But others are ones that I suggested to him because I had practiced them on a regular basis while my shoulder was “frozen” and painful as well as after the condition cleared up, always holding them for at least 90 seconds. These included the three different versions of hands up/on the wall and the doorknob version of Cobra. So if tight shoulders are a problem for you maybe give these a try. (See Friday Q&A: Tight Shoulders for information about why people have tights shoulders and how it can be a problem in both asanas and everyday life.) I'm living proof that they actually do work!

Supported Forward Bends: Peaceful Poses for Stress, Anxiety, Neck Pain and Headache Prevention

by Nina

We finally took some new photographs, and now I’ve got a portfolio of my favorite poses for stress management and anxiety! So I thought that today I’d introduce you to some of favorite quieting poses: supported forward bends. A supported forward bend is one where you use a prop, such as a bolster, stack of blankets or a chair seat to support your head and arms as you stay in the pose. Relaxing onto the support helps remove straining from the pose and enhances the quieting quality of the forward bend. These are gentle, inward-turning poses that both calming and nurturing.

You can do supported forward bends in two forms: standing and seated. Standing supported forward bends are particularly good for stress as they are partial inversions. See Just in Time for the Holidays: Inverted Poses for information about why inverted poses, including partial inversions, are so beneficial for stress management.

Because the supported seated forward bends are less active than the standing versions, they are more quieting. And because you’re resting the weight of your head and relaxing your neck, these poses may also help with neck pain and headache prevention. I love supported seated forward bends, especially when I’m feeling anxious, however, some people do not enjoy supported seated forward bends, finding them rather too quieting, in other words, sort of deadening. And they’re probably not the right poses for people suffering from depression. So you’ll have to try for yourself and see what you think.

In general, when setting up for these poses, it’s important to be honest with yourself about how many props you need to be truly comfortable. The aim here isn’t to feel a stretch, much less any pain, but to use the pose to quiet yourself physically and emotionally.

As you come into the pose, bend from your hip joints and keep your back straight. This will help prevent back strain that comes from rounding your back. If you need to sit on a folded blanket to encourage the bend from your hips—most of us do—then add that prop as well (see photo).

When you bring your head onto the prop, do not force your head down. If your head doesn’t reach easily, you need a higher prop. For the Standing Forward Bend, you can stack two blocks, with one on the lowest height and the second on the highest. Stacking two blocks end on end, however, is unstable, so be honest with yourself and get your chair! (Besides, if you compare, most chair seats are lower than two blocks end on end, anyway—check it out and see.)

If you want to sequence these poses, I recommend starting with the standing versions first—they are better for warming up your legs and hips, and are more active—and then moving onto the seated ones. Of course, any of these can be done alone, or as part of any restorative or stress management sequence (we’ll have some of those coming in the near future). And there’s no reason at all why you can’t end an active practice with a supported seated forward bend of your choice, followed by Savasana.

1. Standing Forward Bend (Uttanasana), with your head on a block or chair
2. Widespread Standing Forward Bend (Prasarita Padottanasana), with your head on the floor or on a block or chair
3. Wide Angle Pose (Upavista Konasana) or Seated Crossed Legs, with your head on a bolster or chair
4. Seated Forward Bend (Paschimottanasana), with your head on a bolster or chair

I hope these poses bring you peace.

Update: Wondering where those photos are? It turns out, they're not quite ready yet. We took them, but I don't have access to them this afternoon. I'll add them to this post as soon as I get them, so check back again.