#elementsofasana

[yoginiinprogress]

Breathing in progress and practice 💗 breath is so important and keeping it steady throughout the flow is a challenge. I know that you can't hear, but I was focusing on that heavily here. Speed up 2x for Instagram.

[yoginiinprogress]

Ujjayi breathing is something that I know little about thanks to meditation. In college I was lucky enough to meet a woman who truly inspired me like no one else ever has. She gave us the gift of meditation, and we got to experience a course with an instructor who taught us the art. I guess I never knew the proper name of this breathing technique, and maybe it wasn’t necessarily mentioned, but it is in use all the same. I find it to be difficult sometimes to set aside time to meditate, but I believe that meditation is something that can be used all throughout life even in the loudest, busiest, or strangest places including yoga practice (not that it is loud or busy, but sometimes tiring on the body). Practicing this breathing in yoga is a way to essentially meditate as it is a focus point to remain calm, take things slowly, and flow naturally. It is beautiful. And I tend to struggle with it, especially because sometimes oddly enough my body naturally wants to hold its breath through certain poses, so I find myself focusing to keep my breath going and not allow for that to happen.

[yoginiinprogress]

Tree pose, Vrksasana <3

I think this is a posture where it can be easy to do and not necessarily think of the mechanics. The goal here is to work on not “popping” the outer hip and forcing all of the weight there, but rather making sure to activate the outer hip to pull it back towards neutral and evenly disperse the weight this way :)

[yoginiinprogress]

Side plank (Vasisthasana)  + a varition 

Working on so many things in this posture; focusing on engaging the outer hip as well as keeping the core activated to keep the hips lifted. Still so difficult, but it is funny actually seeing myself in the photo because it seems so much more successful than it ever actually feels while doing it :p working on my side is always a constant goal for me to one day feel strong and maybe even able to do it with ease :) maybe <3

[yoginiinprogress]

Okay loves, finally playing catch up on posting these and finishing this challenge *tear* #elementsofasana

Here is my cow faced pose, or Gomukhasana, utilizing the inner and outer rotation in the arms. So difficult for me! This is another pose that I can only do on this side :p the other side I can barely grasp my two arms together. But this pose had never really been broken down for me, and knowing the mechanics is important for sure. <3

[yoginiinprogress]

The element of moving the shoulder blades down the back :).

This is the only way that I could think of to show this, and I am super grateful for the focus because this is yet again something that I have never really thought of, even though I do it often and in so many postures :p learning <3

[yoginiinprogress]

Side angle, or Utthita Parsvakonasana :)

The element here is a straight spine. “No matter what the rest of the body is doing, we try to recreate that same tall, straight spine (as in mountain pose).”

This is a pose that I can only do on one side :p. When I try from the other side, I tend to feel like it’s harder to not collapse my side too much, and also have a harder time keeping my body in a straight line.

Works in progress <3