Victoria Morse has been teaching yoga for the last four years at the Mission Oak Parks and Recreation District in Sacremento, Calif. See her profile on Expert-Village.com

You are increasing your health benefits through meditation by letting go of your stressors. This causes your body fluids to balance and the fixations in the body to return to homeostasis, or a natural state. The meditative part was the main emphasis of the yoga. A yogi would sit and meditated for hours. Over time movements were added, and yoga became a walking meditation or a moving meditation. The focus was then on mind, body, and breathing coming into unification. Today we have more yoga postures to increase that unification.

Yoga is beneficial for stress relief, circulation, and the lymph system. It also enhances breathing and posture. The fitness benefit would be a stretching of the muscles. There are spinal twists which send an energy flow up the spine to the brain. This in turn benefits the organs and glands because of the postures used.

The medical profession is sometime prescribing people to go take a yoga class. They are seeing the benefit of stretches and meditation, and seeing that it retards aging because your muscles are being activated all the time. You are staying in peak performance if you do a yoga practice. People who practice yoga often find that they need their chiropractor less. They can see a great deal of progress in their health with stress reduction and muscle tone. Their breathing becomes calmer, and their life changes, because they become more attuned to breathing, mind, and body. They are less likely to be accident prone and less likely to have immune disorders.


Chapter 2: What are yoga clothes?

People should wear loose-fitting clothes that allow ease of movement, because there will be stretches over the arm, over the head, arm reaches, elongation of the legs, and bending of the knees. People now are trying to vogue by buying yoga outfits like most of the movie people do, but it is not necessary. Stars buy those suits because they are so relaxing and so beneficial to their health. Some suits have become quite stylish and really cute, but they are not necessary for movement.


Chapter 3: Types of yoga

There are many types of yoga, and some will be more active than others.

Some people do what is called Bikram yoga, which is fast-moving and meant to be repetitive so that the person really builds up a sweat. It's usually done in a heated room.

Another kind of yoga is the Hathayoga, which is the basis of most yoga postures. It always includes postures that can be done in a slower mode, and is more the original meditative type of yoga.

There is something called Ashtanga yoga, which is very strength-building. People stay in strong poses for many minutes, which will then improve their stamina. Patanjali is the most well known benefit of practicing Ashtanga yoga. It improves the circulation and creates a calm mind. People with a strong physique want that.

Kundalini yoga creates a very magnificent energy flow using meditation. It is a very positive experience.

Some teachers combine a bit of Pilates with yoga, and call it "Yoga-Pilates." Pilates has to do with breathing differently when you are holding the abdomen and spine tight, whereas the ancient yogic movements released the belly so that you were not holding your breath. That is the core difference. The yogis wanted to meditate, and the Pilates people wanted to help dancers tone their bodies.

Power yoga is a name for taking yoga in the gym. Yoga is being taught now in gyms and has doubled their enrollment. It is for young people who want to stay tough. A lot of times, only women did yoga. Now guys get into it, because they like to call it power yoga for stronger people. I see no harm in it, but it was not the original intent. The original intent was for you to go into your center of peace. Power yoga is taking you right back in to the stress world.


Chapter 4: Choosing a yoga instructor

Choosing the right instructor depends upon your motive in selecting a type of yoga class. If you wish to do it for exercise purposes, to lose weight, to become more healthful, or to be toned, you are going to select the teacher who relates to you and a class that will interest you.

The first question to ask the teacher is whether he or she is credentialed. The next questions are ones you ask yourself: "Is this teacher benefiting me," and, "Is this what I expected from the class?" Usually studios allow a free trial class so people can come in and see if it is going to suit them.


Chapter 5: How does yoga meditation work?

Meditation usually follows the yoga class. I don't believe this is done at the studio per se. The original purpose of yoga was to exercise to free the body of all complaints and whining, and then once it was relaxed, one could sit down and meditate. The yoga done at a Nunda, which is where I was credentialed, does their yoga class and then has a silent period for 10 or 20 minutes. You simply sit cross-legged with your eyes closed. Believe me, it is the most refreshing process! You just feel like you are a whole new person. We don't do that enough in today's age. In my classes, we take what we call a Shavasana, which is where you lay on your back during the middle of the class to take a couple of minutes of silence to breathe. We try to put a little meditative time between some of the heavier moves. I prefer to teach this where the people can come into a class, never having had yoga, and get a quality kind of experience at a low cost.


Chapter 6: Yoga positions

One of the most common poses has a hard name: Trikonasana, which is a Hindu word, is the triangle-pose. For the triangle pose, you would be standing with straight legs. You would be turning one foot to the left, the other foot at a 45 degree angle and would feel an alignment with the back arch. The arms are out to the side and you have a lifted pelvic wall. You would turn your head to look over the extended arm and reach isometrically up from the upper shoulder and then pinwheel the arm down the inside the thigh and slide down towards the knee. Some people go straight down to the floor with this pose and their right arm up in the sky, so you are effectively standing in a triangle. In some types of classes, you will hold that pose for long periods. I don't do that. We stay there until we feel the energy flowing through the arm conduit, then I let them either come back up or reach the arm out and over to swoop themselves back to an upright position. Then we do it all again on the other side.

Another common pose is the warrior position. The reason for the word warrior is that we are competing with ourselves rather than with each other. The concept of the warrior is that I am strong and I am magnificent. I am focused in mind, body, and breath in this present moment. You can see how this would benefit over time if you are doing this at every class. It brings you into that concept that you are together. We have a warrior 1 and a warrior 2. Warrior 1 is in that same triangle shape. Your arms are pulled up overhead, and you are looking at the point between the eyebrows. For the warrior 2, the arms come down to either side. You can find a picture of this in just about any yoga magazine.

Another pose would be the bridge pose where you would be supine on the floor, with your knees bent, covered in double V, and your hands down by your hips. You lift the buttocks up so that you are making a bridge out of your spine. It is called Setu Bandhasana and is another Hindu name.

Downward facing dog is also a very common pose. Mukha is the hare pose, and Sashankasana where you are leaning forward, is a child's pose. Another is a camel pose called Ushtrasana where you are on your knees and look like you are doing a back bend when your head goes back, and you are pushing up towards the ceiling.


Chapter 7: What are the risks of practicing pregnancy yoga?

Many people can practice yoga throughout pregnancy if they are in a class that is appropriate for them. Many studios teach a special class for women who are pregnant.

There are some contraindications from regular yoga class for a pregnant person. They should not put their head down in the downward facing dog position, and there are some positions, like twisting positions, that would be too much for them. The body lock should not be practiced by pregnant woman or those with heart problems or high blood pressure. While you are doing the body lock, or a very tight twist, you don't want to cut off the flow of prana (or energy) to the baby.


Chapter 8: Is yoga a good exercise for children?

Yes. One class that some studios offer is yoga for mommy and me which allows a child to partner with their mother. Yoga is coming more and more into schools as well so that children can calm down and stress less. It is simply a breathing and relaxation exercise that moves the focus back to the center of the body rather than the hyperactivity.


Chapter 9: Can you use yoga for weight loss?

Yoga affects weight loss because breathing and exercise together can raise the metabolism. If your metabolism is ebbing, you'll find it difficult to lose weight. Metabolism is at its peak when we do the breathing inconsonance with the mood and with the yoga postures. Not only that, but the stretches elongate the muscles and tighten the abs. We get rid of excess flab through toning. With the twists, of course, you are going to lose flab from your waist. You are going to keep yourself toned. Through meditation, you will become aware of the needs of your mind and will begin to want to eat appropriately.

The Bikram yoga style is probably the best for weight loss, but people who are heavy that can't really do that. They would probably do better in a traditional Hathayoga class and then build up. They could start with a chair yoga class, which is gentler on them, and begin doing twists from the chair before going to the floor and reaching up. They begin gently and go to the standing. They need to shop around for a teacher who will take their time with them.


Chapter 10: What kind of music is appropriate for yoga?

It depends on the yoga style. Some people want drumbeats when they are teaching something hard like Ashtanga. I prefer piano and music that is slightly classical and slow. I like to start off with a drumbeat called yoga rhythms. We can start ourselves breathing and waking up with energizing exercises before we go into stretches with piano music. I also like to include quite a bit of violin and flute in there, and then I'll come back with a soft drumbeat.


Chapter 11: What is the price of a yoga class?

The price varies by instructor and by studio. Some are $10 per class. For some you'll pay $60 for a series of classes. Some places say it is $6 if you pre-pay or $14 for walk-ins or something like that. Mine are $18 a month for four weeks. That's at a public recreation center, and I know it's very low, but my classes are pretty full.

Some people think I might not be a good teacher at so low cost, but parks and recreation places pay by numbers. When you go to a yoga lounge or private studio, you will pay more. I do better, because I can have 40 people in my class and get a percentage of that without the costs of owning my own studio.


Chapter 12: How can yoga benefit athletes?

When we begin to honor the body's movement, we are training the body to jump into sports. With tennis, for example, you would get a spinal twist where you are holding the racket straight and then need to turn the body. Yoga-Pilates will also flex the belly much like if you were going to play basketball. When you lift your arms up, you have to pull the tummy in when you are lifting up to make the basket. I once knew of a class in California called yoga basketball, because you need durability in your running and moving. You need to use proper placement of the hip to make the basket instead of throwing yourself to one side or twisting your spine. You should keep yourself in a straight spinal position while you are dribbling. When your neck is in alignment with your spine, you can more easily make the basket.