The Minimalist Yogi

I believe that every morning has so much potential; early morning is a powerful and sacred time for personal ritual and practice that can carry you through your whole day. But also, a good nigh sleep makes for the best mornings; when I am well rested I feel that I am more in tuned with the start of the day, more grounded and connected.  Establishing a morning ritual, or routine can make each  morning less unpleasant and more exciting, over time and slowly these practices  can become ingrain. Every morning I like to dedicate at least 6 10 minutes to  yoga, depending on the day I am leaving the house be it at 5:30 am or 7am, I  modify the sequence to accommodate for the day. On days where my morning starts  at 4:50 am I dedicate at least 5-6 minutes of morning to a Surya Namaskara A  and B, or a simple flow that integrates it simple sun salutation. Whereas, on  days where I have leave late in the morning I dedicate at least ...

Exploring this flow for while now, I've done some version of it, but still not completely satisfied, but here is a version I've done yesterday. Majority of this flow consists of hip openers which has a lot of benefits. According to San Francisco vinyasa teacher Stephanie Snyder we hold stress and negative emotions—such as fear, guilt, and sadness—in our pelvis. For this reason alone, Snyder believes it’s particularly important to do poses that move prana (life force) through  that area.  But before going ahead trying the flow few things to keep in mind, take your time with opening your hips, because hip ligaments are strong, and DON'T PUSH yourself. Be aware of your breathing and and your knees. If you have any knee issues like I do modify the poses, props to help you as you can see that I use a yoga block while doing the split to protect my knees. Lastly, before starting you might be a little tense depending on when was your last practice, so lubricate your join...

What Are you up to this weekend? This weekend I have nothing big planned besides helping a friend in his political campaign, doing some schoolwork that I’ve been avoiding all week, and getting some fun reading time.   Recently, I tried to re-read Michael Pollan’s The Omnivore's Dilemma for the second time, but I could not bring myself to actually finish the book. This is my second time attempting to read the book, but finding myself completely bored and uninterested. So I’ve decided to go with another book that I’ve been meaning to read for while now; Samuel Huntington “The Clash of Civilizations.” Even though the reading is somewhat heavy and some may even consider boring, I have to say I am enjoying, perhaps it’s my boring personality that’s enjoying it. The author provides an interest perspective into Post- Cold War world, and what we could expect in the future in regards to war; strongly recommend reading it. Apart from reading and canvassing, I’ll be seeing an ol...