Anatomy for Yoga; click to view Uttanasana Spread

McGraw-Hill Publishing was kind enough to send me their latest yoga book to review. Anatomy for Yoga: An Illustrated Guide to Your Muscles in Action, by Nicky Jenkins and Leigh Brandon, is a helpful guide to a personalized yoga practice. The authors provide an overview of yoga anatomy, including terminology, main systems, and breathing. They also review meditation and the chakra (or “subtle”) system, and how it might affect your physical systems.

From there, they identify four major postural types: kyphosis (round shoulders), lordosis (overarched lower back), flat back, and swayback (hips forward). Each type has a few possible causes; you might have a head-forward posture because of your computer setup, the sports you play, or the emotions trapped in the chest.

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Visvamitrasana, from Yoga Journal

From Tara Glazier, at Abhaya Yoga:

Student: Why do I feel like I’m pulling my shoulder out if its socket? [in Visvamitrasana]

Tara: You might be!

This wake-up call drew a big round of laughter from the class. It’s easy to forget that the asanas are serious challenges for the body. (She went on to explain that we need to draw the shoulder strongly back into its socket to counteract the force of the leg.)

I’m still chewing on an idea from yoga this morning, a delicious treat. Even better than weekend pastries.

Tara Glazier, the owner of Abhaya Yoga in Dumbo, was teaching us the concept of arm spirals. (It’s an alignment refinement she said she just figured out last week, after 10 years of practice.) We would internally rotate the arms, rounding the shoulders, to feel the width across the upper back, the spreading between the shoulder blades, and the expansion of the breath in the back of the body.

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I just went to a new (for me) class (at Greenhouse) and loved it. Even though I had decided to do a Pilates routine today so I could work more, the teacher’s bio won me over:

Molly’s yoga class is known for it’s [sic] intelligent Hatha flow in a vigorous and dynamic style that heals, balances, and promotes adventure in the way of transgressing personal boundaries. Using precision in asana (physical postures), pranayama (breathing techniques) and practive [sic] as well as the tools to develp [sic] an individual connection to the art of yoga. Classes are paced moderately and are designed with modifications for all levels and abilities. Molly is inspired by the teachings of Tantra, and infuses these teachings into her classes. “When we change the way we look at things; the things we look at change.”

She was calm and well-paced and had a lot of unusual alignment instructions (engage the spinal extensors in Warrior III; shoulders over the elbows in Dolphin). She said she studies with Irene Dowd at Julliard, who teaches anatomy for dance, which sometimes conflicts with the specifics of yoga alignment but is often better at getting the general direction across. For example, “drop your shoulders” might make students collapse through the whole chest.

Turns out this was Molly’s last class at Greenhouse; her school schedule has changed so she has to drop that class for now. I’m so glad I went. This is kind of the whole feeling behind this site, that your brain and habits will talk you out of so many things so stop thinking and go now!

(She’s also at The Well, a new-ish Pilates studio at 25 Broadway, at Wythe.)