My Favorite Yoga Poses

“Yoga is so universal in its principles and so holistically beneficial, it is possible for any person, young or old, religious or agnostic, to embrace and enjoy a practice.” – Christy Turlington

Ever since I can remember, my grandpa has been a yoga instructor. I used to participate in his classes when I was younger. But as I entered my teen years, I remember thinking that yoga was too boring and slow for my liking. In recent years, I’ve discovered more challenging forms of yoga that are more my style because they have me breaking a sweat, while making me feel long and limber.

I now do yoga a few times a week, and love to practice it on days when I’m feeling sore from my more hardcore workouts. I also enjoy doing a bit of yoga when I wake up feeling sore and stiff, and will do anywhere from 5 to 30 minutes of poses, depending on what I have time for.

The best part about yoga is that it’s meant to be a practice where you embrace your journey in progressing and becoming more flexible, balanced and strong. I usually rep most of the poses out to get my heart rate up a bit, holding the position at the end for a good 15 seconds or so. Here are some of my current favorite yoga poses:

Tree Pose is a good one to start with:

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I always do a bunch of Sun Salutations:

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Camel Pose feels great when I’ve got a sore back:

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I like doing reps of Chair Pose to wake my legs up: 

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Dancer Pose is fun for balance and flexibility:

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I tend to throw some Reverse Triangles in in the midst of my Sun Salutations:

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A fitting name I think, the Warrior 2 pose makes me feel strong and is tough to hold if I have super sore legs:

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And lastly, Warrior 3 is all about concentrating on balancing:

I did some of these poses this morning after I awoke with a funny soreness on the right side of my neck and shoulder for the second day in a row. I felt better initially, but a few hours later, was experiencing a shooting pain from the top of my neck to my shoulder blade whenever I turned my head. It was distracting me from working, and I wound up getting a massage this afternoon in hopes of ironing it out a bit. After cringing in hurts-so-good kind of pain during my hour massage, the area now feels a little better and isn’t quite as tight. I rested it today by doing a strictly lower body workout of cycling 20 miles, and am off to ice it now. Fingers crossed that my tweaking muscles will resolve themselves quickly! 😉