Pose-itively Yoga

06/04/2025

LIGAMENTS ATTACH BONE TO BONE. Tendons attach muscle to bone. Ligaments are how we hold our skeleton together. This is why we pay so much attention to our hands (and feet) in yoga.
I Love anatomy, so I like to talk about it a lot in the classes I teach.
I always mention the tiny little ligaments of the hands (and feet). Every day in yoga, I instruct the yogi's to REACH through their fingertips, SPREAD the fingers wide, PRESS the hands into the mat. PUSH the mat away. HASTA BANDHA, which is the hand lock on the mat.
**The hand lock is crucial to prevent wrist pain or injury. And when or if you fall, you want strong hands and wrists. Make sense? And prayerfully you can fall into a yoga pose.
Example - if you fall out of Standing Bow, then fall into Half Moon or better yet, Chapasana. The last pic below is 'Chapasana' is a pose we do all the time.
***Check out those tiny little ligaments wrapped around each knuckle. Check out the tiny ligaments holding all of the bones together. Then there are the muscles and tendons that make the hands move.
I'll post feet tomorrow. In the meantime, swallow this crazy pill. You must keep your hands strong so you can grab, hold and open jars. We aren't getting any younger. :)

03/14/2025

YOGA! Today was pretty much BIG TWIST FRIDAY. In fact, I think I will change the name of the Friday Slow Flow Vinyasa Class to BIG TWIST FRIDAY.
Our 'peak pose' today was 'Parivrtta Utthita Padangustasana' otherwise known as 'Revolved or Twisted Hand to Big Toe Pose'. We do this pose without the twist all the time (Utthita Padangustasana), but today I took the yogi's through multiple shoulder, trunk, and hip twists to ready themselves for the Parivritta (twisted version) of big toe hold.
This included teaching them a bit about the lungs, how big they are, and those tiny little intercostal muscles between each rib. Multiple twists are important to open up the trunk for this crazy cool twist. One or two twists before this pose is simply not enough, it's a lot of prep, but the yogi's can and will do it, cause their AWESOME!!
Think about how much you twist every single day, including a simple head check when you drive. Twisting poses are super important and are a huge part of our daily practice.

03/07/2025

I talk a lot of anatomy during the yoga classes I teach. I think it's important.
I always mention the bacon strip muscles in our forearms that morph into the tendons that make our fingers move, and those tendons look like fettuccini noodles.
Tendons are fibrous connective tissue and feel like tough asparagus near the bottom of its stem. That's what it felt like to me during gross anatomy class.
In the yoga classes I teach, we do a lot of hand and wrist, toe and ankle poses several times a week. We have to keep that grip strength in-check ya' know. We aren't getting any younger.
I also mention the 'Flexor Retinaculum' a lot, which is the band around the wrist.
This morning I also mentioned the 'itty bitty teensy weensy' ligaments that wrap around the finger bones (phalanges) and hold them together.
Ligaments hold the skeleton together, then the muscles can attach from joint to joint by way of tendons and then we can move our bodies. Cool beans!
We sprain ligaments and strain muscles. A strain/sprain is both.
One more thing, doctor comes from the Latin word - docere and docere means teach.
Doctor means teacher. TEACH!
I told the yogi's I would post some pics today so they could see those bacon strips and all of those tiny ligaments that keep all of the bones in the hands and fingers together. Enjoy!~

02/28/2025

While teaching yoga, I like to throw out a lot of anatomy, over and over and over again. It's important to know why we do the things we do, then we can become more 'intentional'. This morning during 'Slow Flow Vinyasa' while we were in 'paschimottanasana pose' (seated forward fold), which is the same as 'uttansana pose' (standing forward fold), I was explaining about the 'anastomosis of the elbow and knee' as well as the 'circle of willis'. I like to describe anatomy to them like road maps. This morning I explained to them (while in the pose) the anastomosis is like roundabouts that we come to at 4-ways. It's important to know 'your body' better than you know anything else. FUN!!! That fat pad behind your knee, its important to protect the anastomosis around the knee. Same with the elbow. And the brain. There are some words I just like to say - anastomosis, elbow, and paschimottanasana are three (3) of them. Epiphany is another. 🙂 Love is another. 🙂

11/26/2024

08/30/2024

This is a follow-up to the hamstrings info I was talking about this morning during yoga (Slow Flow Vinyasa). There are many reasons why we do what we do, hamstringin’ is one of them. 🎸🎶💪🦵

02/09/2024

Attention Yogi's - I wanted an 828 area code and had to get a whole new phone number. The new number is 828-620-6003

05/04/2023

Thurs. May 4, 2023 - Daily Horoscope for each Sun Sign posted ... today the Moon is in 'hot damn' Scorpio!
https://www.pose-itivelyyoga.com/astrology-and-yoga

04/28/2023

Yoga Teachers . . . Studio Owners . . . on the home page of Pose-itively Yoga you will see the Full Moon and New Moon Astro Memes for 2023. A great resource to schedule your Moon Salutation Classes . . . including the sign that Moon is in, meaning its theme.

04/28/2023

Fri. April 28, 2023 - Daily Horoscopes for 'each sun sign' are here. Save the website to your phone for easy access. I will be updating for the weekend on Friday's. Watch for it.

The way I see it, if so many things that are 'not' yoga, are accepted and coupled with yoga, then why not Astrology? It's older than yoga itself. Our yoga practice is personal and so is our Astrology. On this website, under the AstrologYoga header, you will find asanas for your Sun Sign, as well as....

04/24/2023

Mon. April 24, 2023 - The Pose-itively Yoga is ramping-up during Mercury Retrograde (April 21 - May 14, 2023). The site is already a couple of hundred pages (no kidding), which has set itself to be a wonderful resource for yogi's, trainees, teachers and teachers teachers all over the world.
All levels of yogic study are presented in an easy to access format. The detail and the presentation interweave between the pages so you can see the relationship between each as the oldest studies of health and discipline weave together - Astrology, Ayurveda and Yoga.
The roots of yoga are important, which you will also see presented and woven throughout.
While this website sits at a couple of hundred pages, it's a small example of what it will.
Please use the website and share with others. You can also check your Daily Horoscope.
https://www.pose-itivelyyoga.com/