HEAL YOUR KNEES (posted July 14)
Did you know that the knees are the largest joints in the body & sometimes the most vulnerable to injury? Many people bow the lower legs outward so the knees & thighs angle inward which eventually causes pain in the knees & hips. Collapsed arches in the feet & the toes pointed outward are also injurious, as well as ‘slumping’—putting more weight on one side of the body. How can you resist the discomfort & pain due to these imbalances, exaggerated stress, and ‘wearing down’ of these precious joints?
Here is how: Stabilize & align the knees so they are safe in all kinds of movements & positions!
Try this posture. Stand with your feet parallel (middle of the ankle to the 2nd toe mound), balance the weight on the 4 corners of the feet (mound of the big toe, inner heel, mound of the little toe & outer heel), raise & spread your toes. In order to stabilize & firm your lower legs toward the midline of your body: Bend your knees, placing your hands on the large side of the calves. Isometrically, press the side of your calves without moving the feet or knees. You will feel the thighs widen. Now, you are in alignment, because you can trace a plumb line from your ankle to the hip joint. These stabilizing actions release energy you can feel & accelerate your circulation through the joints! These actions also help to realign the hips & sacroiliac joint.
Now, check to see that you are not hyper-extending your knees. Take a breath & soften! These poses can be done standing & seated. Be precise & take your time & Breathe!
YOUR FABULOUS FEET!!!
Do your feet feel tired after shopping? Have you sprained your ankle on a hike? Do you or a family member have plantar fasciitis? Do you want a pedicure so someone can massage your feet? Are you wearing socks to hide bunions? Do you feel off balance sometimes? If you answered ‘yes’ to any of these questions, read on! YOU can support the healing of your feet, feel great and be more energetic too!
Try this exercise: While standing, walk in place for a minute and then stop—-Look at your feet! Are they parallel & are you stable on the 4 corners of your feet? Press on the big toe mound, inner heel, little toe mound & outer heel. Be precise. Now lift & spread your toes. Look— you have an arch & are stimulating the blood flow & circulation to your foundation! Practice walking with your feet parallel—all the time! Might feel weird but it works!!!
Sounds too simple, you think. One of my students just sprained her ankle. After performing these exercises, her sprain was healed immediately!
Another student had plantar faciitis for 10 months. A combination of foot massage, ice, letting her feet breathe & the actions described brought almost total relief after less than 2 weeks!
After my 82 year old student focused on the 4 corners of his feet, keeping them parallel while walking, he forgot his cane—-for good!
You can facilitate lifting & spreading your toes by using a pedicure guard or Kleenex in between your toes. It is easy to do at home while reading or watching a movie.
Please remember to practice your breathing. The breath keeps the energy flowing for your Vitality!
Your feet are not only your foundation for maintaining balance, stability, agility & flexibility. They also have a direct correlation with your knees and hips. More discussion about this correlation in the weeks ahead.
The Breath
Do you run out of breath on your way upstairs? Hiking one of your gorgeous trails, are you always stopping to catch your breath? Do you realize that you sometimes hold your breath too long? The Breath can support you while you work, garden, play, etc. Perhaps ‘How to Breathe’ should have been one of your elementary school courses. But, like me, if it was not, begin right now. Enjoy this course—It is for Life!
Sit in a straight back chair with your feet parallel on the floor, butt back & shoulders back, the blades flat on your back. Move your chin back keeping the curve in the back of your neck. Relax your jaw. Feel from the top of your head down to your sitting bones a natural alignment & gently close your eyes.
Inhale & exhale in your own rhythm. Take your attention to the back of your heart, keeping the shoulders back lengthen your spine, stretching upward. Go to the top of your brain, inhale, & exhale down to your feet. Observe the space within you: how the air moves into & around your organs. When you are aligned, your breath will create room for your systems. Perhaps there is a muscle or organ that has been an issue. For example, you have a ‘knot’ in the middle of your back. Exhale, concentrating on that knot until it releases—It Will! You can even open the esophagus with your breath to help heal the digestive system—Try it!
Now, go have Fun! Garden, pick mushrooms, or take a hike…& Remember to breathe!
Yoga for the Athlete
Teaching hatha yoga to the athlete is a special educational process. By definition, an athlete is a skilled & physically powerful individual who uses his muscles and ligaments in order to achieve maximum & victorious success. Using his endurance and vitality, he strives to attain a great performance.
For this athlete to execute stronger & more vigorous results, I use several components of hatha yoga which coincide with the Anusara Universal Principles of Alignment created by John Friend. (www.anusara.com)
1. The Breath
2. Core conditioning with ‘effortless effort’
3. Expansive flexibility
4. Stability combined with Focus & Patience
5. ‘Going for the Gold’
Visualization & Relaxation for balance, as the athlete exerts more concentration & intensity, is also an important facet of this teaching.
The athlete will discover more and more energetic reserves because he learns to utilize his organic body, to rejuvenate & vivify the power of the kidneys, the lungs & the heart, for example.
How are you challenged as a high-performance athlete?
HEALING THROUGH YOGA
WhenI told one of my students that I was writing a ‘yoga tips’ weekly, she suggested a title more in keeping with what you are all seeking & I am teaching—-feeling good, revitalized, with clarity in your daily living.
Knowing how to stand for hours in the kitchen cooking & NOT get a pain in your lower back; sitting in a long movie without leg compression & a pain in your neck; driving and arriving feeling good instead of (b.y.=before yoga) stiff as a board, crooked & hurting!!! Gardening; keeping up with your kids on those hikes, ‘up the stairs’ & out of breath, etc…You get the picture—LIFE can be challenging—off the mat!
Yoga & breathing techniques, visualization, postures assist the body, emotions, & mind in finding it’s natural healthy place: its optimal alignment & energetic reserves. You can incorporate these same principles, attitudes & actions for your own wellness.
Yoga therapeutics may help improve your balance, range of motion and flexibility; strengthen injured muscles, and diminish—even abolish—pain.. Yoga therapy may be integrated with traditional health care such as cardiology, orthopedics, sports medicine, osteopathy, physical therapy, chiropractics, gynecology, oncology or other health and wellness modalities as the patient & physician desire.
Next week’s Tip for Daily Living—How to use your Breath to heal
Amy Kraft is an Anusara-Inspired™ Yoga Teacher , Yoga Alliance® Registered Yoga Teacher (RYT® 200) designated teacher with thirty-five years yoga experience. Helping people through Yoga is her passion! Amy teaches yoga as a therapy in the Bitterroot Valley of Montana.
406-546-6922 or email : amykrft@yahoo.com
Pierre—My student who teaches me about Fear!
I teach students from all over the world—-What a wonderful life I have!!!
My student, Pierre, teaches me lots about living Life to its fullest!
2 years ago he recovered from throat cancer. Last year, while riding his bike, a deer unexpectedly crossed the road, and Pierre flew over the handlebars & broke his neck!
6 months later, he is standing on his head because that is what he wanted to accomplish! Not an easy task!
Yes, Pierre was physically prepared to do this inversion with the Anusara Universal Principles of Alignment but that bugaboo ‘fear’ kept haunting him—the ‘what ifs’ of twisting & falling & cracking cervical vertibrae & what about his torn rotator cuff & hurting wrist & more…Each week he practiced moving his arm bones back, opening his heart & keeping his throat open with the hyoid bone open & back— in line with the dens— which is between c 1 & c2—Feeling the top of his brain aligned with his sitting bones—All 6’6” of him!!!
He did many shoulder openers and felt the scar tissue give way to a freedom not felt for so many years…He put his head on the floor nestled in his clasped hands and pushed himself up to a downward dog variation. He practiced lunges and Warrior 2, using his quads, hamstrings & inner thighs. His confidence grew!
When he was ready, he used the wall to support himself, and stood on his head—-He came down with Joy & radiant self-assurance. I was in Heaven!
How have you tackled ‘fear’? Is there a yoga pose that you want to do, but ‘fear’ stops you? Write to me about it!
HEALING YOGA off the Mat with Amy
Feeling good off the mat is really where I want to Be — living Fully. I am absolutely passionate about my yoga practice and the Doing of yoga asanas—the postures—-which make me feel so alive and strong and flexible! When I am home in the beautiful Bitterroot Valley, Montana, I adore stretching and posing overlooking the pastures, my horse Milla & her playdate, Butterfly. Standing in Mountain pose & looking at the regal Bitterroots & shining Sapphires—now, that is REAL! Tree pose with the pine and ash staring back at me ….Balancing is a blast!
However, knowing how to stand for hours in the kitchen cooking for a crowd & Not get a pain in my lower back. Sitting in a long movie without leg compression & a pain in my neck. Driving for hours—-I live in the mountains—-and arriving feeling real good instead of (b.y.=before yoga) stiff as a board, crooked & hurting!!! Gardening, hiking with the kids, etc…You get the picture—LIFE can be challenging—off the mat.
Yet, living Anusara’s Universal Principles of Alignment off the mat is a Blessing!
Thank you, John, and much gratitude to all my amazing teachers and students—-You educate me HUGE!!
I would love to hear some stories from you about how yoga helps you live off the mat!
Therapeutic Yoga for My Mom…and Yours She is my Mom—almost 88 & doing her yoga poses every day. YES—every day with focus, clarity, & a smile. Very inspiring!!! And this is a woman who was 5’4” and is now 5’1”—-Lots of back & neck pain through the years (b.y.=before yoga!) A while back, she called me and said that her ankle hurt and her doctor told her to stay off her feet. I suggested that she ‘lift & spread her toes’. ‘It’s uncomfortable’, she said. ‘Lift & spread your toes’, I answered. A couple of hours later she called me back. ‘How are you’ I asked. ‘My ankle does not hurt anymore she said, but I cannot speak with you now; I am doing my yoga practice!’ I am blessed to be able to teach therapeutic yoga to my Mom. Write to me about doing yoga with your family!
Sciatica had ‘done me in’. Five summers ago, it hurt to lift & carry a plate of food across the lawn. I am a yoga teacher in so much pain—This picture does not compute!!! So, I began to practice what I was instructing my students and consciously embodied the Anusara Universal Principles of Alignment (UPAs) every day. Two weeks later I was doing backbends & handstands. I have not had sciatica since Anusara yoga, nor have my students! Here are the UPAs ( as taught by John Friend) with my ‘spin’: 1. Set the Foundation & Open to Grace with the breath: ; Check the 4 corners of your feet & spread your toes; Inner body bright; Side body long, from your waist to under your armpits; Head of the arm bones back 2. Muscular Energy: Hug in to your midline (from the periphery of your body to the focal point)—focal point in standing & sitting poses is the core of your pelvis. 3. Inner Spiral: Expansion. The action is thighs back and sitting bones wide and apart 4. Outer Spiral: Contraction. The action is to root down the tailbone. (You can feel a lift to your belly button) 5. Organic Energy: Shine out from the focal point to the periphery! And SMILE! Try the Anusara Universal Principles of Alignment and write me how you feel!
Welcome to Amy Kraft’s Healing Yoga blog. This column will focus on the use of Therapeutic Yoga techniques. The use of Yoga does not heal the body, rather it assists the body in finding it’s natural healthy place. In addition, this blog will show you how you can incorporate some of these same principles in your own search for optimal health and wellness.
A Little History:
Amy Kraft is an Anusara-Inspired™ Yoga Teacher and Educator, Yoga Alliance® Registered Yoga Teacher (RYT® 200) designated teacher with thirty-five years yoga experience. Member International Association of Yoga Therapists. Helping people through Yoga is her passion. She travels the U.S., Canada and the world spreading her message that Yoga can help anyone who wishes optimum health, no matter what the health challenges may be. In addition, Amy integrates Yoga Therapy with traditional and alternative treatment modalities, working closely with physicians, physical therapists and other health providers as her students desire.
Amy Kraft was a pioneer in integrating Yoga into other life activities. She continues to offer retreats and workshops where ever the need is. This could be at the IDEAL-Spring International Foundation home in the beautiful Bitterroot Valley of western Montana or any location in the U.S. and Canada.
Anyone searching for wellness in any or all areas of life are in for a real treat with Amy’s entrance to the world of blogging. Her writing is moving as she tells stories of the people she’s helped. The stories are genuine. I know this, because I am one of her stories. And so is my husband. We were skeptical at first that Yoga could make a difference in our lives, but quickly became believers as we began reaping the health benefits. We breathe easier, stand taller, have greater strength and flexibility. And pain relief through Yoga is real.
To find out more about Amy and her healing Yoga Therapy, go to her web site: www.yogaontheroad.com There are a couple great retreats coming up in June and July. The June 26-27 retreat, “Giving Birth to a New Consciousness:
Exploring Your Personal History & Your Family Tree” with Dr. Alexandre Velik looks to be especially interesting and there are a few spaces left, so if discovering how your family history affects your life choices, behaviors and relationships, check out the link on the web site and get signed up right away.
The next post here will be from Amy herself. I invite you to post your questions for Amy on how Yoga Therapy can help you or someone you know in the comments.
To your good health!
Karen T. McCormick
