News — yoga

Spinning and twirling helps with balance.

Have you ever noticed how much fun children have spinning around and around and around?  I remember growing up, my friends and I loved going in circles and making ourselves silly dizzy.  Even some adults still like to twirl.  Look at the Olympics for example.  We are always amazed at the power, focus, and balance that figure skaters have when they spin at amazing speeds.

I heard recently that spinning is good for a child.  I mentioned it to a father at the park, and he responded: "Yes, I heard it was good, too."  So, when I got home I did a bit of research and found out that yes, it is in fact good for you in some respects, but it can also be  (that's why our body sometimes tells us to stop by causing us to get nauseous).  Here are a few tips that I found from the website www.asensorylife.com  and thought I'd share. 

• Spinning needs to be controlled, supervised, and monitored with our children who have sensory differences and SPD (sensory processing disorder)
• Teach your child to spin no more than 10 times in one direction at 1 spin per second...then stop briefly, then spin the other direction
• For those children who do not get dizzy, encourage spinning in prone extension (on tummy) to help the brain learn to register the feeling of rotary input, along with following the two items above
• Spinning is incredibly powerful and the brain may need a long time to process the input
• Swinging in linear planes in prone extension and full body flexion are so much more important and beneficial for the brain in regards to the power sensation of vestibular input.  Focus more on this type of swinging rather than so much spinning.

No, no, no...I'm not talking about yoga as an Olympic category.  I'm talking about the many athletes, including the Olympians who include yoga and meditation in their lives.  I was recently reading an articles in the Wall Street Journal, and came across many similarities among the athletes in the Olympics this year.  Besides eating healthy and training, a lot of them practice yoga and meditation.  For example, Elena Hight who is a professional snowboarder, says that she stays mentally focused and prepared by meditating on a daily basis.  She does it almost every morning and every evening.  She's also been doing yoga for quite some time.  All of this helps her keep a clear mind and stay calm throughout an event and life in general.  Then there's Jamie Anderson, another snowboarder who calms herself the night before a race by incorporating meditation and yoga.

Whether you are an athlete, Olympian, or just plain Jane or Joe; yoga and meditation can do wonders to your body and soul.  It's not a religion, but a way of life. 

Try it, be open-minded,  and enjoy. 

I discovered that yoga is alive and well in Taiwan.

Last year, my husband, daughter, and I spent a year in Taiwan. My husband and I were teaching English to Taiwanese students, while my daughter learned Mandarin at a small school up in the mountains. Now, when I say that we were teaching English, I mean that we were teaching English as a completely foreign language....not a second language. In other words, everything had to be translated and learned. Chinese characters had to be translated into letters, letter sounds had to be learned, and sometimes-actually a lot of times-things were lost in translation, because some things just couldn't be translated word for word.

Well, while I was teaching words such as lion and mouse, and sentences such as: "I can help you," I came up with this idea to teach the English words while doing yoga. Why hadn't I thought about this before? The children ages 8-12 really got into it. At first, they were a teensy bit shy, but when they realized that they could move around rather than all sit at their desks in rows, they were pumped up. They learned the word elephant, by getting into elephant pose, sucking up pretend water, and hosing down their friends with the water. When things got crazy, I had them get into mouse pose. They learned the phrase "quiet as a mouse" in a friendly, peaceful way.

Sometimes I think about the pros and cons of being a child these days.  Naturally, pros and cons can be different for every individual.  For me, the pros are more choices.  Kids these days can do almost anything. The sky is not even the limit.  There are choices about what to have for lunch, or what school they want to go to.  For some people this may seem more complicated and overwhelming, and perhaps it is.  That's why it's so important these days to enjoy each moment and be more mindful of the present.  "Yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery, and today is the present.  That's why we call it a gift" (Chinese Proverb)

In yoga, we end the day with "Savasana."  It's a little yoga nap where we just lie down, relax, and focus on the present.  It's probably one of the more requested parts of yoga (by both kids and adults), and it not only relaxes you, but energizes you in a way that makes you feel new. 

Whether you do yoga or not, you can still practice this sort of meditation.  It only takes about 10 minutes of resting your body and clearing your mind of any thoughts that are negative or too busy.  Lie down on the grass, snow, sand, on a mat or board, or wherever...as long as it's safe. Inhale and exhale deep breaths and just think about 10 things that you are happy and thankful about.

Enjoy.