When stress consumes your day, finding time to relax becomes integral for work-life-balance – and generally keeping sane! Consider doing some yoga poses!

---

The piles of paperwork, deadlines to beat, meetings to attend, traffic to cope with and many other stressors take a toll on the body.

Here are some home tips for seeking a little peace in the physical, mental and spiritual discipline of yoga. With deep breathing patterns and body poses, yoga can do wonders for your body and it’s been known to put your mind in state of tranquility.

Try these six poses at home to keep you calm, grounded, and yes, sane.

Butterfly

1. Sit with your spine straight and with your legs straight out in front of you.
2. Be sure the your soles meet by bringing your feet in.
3. Hold your feet in with your hands and elbows resting on your thighs.
4. Bring your feet in a few inches from your pelvis and slowly lean forward.
5. Relax your body as comfortably as you can.
6. Repeat daily. A good stretch opens and stretches our hips, hamstrings and glutes and improves flexibility in the groin and hip region. It enhances intestine and bowel movement, removes fatigue from long hours of standing and walking and provides relief from menstrual discomfort and menopause symptoms.

Mountain pose

1. Stand up straight with your feet together, evenly distributing your weight on the ground.
2. Spread your toes out like a fan.
3. Tighten your thighs to lift your kneecaps.
4. Move your thighs back and tailbone in
5. Straighten the arms, palms facing in.
6. Pull your shoulder blades back and lift the chest.
7. Keep your neck and shoulders relaxed.
8. Look straight ahead.
9. Repeat daily. This pose helps you keep in focus and places responsiveness on your feet for good grounding creating a space within the body. The space allows your internal organs to function more efficiently and thereby improve your respiration, digestion and circulation.

Supine Spinal Twist

1. Come to lie on your back.
2. Bring your knees to your chest.
3. Extend your left leg out back to the floor.
4. Shift your hips slightly to the right.
5. Use your left hand to guide the right knee over to the left side of your body towards the floor on your left.
6. Make sure your body is still in a straight line from your left foot up to the crown of your head, and look over to the right if this feels good to you.
7. Relax here for a minute or longer until you feel your body easing deeper into the pose.
8. Hold 5 to 10 breaths before drawing your right knee back into your chest. Repeat on the other side.
9. Repeat daily. This position stretches and relaxes the spine and glutes that can help relieve back pain.

Tree

1. From Mountain pose, bring your hands to your heart center.
2. Stare at a focal point that does not move, and shift your weight onto one leg.
3. Bring your opposite foot onto the standing leg’s ankle, leg or thigh (not the knee).
4. Make sure that your hips are level. Keep the hands at your heart center or reach them overhead if you feel like a little challenge.
5. Reach down through your foot and up through your hands for strength and balance.
6. Repeat daily. It strengthens thighs, calves, ankles, and spine; and stretches the groins and inner thighs, chest and shoulders. Tree is an excellent stabilizer for the mind.

Child’s pose

1. Get on hands and knees.
2. Knees hip distance apart. Feet together.
3. Lean back and sit on your heels.
4. Extend arms and torso forward.
5. Rest your forehead on the floor.
6. Stretch arms out in front of you.
7. Press palms into floor and butt into heels.
8. Stretch out your back. Relax your neck.
9. Repeat daily. This position is another brain-calming pose that calms your nerves, lowers blood pressure, Releases tension in neck, back, shoulders.

Chest Expansion

1. Standing in Mountain pose (standing with hips width apart at the front of your yoga mat and hands by your sides).
2. Reach your palms towards one another behind your body.
3. If possible, interlace your hands and pull your shoulders back gently.
4. Stay here, or bend your knees a little to hinge the hips into a forward bend, resting your belly on your thighs.
5. Raise your hands up towards the sky while keeping your shoulders back.
6. Stay here and breathe into the pose.
7. Repeat daily. Chest expansion is an excellent pose for relaxation as it realigns the spine while allowing you to stay still, breathe, and allow blood to flow easily to the brain.

These do-it-at-home poses are easy and comfortable for beginner and advanced students. If this is your first time to try yoga and have decided that you are falling in love with it, check out available books, DVDs and applications you can use for guide and inspiration! 🙂