Insomnia? Get Rid Of It

Rid yourself of insomnia with this calming pose sequence.
By Nora Isaacs
Before Bedtime




Uttanasana (Standing Forward Bend), supported
Benefit Quiets the nervous system.
Fold one or more blankets and place them on a chair so they cover the entire width of the seat. Stand facing the chair in Tadasana (Mountain Pose). On an inhalation, reach your arms up overhead and lengthen your spine. Exhale and fold forward until your forehead rests on the blankets. Rest your arms, including your elbows, on the blankets so they do not slide off when you relax them completely. Stay here for 3 to 5 minutes or as long as you're comfortable. Inhale as you come out of the pose.




2:1 Ujjayi Pranayama (Victorious Breath)
Benefit Calms the nervous system.
Come to a comfortable seated position and breathe normally. Start Ujjayi breath on an exhalation: With your mouth closed, slightly close the root of your throat as though you were whispering and exhale for 2 counts. You should hear a smooth, audible sound (akin to the ocean, the wind in the trees, or even Darth Vader) coming from deep in your throat as you breathe out. Release the restriction in your throat and inhale normally for 1 count. As you become more adept, increase the counts to any ratio of 2:1, such as 4 counts exhaling to 2 counts inhaling or 6 counts exhaling to 3 counts inhaling. Do this breath for 3 to 5 minutes, followed by 10 to 15 minutes of meditation.




Viparita Karani (Legs-up-the-Wall Pose)
Benefit Triggers relaxation response, slowing heart, breath, and brain waves.
Bring a folded blanket or a bolster about 6 inches away from a wall (or farther away if your hamstrings are tight). Sit sideways on the support, with the right side of your body against the wall. On an exhalation, slowly turn to your right, lowering your shoulders down to the floor as you swing your legs up the wall. Adjust yourself so that your sitting bones drop down slightly between the support and the wall, the back of your pelvis rests on the bolster, and your shoulders rest on the ground. Bring your arms into a position that supports the opening of the front of your chest, whether out to your sides or reaching overhead on the floor. Relax your legs, face, and jaw. Stay here for 5 to 15 minutes. To come out, slide back off the support, turn to the side, and stay here for a few breaths before sitting up. You can do this right before bed or earlier in the evening. Make sure you don't fall asleep in the pose; save your sleep for when you are in bed.

Sleep Soundly




Side Sleeping
Benefits Helps keep spine aligned and reduces snoring.
Get into bed and turn to one side. Put a pillow between your knees and another under your head for support. Your head pillow should be just high enough to prevent your neck from side bending up or down; your whole spine should be straight when viewed from the side. Draw your bottom elbow and shoulder forward far enough so you do not lie directly on your arm. Optionally, place a third pillow in front of you and support one or both hands on it.




Zero-Point Release
Benefit Releases craniosacral tension.
Caution Don't use this position if you are prone to snoring or sleep apnea.
Lie on your back in Savasana (Corpse Pose). Bring your hands behind your head with the right hand touching the back of the head and the left hand on top of the right. The hands should be underneath the occipital ridge (the prominence at the base of the skull). Allow your elbows to rest on the bed and let your neck release into your hands so that your head is in slight traction. This is a great position to fall asleep in, although you don't want to stay here all night with pressure on your hands and your shoulders stretching upward.

Upon Awakening



Ardha Adho Mukha Svanasana (Half Downward-Facing Dog)
Benefits Alerts the mind, stretches the back and legs, and relieves shoulder tension.
Stand at the side of your bed, with your palms resting on the bed. Step back, one foot at a time, so that the arms remain straight and the spine elongates as in a regular Downward-Facing Dog. Adjust your feet so that you feel you are getting a nice stretch through your shoulders, hips, and hamstrings. As you breathe, draw your hips away from your head and let your head gently descend between your arms. Stay here for 10 breaths.



Lunge
Benefits Stretches the hip flexors and abdomen, opens the chest, and awakens the cardiovascular system.
From Half Downward Dog, come into a lunge by bringing your right foot forward between your arms, bending the right knee and keeping the left leg straight behind you. Try to keep the back heel on the floor. On an inhalation, bring the arms out to your sides and up overhead, lengthening the spine. On an exhalation, bring your hands back to the bed. Return to the Half Dog, then repeat the lunge on the other side. Do this sequence several times until you feel invigorated.



Side Twist Benefits Invigorates the body and gets the blood flowing.
Sit sideways in a chair, with the right side of your body alongside the back of the chair. On an inhalation, lengthen the spine. On a soft exhalation, twist to the right, bringing both hands to the back of the chair. Relax your right shoulder and make sure you aren't cranking your neck so that it's uncomfortable. On each inhalation, lengthen the spine, and on each exhalation, deepen the twist. Stay here for 10 breaths. Release back to center, then sit with the left side of your body alongside the chairback and repeat to the other side.

Nora Isaacs is a freelance writer and the author of Women in Overdrive: Find Balance and Overcome Burnout at Any Age. She tries to get eight hours of sleep at her home in California.

Neck Issue

Changing how your head sits on top of your spine can reduce back and neck pain, improve your posture, and revolutionize the way you breathe.
By Richard Rosen

Look around the next time you venture out to the movies or the grocery store, or any place crowds of people congregate. You don't need to be a trained yoga teacher to recognize that most of the heads around you don't seem to be screwed on quite right to their respective bodies.

Most of us don't know what to do with our heads—how to hold and move them properly—not only in asanas but in our daily lives. We tend to carry our heads to a greater or lesser degree forward of the spine, a symptom of the widespread afflictions of stress and poor posture. The ideal upright head is physically neutral, perched lightly atop the atlas (the aptly named first cervical vertebra) and supported by the underlying column of bones and minimal muscular effort in the back of the neck and shoulders.

Along with this bare-bones support, the head is also sustained energetically by what I call the root of the neck. You won't find this root in any anatomy book. Like the roots of the arms and legs, the root of the neck is imaginary—but the image can be of immense practical use and can have profound therapeutic benefits.

You might suppose that the root of the neck is located where the base of the neck joins the top of the shoulders; in fact, it's farther down the spine, at the lower tips of the shoulder blades and behind the heart center, where you'll also find the roots of the arms. A neutral head is anchored deep in the upper back through this neck root, and all of its movements—whether forward (into flexion), backward (into extension), or to the side—are initiated from and flow out of this source.

A forward head, by contrast, hangs rootlessly off the front spine. This disrupts the spine's naturally sinuous curves and wreaks havoc with the muscles of the neck and shoulders as they struggle to keep the head's weight upright. This leads to a mixed bag of bothersome aches and pains in the head, neck, and back; reduced neck and shoulder mobility; and breathing limitations. Young children are usually cited by posture and movement experts as having a healthy, neutral head position, leaving us adults to ponder how we ever managed to end up as such slouches. However, we can be comforted by the knowledge that somewhere deep inside our bodies, the memory of this harmonious alignment of head and spine survives and can be recovered.

Your head may be the last thing you think about as you assume the various yoga postures, but it shouldn't be. For the successful practice of yoga—not only asana but also pranayama and meditation—it's crucial to cultivate awareness of the root of the neck. Misalignment of your head in a posture can result in unbalanced loading on the cervical spine and strain in the neck and shoulder muscles. You can protect your neck first by learning how to find its root and arrange your head in a neutral position. Once you've got your neck in neutral, then you can add movement—twisting and turning, flexing or extending your neck to complete a pose. (In this article, we'll discuss only extension and flexion; rotation is considerably trickier to describe and to perform from the neck root.)

Down to the Root
To get a feel for both a rootless forward head and a properly rooted, neutral neck, pair up with a friend who practices yoga, so that you both see and can talk with each other about what you're observing and feeling. To start, have your friend sit "normally" in a comfortable position, then sit to one side so you can observe her in profile.
First, look at the center of her shoulder joint. If you're not quite sure where that is, have your friend slowly swing her arm back and forth a few times, like a pendulum. The center of the joint is right at the pivot point of this swinging motion. Then determine where the opening to your partner's ear canal is situated relative to the center of the shoulder joint. For many people, the ear canal will be ahead of the shoulder joint. If it is (and there's no guarantee that it will be, so you may need to look at another friend), you may notice some of the classic signs of a forward head: the relative shortness of the nape, lifted and rounded shoulders, and a pointy, Wicked Witch of the West chin.

Next, have your friend carefully extend her neck and head as if she were moving into a backbend like Ustrasana (Camel Pose), and note what happens. Typically, the base of the skull jams down onto the nape; the chin pokes even more sharply upward, hardening the throat, tongue, and soft palate; and the shoulders turtle toward the ears. Your friend will likely look as if she is wincing from a loud noise.

Finally, have your partner carefully flex her neck and head, lowering—but not forcing—her chin toward her sternum, and again note what happens. Usually, the habitually tense nape muscles refuse to elongate, the shoulders curve forward, and the chest sinks away from the chin. Your friend—and you—should file away all of these actions for future reference. You may want to change places with her so she can give you the same once-over.


Put It in Neutral
When you understand what a forward head looks and feels like, you can begin to gain an appreciation for a neutral head. Start by sitting behind your partner, pressing and spreading your palms against her shoulder blades and drawing them lightly downward. Remember that the action of neutralizing the head and then moving it (in any direction) is triggered from the neck root, and the root itself is galvanized by firming the scapulas into the back torso and descending them toward the tailbone. Make sure that your friend does not "help" the movement of the scapulas by poking her lower front ribs forward. Your hands on her back can gently remind her to lengthen her neck and lift the crown of her head.
Once the neck root is activated, two imaginary (or energetic) channels flow out of it. One streams vertically upward along the front spine, through the brain, to finally press against the cranial vault. To sense this channel, lengthen your neck and align your head by pushing up from the neck root below, rather than imagining that the head is being pulled up from above.

The second energetic channel climbs diagonally from the root through the chest and pushes the top of the sternum, called the manubrium—which is just below the small depression at the base of the throat—straight up toward what I call the crook of the throat, where the front of the throat joins the underside of the chin. Whenever you work with the sternum, it's important to distinguish between the manubrium and the bottom of the sternum, which is called the xiphoid. When instructed to lift the chest, we tend to shove the xiphoid forward, making the front ribs protrude and squeezing the lower back. A better, more balanced action for the spine is to elevate the manubrium as you release the xiphoid toward your navel.

Return to your friend's side now to bring these two channels to life. Hook the fingertips of one hand underneath the center of the base of her skull, in the middle of the back of the head-you should be able to feel a bump there, called the occipital protuberance, or inion. Lay the fingertips of your other hand on her manubrium and gently lift her skull away from the nape while pressing her manubrium up toward the throat crook and encouraging her to release her nape down toward her tailbone. There may be a tendency for the pressure on the inion to move the head forward—especially if you are pushing too hard—however, continuing to move the scapulas down the back counteracts this. Traditional yoga posits a mystical "third eye" on the forehead between the eyebrows; in this exercise, your friend can imagine there's a fourth eye on the back of her head, widening in wonder and delight as you spread the inion and nape apart.

At first, you might feel some resistance. Don't respond by pulling harder; any show of force will just make the neck muscles contract more stubbornly. Instead, apply gentle but persistent upward pressure to the skull. Eventually, the tensed muscles will give up, at least somewhat, and then you will see—and your friend will experience—a remarkable transformation: Her head will float up and back like a balloon; her chest will bloom open, freeing the breath in the heart and upper lungs; and the curves of her spine will gratefully lengthen.

Once you have brought the neck into a more neutral position, tip your friend's head slightly back, then slightly forward. In extension, a neutral head cascades back from the neck root, so the upper back and neck make one graceful arch, the throat crook stays soft, and the fourth eye opens. In flexion, the manubrium is first boosted from below by the scapulas to provide a nesting spot for the chin. Then the nape reaches out of its root and the chin pivots over the deep throat crook, snuggling comfortably down onto the manubrium.

The Taste of Freedom
Of course, soon after you let go of your friend's head (and she yours) it will likely slide forward—don't expect miracles. But you and your friend have laid the foundation and have had the tantalizing taste of freedom in the neck and head. Next, you need to learn to neutralize and move your head from the neck root in poses without the help of a partner.
Start with postures that require a neutral head. There are plenty of these poses, but choose something simple like Dandasana (Staff Pose) or Tadasana (Mountain Pose), the jumping-off points for other seated forward bends and standing poses, respectively.

If your head and neck still feel a little rootless, and you are not quite ready to practice without support, you can replace your yoga friend with a wall. Start by standing with your back torso against the wall (and your heels an inch or two away from it) and leaning into the wall so that it firms your scapulas against your back. From here, you can do various things with your hands and arms to intensify your awareness of the neck root and its two channels. For example, you might press your fingertips against the wall at the level of your hips and push the wall toward the floor; these actions help deepen and descend the scapulas to clarify the neck root. Alternatively, you could rest the fingertips of one hand on the top of the sternum, those of the other hand on the inion, and play with sensing the energetic channels.

In any case, adjust your head so it is close to the wall but not touching—that would bring your head too far back and give you, I suppose, a backward head. Stay for a couple of minutes to fix this position in your awareness, then step away from the wall and stand in Tadasana for a while longer, enjoying your newfound neutrality.

Back on the Mat
For your next several asana sessions, whether in class or at home, keep your head in this neutral, Tadasana-like position in whatever poses you're practicing. You might discover that this is quite challenging. You can have your teacher eyeball your head position in, say, Trikonasana (Triangle Pose) and help you make needed adjustments with verbal cues. When your neck root is primed and ready, add some easy extension and flexion poses to your practice. There are many extended-neck asanas in yoga, like Virabhadrasana I (Warrior Pose I) and the baby backbends, such as Bhujangasana (Cobra Pose) or Ustrasana.
Flexed-neck postures are much rarer. You'll need flexion mostly for Sarvangasana (Shoulderstand) and Setu Bandha Sarvangasana (Bridge Pose) and its variations—and for asanas like Ardha Navasana (Half Boat Pose) and Paripurna Navasana (Full Boat Pose). You will also need it in your pranayama practice for Jalandhara Bandha, one of yoga's three essential locks (bandhas).

Much of the value of an asana practice is in its enrichment of the quality of your daily life. Once you leave yoga class, you can apply the lessons of your vastly improved head-and-neck relationship to whatever you do. Over time, you'll feel lighter and taller—you may even be taller—and your head and neck will be more integrated with the rest of you, making for a happier body and a calmer mind.

Contributing Editor Richard Rosen teaches yoga in Berkeley and Oakland, California.

Feng Shui Your Bedroom

Feng Shui Your Bedroom

If insomnia is a problem, don't overlook the décor of your bedroom. Ideally, your bedroom should be restful and not used for anything but sex and sleep. Banish all paperwork and the television to other rooms, keeping clutter to a minimum. Get the sleep of your dreams with these simple feng shui tips for your bedroom.

Furniture, plants, and other objects should never loom or hang over the bed; they can threaten your subconscious mind. Plants should also be alive and green, not dry (suggesting death or morbidity) or spiky (threatening).

As for the bed, place it so your head is either facing north or east—experts disagree on which is best—in a spot where you will not be startled if a family member enters. And don't let junk accumulate under the bed. It can disturb the flow of chi (energy) and affect your sleep.

Color is important. Best is pale pink, peach, or lavender if you are healthy, but pale green or blue if you've been ill or low in energy. Avoid bright colors and busy patterns.

It is also recommended that natural—not synthetic—sheets, blankets, and pillows, the right room temperature, good air circulation, and few mirrors, which create cacophonous visual images.

Rather than a loud, buzzing alarm, greet the morning with Zen chimes, Tibetan bells, chirping birds, relaxing music, an energizing mist of peppermint oil, or a light that brightens gradually to imitate the rising sun.



Gentle Nighttime Routine

Whether it's breathing to slow the heart rate or massage to calm the mind, a simple yogic routine can be effective for a better night's sleep. The next time you have trouble sleeping, follow these simple steps, and observe their soothing wonders:

Know your timing. Institute a regular bedtime; maintaining consistency will help keep your circadian rhythms—the biological changes that happen every 24 hours—steady. Eventually, your body will naturally understand and crave sleep during these hours.

Create a wind-down period. Create space between your busy day and sleep time. Honor your time at home and play relaxing music, or light candles. Think of the yoga precept of pratyahara: Withdraw your senses in order to turn inward.

Strike a pose. Notice how you feel before doing a nighttime yoga routine. Are you wired or tired? If you're amped up, do poses like twists or standing poses to burn off excess energy. If you're tired, do some restorative poses or breathing until you feel more refreshed.

Get warm. Remember to stay toasty while practicing your nighttime poses—have a blanket, socks, and a sweater nearby. Drink a warm cup of herbal tea or take a bath based on your dosha.

Jaggery to substitue white sugar

Jaggery satisfies your sweet tooth without the chemicals found in processed sugar.
By Tamara Schryve
Americans consume an average of 152 pounds of sugar a year-an increase of 30 pounds compared to two decades ago, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Processing refined sugar from sugar cane, though, often includes the use of harsh chemicals, such as sulfur dioxide, phosphoric acid, and bleaching agents, that strip it of vitamins, minerals, and phytonutrients, leaving what nutritionists refer to as "empty calories."

Yet not all sweeteners are nutritional duds. For those reluctant to surrender their sweet tooth, there is a healthier alternative: jaggery, a staple in many Eastern diets that is used to sweeten foods like rice pudding, hot coconut milk, and vegetarian curries.

Jaggery comes from either the sap of sugar cane or palm trees, and its flavor is described as an aromatic blend between brown sugar and molasses with fermented or wine undertones. But what makes jaggery superior to regular sugar is the way it's made.

Because it is processed without the use of chemicals, jaggery retains many vital vitamins and minerals, such as calcium, phosphorus, magnesium, and potassium. In fact, jaggery has a mineral content approximately 50 times greater than refined sugar and five times more than brown sugar. Just a teaspoon of jaggery delivers approximately 3-5 mg of calcium, 3-5 mg phosphorous, 6 mg magnesium, and 45 mg of potassium. It sells in most East Indian markets in a spreadable form called gur, or as a grainy, brown, coffee can-shaped chunk. Jaggery can be used in practically any food or beverage where you might want to add a few spoonfuls of sugar. You can grate or cut jaggery into small pieces and add it to cereal or coffee; gur can be used on bread and other baked items. Jaggery can also be chopped up and dissolved in water to form a syrup to sweeten custards, rice, or even poured over ice cream. You can substitute jaggery for granulated white sugar in many recipes-you will need to use about one-and-a-half times the amount of jaggery to achieve the equivalent level of sweetness.

Jaggery's health benefits even go beyond the kitchen. It has long been observed that people who work in highly toxic surroundings and regularly consume jaggery, such as industrial workers in dusty or smoky environments, have little or no bronchial or lung discomfort. And a study in Environmental Health Perspectives (1994: 211-214) reported that jaggery reduced the number of lesions formed in rats' lungs infiltrated with coal and silica dust.

Revamp Your Diet- Ayurvedic Way

The food we eat has a direct result on our health and our emotional life. Sometimes even when we maintain a generally healthy diet, we can hurt ourselves in other ways. For instance, when we feel tired we reach for caffeine or sugar to "pick up" our mood. But these substances often create "crashes" that leave us feeling worse than we did to begin with.

Once again, yoga can help. The next time you need a pick-me-up, don't automatically reach for that dietary crutch. Instead, try a natural stimulant, like a quick walk in the sunshine, some deep breaths of fresh air, or your favorite yoga pose. Your favorite breath technique (pranayama) can also help oxygenate—and wake up—your body and mind.


Researchers point to nutritional imbalances as a possible cause of chronic fatigue syndrome. Many CFS patients find they are sensitive to foods and drinks they were once able to tolerate. They may also find that a variety of foods and food additives—caffeine, alcohol, chocolate, dairy products, and dyes, among other things—trigger CFS symptoms.

Ayurvedic practitioners go one step further, suggesting that by making food choices in the Ayurvedic tradition, CFS sufferers can find greater relief. Robert Svoboda, an Ayurvedic physician, says Ayurvedic dietary changes help restore energy, and he advises people with CFS to eat a vata-controlling diet. "They need to drink soup and eat food that's very mild—not too hot, not too cold," he says. "It should be spiced, but mildly spiced. Also, they should not consume anything that's cold, especially cold water and ice cream. They should drink hot water only." He also recommends a diet low in protein, because protein demands great quantities of energy to digest and produces heaps of nitrogenous wastes. "You want a small amount of protein and a balance of carbohydrates and fats all cooked into one soup or a juicy one-pot meal, so your organism doesn't require a lot of energy to digest."

Svoboda also recommends avoiding foods that contain caffeine or concentrated sugars. "These are so concentrated that they cause your system to go into a tizzy, overreact, and make the fatigue worse."

Moon Salutation

Om Sue: Moon salutation:]
The Chandra Namaskara, Moon Salutation, has the opposite effect on your body than the Sun Salutation. It is meant to soothe and calm your body. Moon salutations are excellent to perform in the evening to get a good nights sleep after a buzy and stressful day. In Ayurveda the fiery and easily irritated PITTA types benefit enormously from doing the moon salutations.

This moon salutation pacifies the Pitta dosha. Poses focused on cleansing the liver, spleen, kidney and small intestines to hold the Pitta diseases away.


Moon Salutations are a soothing yet empowering variation and counterbalance to classical Sun Salutations (Surya Namaskar). They allow us to honor the yin or feminine side of our energy, in contrast to the Sun Salutations, which are more yang, or masculine, in nature. A resurgence of the Moon Salutation is part of the rediscovery of the divine feminine at this important time in our evolution. However, moon salutations are not just for women! Men can reconnect, realign and cool-down fiery impulses through Moon Salutations. Moon salutations can shift energy without increasing heat in the body and tend to be less stimulating than Sun Salutations, thereby balancing hot emotions, relaxing and calming the mind and body and restoring balance.

The Yoga Moon Salutation is both ancient and modern. The moon is of particular importance in Hatha Yoga. The word Hatha is broken down as "Ha" meaning "sun" and "Tha" meaning "moon." Traditional Sun Salutations enhance our inner fire and strengthen us as we prepare for life's obstacles, while the Moon Salutations cool us as we prepare for our journey of descent; going inward, uncovering our wisdom, creativity, balance and inherent intelligence, hence opening the path for enlightenment. (The practice of Hatha Yoga brings unity between the two opposites; aggression and retreat).

The Sun Salutations are designed to allow us to connect to the sun's powerful energy and are often practiced at dawn. The amazing Moon Salutations are not just for full moon practice and are for any time of day, but are especially beneficial when performed in the evening as the series of poses is designed to calm the mind and relax the body.

These are the asanas for the Yoga Moon Salutation:

Prayer Pose - palms together overhead
Crescent Moon Pose - arching to the left
Goddess Pose - squat, arms at sides in an L-shape, palms forward
Transition Pose - star pose, the body is like a 5-pointed star
Triangle Pose - extending to the left, right arm up
Head to knee - left leg
Lunge to the left
Forward Facing Lunge - right leg extended
Squat Pose - Malasana, hands in prayer position
Forward Facing Lunge - left leg extended
Lunge to the right
Head to Knee - right leg
Triangle Pose - extending to the right, left arm up
Transition Pose - star pose
Goddess Pose
Crescent Moon Pose - arching to the right
Return to Prayer Pose - palms together overhead


The diagram below from Laura Cornell, PhD, shows the sequence of Chandra Namaskar; 16 asanas that constitute the Yoga Moon Salutation.












Why not give the Moon Salutation a try? You can practice it in a flowing manner, following your breath or hold each posture for a number of breaths (3-5).

* Note: Coming into each pose, focus on lengthening the spine first in order to create space between the vertebrae, making it easier to side bend without compressing the intervertebral discs.

Is Sun Salutation suitable for Evening Time?

By Tracey Rich
Should my nighttime practice consist of restorative poses only, or is it OK to do Sun Salutations in the evening?


A nighttime practice helps us to slow down, focus inward, and transition from day to night. Unwinding and releasing the musculature through asanas can relieve the accrual of tension and the compression that gravity brings. The disks of the spine are rehydrated through the intentional stretching and twisting of various asanas.

An evening practice could consist of pranayama or restorative poses. It could also include a very quiet, intuitive posture flow where the breath guides and inspires you to move according to the "body's speaking." For example, you can let the breath help you define the feeling of a tight shoulder and then—just as you do in a spontaneous morning stretch lying in bed—explore various movements that feel good and affect the shoulder area, eventually releasing the stiffness. These moves can be classical asanas or simply innate movements.

The Sun Salutations, beautiful vinyasa sequences that can be done alone or as complements to a larger practice, are also appropriate poses to do before bed. Even though they are often used to energize and warm the body, they can be practiced in a way that relaxes and recharges the body instead of raising energy.

The 12-position Sun Salutation is a wonderful evening flow sequence. Practice Sun Salutations with Anjaneyasana (Crescent Moon Pose), stepping back into Plank and then Asthanga Pranam (Eight-Pointed Bow or Knees-Chest-Chin) and moving up into Bhujangasana (Cobra).

The willowy sway of the opening standing back arch, the waterfall feeling of riding your breath into Uttanasana, the slow and elegant stretch into the lunges, and the snaking move into Bhujangasana can all be enjoyed in a languorous motion. This series of Sun Salutations, coupled with some long forward-folding gentle twists, and a half or full Sarvangasana (Shoulderstand), can be a wonderful end-of-the day or pre-bedtime repertoire.

So my answer is yes, it's fine to practice Sun Salutations in the evening. The outcome of our practice is predicated on how it is approached; the beauty of yoga is in its malleability.

Tracey Rich is a director of the White Lotus Foundation in Santa Barbara, California. Visit www.whitelotus.org.