Slim Calm Sexy Yoga: 210 Proven Yoga Moves for Mind/Body Bliss

post-workout soreness. The answer was a definitive yes. Because of yoga’s ability to stabilize the joints by strengthening the muscles around them, the concept of yoga therapy is catching on in the United States, where practitioners use yoga to treat patients recovering from sports injuries, surgery, and chronic pain. Patients get one-on-one attention with targeted poses, much as they would with traditional physical therapy. As for yoga helping you bounce back from an injury, there is compelling evidence that it can help relieve chronic conditions like carpal tunnel syndrome, arthritis, and back pain; not so much when it comes to, say, healing a sprained ankle, though.
    I work with a lot of runners, a group in desperate need of yoga. Tight hamstrings, tight hips, and injuries are the natural results of constant pavement pounding. The most common reason I hear from runners for not embracing yoga is that they just don’t have time. That’s no excuse! You need no more than 15 minutes of yoga to reconnect your body with your breath, release tension in tight muscle groups, and focus your mind. And the advantages are too good to ignore: reduced injuries and faster recovery times.

YOGA INTERVENTION

Tiffany West
THE ISSUE: SPORTS INJURIES
    “
Own your practice. The instructor will give you a series of poses, but you’re under no obligation to do them. If you have an injury, tell the teacher before class starts, and he or she will usually suggest a variation that should work better for you. Don’t feel that you have to do what the teacher says if it doesn’t feel right.”
    As a lifelong athlete, 33-year-old Tiffany West has a fierce competitive spirit. It was helpful on the lacrosse field and in the boat she crewed for her high school rowing team.
    Not so much when it forced her to push so hard she wound up injured multiple times, though. “After five foot surgeries, a torn meniscus in each knee, and most recently a herniated disk, I’m pretty limited in the kinds of exercise I can do,” says Tiffany, a global leadership fellow at the World Economic Forum.
    Each stint on the sidelines took an emotional toll. “I was always afraid of losing all my fitness,” she says. So 8 years ago she turned to yoga to stay in shape—and off the injured list. At first it was hard to ditch the athlete’s mindset. “I had to let go of certain desires (’I will do a headstand no matter what’),” she says. But eventually her nopain-no-gain attitude began to soften. “Practicing yoga helped me focus just on myself, rather than on a competitor,” she says. “I’m less hard on myself when I’m on the mat than I ever was in sports. Knees feeling especially creaky today? I back off so they’re not strained. Lower back can’t handle plow pose right now? I’ll try a new pose or a variation instead.”
    For Tiffany, yoga has been the key to finding a healthy balance between challenging herself physically and staying injury-free. “My injuries forced me to reexamine how I view the world, and yoga helped me go from ‘win at all costs’ to a new goal: ‘Enjoy, explore, and learn.’”
    PLAY IT SAFE
    If you’ve been injured, be sure to see a doctor before starting yoga. You really don’t want to push, pull, or bend your body in a way that could aggravate sensitive areas.

YOGA INTERVENTION

Tiffany West
THE ISSUE: SPORTS INJURIES
    “
Own your practice. The instructor will give you a series of poses, but you’re under no obligation to do them. If you have an injury, tell the teacher before class starts, and he or she will usually suggest a variation that should work better for you. Don’t feel that you have to do what the teacher says if it doesn’t feel right.”
    As a lifelong athlete, 33-year-old Tiffany West has a fierce competitive spirit. It was helpful on the lacrosse field and in the boat she crewed for her high school rowing team.
    Not so much when it forced her to push so hard she wound up injured multiple times, though. “After five foot surgeries, a torn meniscus in each knee, and most recently a herniated disk, I’m pretty limited in the kinds of exercise I can do,” says Tiffany, a global leadership fellow at the World Economic Forum.
    Each stint on the sidelines took an emotional toll. “I was always afraid of losing all my fitness,” she says. So 8 years ago she turned to yoga to stay in shape—and off the injured list. At first it was hard to ditch the athlete’s mindset. “I had to let go of