Half-Moon Pose

When I start a yoga class, I usually make sure that the room is clean, the floor is ideally a hardwood floor and there should be bathrooms nearby that are also clean.   Lights that dim are also ideal so I can create a soulful class and really make the mood quite serene.  I usually start the class off by telling students what props they need.  I then let them know to turn their cell phone off and to have a bottle of water nearby.

I then usually start with some simple warm-ups.  Most yoga classes start off with some kind of silent meditation which I would ideally like to do.  Since students often come later and it is incredibly disruptive to come to the meditation part of the class late, I usually have the meditation part about 10 minutes into the class or at the end of the class.  It always angers me (even though I am in a yoga class) when people come in late during meditation.  Most of the people that come in late don’t even have the courtesy to not set up during the meditation but they are just fumbling around noisily when I am trying to find some inner peace.

Ideas for Yoga Sequences such as sun salutations

Ideas for Yoga Sequences

After the warm-ups,   I have various ideas for yoga sequences which usually are something that is seated on the floor to warm up the mid-section, I do some poses on the floor to warm up shoulders, hips, hamstrings, low back and to stretch out and elongate the spine.  They usually consist of seated forward bends, side bends or a cat and cow flow that ends with a child’s pose.

After some seated postures, we then transition to some standing postures such as mountain pose, warrior pose, down dog, triangle,  standing forward bend and side angle.  Since I teach gentle beginner yoga classes I don’t do a lot of sun salutations.  If I do teach any kind of sun salutations it is usually a modified version with a chair to support such as hands on top of the chair for down dog or you can also you the wall with your hands up against it for down dog.  For a modified warrior, you can do that against the wall with a block between your knee and the wall which makes it much easier.

Then we will do some balancing poses and I love doing half moon pose against the wall with a block.  Even yoga newbies and those with physical limitations can do this challenging pose using a block and a wall and it really builds confidence.  Sometimes I will do tree pose or occasionally dancer pose but always against the wall so that everyone can do it even if they don’t have very good balance and focus.

Sometimes we will do some poses in a chair depending on the athletic ability of the class.  You can do lots of traditional poses with a chair such as down dog, side angle, hamstring stretches, standing wide legged forward bend, seated arms stretches,  eagle pose and even thread the needle.

Then we transition to the mat and we do some poses such as twists, bridge pose or we grab a strap and do some hamstring and abductor and aductor stretches.

I almost always finish with a restorative pose such as legs up the wall or legs up the chair.  You can also roll up a yoga mat and lay your spine on top of it for a nice and gentle shoulder opener. If I have a lot of props I will put them in other poses such as goddess pose.

I then finish the class with a controlled breathing exercise and meditation.

Warrior Pose

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