Nintendo’s new Wii Fit has been said to be causing a selection of strain injuries, from minor lower back pain to carpal tunnel syndrome.
Nintendo’s Wii Fit is an exercise system. Players stand on a small pad and are guided through repetitive exercises. These exercises run the range  from track and field to hula hoop, and can be just as vigorous as the exercises they’re mimicking.

I have spoken to a range of people that use the Wii Fit and outline that they often feel out of breath after a play. Just like real exercises, these can lead to various kinds of physical discomforts such as sore joints and strained ligaments. Many users have said that they experienced lower back pain after yoga and hula hooping.

Nintendo’s Wii System has been the subject of controversy since its inception, initially stemming from its innovative Wiimote controllers. The Wiimotes, when not strapped to the wrist properly, have a nasty tendency to fly out of player’s hands and damage friends, family or televisions.

When faced with mounting damages following the initial Wiimote fiascoes, Nintendo introduced a warning screen before each game and warns users to make sure their wrist  straps are fastened.

I have also heard users mention that the initial Body Test used by Wii Fit uses the Body Mass Index (BMI) which is all very good and all but it doesn’t cope well with people who actually have a high muscle density. I have heard stories of people who have high muscle density being catagorised as being overweight. It seems like it can all get a little bit confusing.

It has been said that these Wii Fit injuries are on the increase and I am hearing more about them in my everyday. What do you think of the Wii Fit? Let us know any of your positive/negative experiences?

This weeks asana is the boat to get your core muscles working. If it gets your wobble on after a while then don’t worry it’s only your muscles showing you that they are working. Why not give it a go and get your wobble on?

1.Sit on the floor with your legs straight in front of you. Press your hands on the floor a little behind your hips, fingers pointing toward the feet, and strengthen the arms. Lift through the top of the sternum and lean back slightly. As you do this make sure your back doesn’t round; continue to lengthen the front of your torso between the pubis and top sternum. Sit on the “tripod” of your two sitting bones and tailbone.

2.Exhale and bend your knees, then lift your feet off the floor, so that the thighs are angled about 45-50 degrees relative to the floor. Lengthen your tailbone into the floor and lift your pubis toward your navel. If possible, slowly straighten your knees, raising the tips of your toes slightly above the level of your eyes. If this isn’t possible remain with your knees bent, perhaps lifting the shins parallel to the floor.

3.Stretch your arms alongside the legs, parallel to each other and the floor. Spread the shoulder blades across your back and reach strongly out through the fingers. If this isn’t possible, keep the hands on the floor beside your hips or hold on to the backs of your thighs.

4. While the lower belly should be firm, it shouldn’t get hard and thick. Try to keep the lower belly relatively flat. Press the heads of the thigh bones toward the floor to help anchor the pose and lift the top sternum. Breathe easily. Tip the chin slightly toward the sternum so the base of the skull lifts lightly away from the back of the neck.

5. At first stay in the pose for 10-20 seconds. Gradually increase the time of your stay to 1 minute. Release the legs with an exhalation and sit upright on an inhalation.

We are all reminded to keep our breath flowing throughout our practice, this is the foundation to our practice. I have heard many people  mention that  theycan’t help but steer away from the importance of their breath when they are wrapped in a pretzel style yoga pose, think eagle pose with eagle arms. Take a look below for extra inspiration for different types of breathing.

Upper-Chest Breathing Lie on your back, placing one hand on your upper chest and the other on your abdomen. If the hand on your chest moves as you breathe but the one on the abdomen does not, you’re definitely a chest-breather. Anything more than slight movement in the chest is a sign of inefficient breathing.

Shallow Breathing Lie on your back and place your hands around your lower ribs. You should feel an effortless expansion of the lower ribs on the breath in and a slow recoil on the breath out. If your ribs remain motionless, your breathing is too shallow, even if your belly moves.

Overbreathing Lie down and take a few minutes to let your body establish its relaxed breathing rate. Then count the length of your next exhalation and compare it to the length of the following inhalation. The exhalation should be slightly longer. If not, you are an overbreather. As a second test, try to shorten your inhalation. If that causes distress you are probably an overbreather. Because it is easy to manipulate the outcome of these two tests, you may want someone else to count for you at a time when you are not paying attention to your breath.

Holding the breath Holding one’s breath after inhaling may be the most common poor breathing habit. To determine if you do this, pay attention to the transition from inhalation to exhalation. A breath-holder usually feels a “catch” and may actually struggle to initiate the exhalation. This tendency is particularly noticeable during exercise. You can reduce the holding by consciously relaxing your abdomen just as an inhalation ends.

Breathing in reverse Reverse breathing happens when the diaphragm is pulled into the chest upon inhalation and drops into the abdomen on exhalation. Lie on your back and place your hands on your abdomen. The abdomen should slowly flatten as you exhale and rise gently as you inhale. If the opposite occurs you are a reverse breather.

Open mouth Breathing It’s fairly easy to notice if you’re a mouth-breather; if you’re not sure, ask your friends or try to catch yourself at unguarded moments.

So many people ask me about how to relieve shoulder, neck or back pain when they are at work. They can’t exactly get down on their trusty Agoy mat mid spreadsheet and come into down facing dog. So I have scoured the internet for a short sequence that would give you a bit of a mid day boost. Don’t worry you can still fit in your elevenses complete with hob nobs and tea. Take a look below for some yoga desk stretches.

.

Arm Stretch

1. Bring your arms behind your back, clasping your hands. Or, hold a tie, sweater, or scarf between your hands.

2. Lift your arms as high as you can. Lift your sternum.

3. Hold for 30 to 45 seconds, relax for a moment, then repeat.

Shoulder Stretch

1. Interlock your fingers and extend your arms outward, straight in front of your shoulders. Your palms should be facing outward.

2. Slowly raise your hands overhead, stretching all the way from the waist. Work on straightening your elbows. Hold for 30 to 45 seconds, relax, and try again.

Chair Twist

1. Sit on the edge of your chair, sideways with your left side facing the chair back.

2. Throughout the pose, keep your feet and knees together and even.

3. Place your hands on the chair as shown.

4. Inhale while straightening your spine. As you exhale, twist toward the back of the chair, twisting from the very bottom of your spine — pushing with your left hand and pulling with your right hand.

5. Repeat the inhalation/straighten, exhalation/twist series several times.

6. Release and change sides.

Deeper Chair Twist

1. Sit in the middle of your chair, sideways with your left side facing the chair back.

2. Repeat the same routine as in Chair Twist 1.

3. Do you feel the twist in the spine at a slightly different place?

4. If you need to, place a book under your feet to keep them flat.

Detoxification means the removal of toxins from the body. Humans absorb toxins—preservatives, pesticides, stimulants, and heavy metalsthrough food, water, and air. Your own body produces toxins, called metabolic waste products, as a natural result of processes like digestion and respiration. Luckily, your digestive, endocrine, and circulatory systems come equipped with a complex set of mechanisms designed to eliminate these toxins through your mouth, eyes, skin, colon and even your breath. The trouble is that too much sugar, caffeine, and processed foods, little to no exercise, and stress can slow the body’s natural detox function to a sluggish pace.

The result is a buildup of toxins that can leave you fatigued and suffering from poor digestion, and that may even lead to disease. You can help boost your innate detox functions by practicing cleansing yoga sequences and following a simple plant-based diet during a multiday detox plan. Most people need to detoxify to get these things out of their systems in order to feel healthier. Some benefits of an occasional detox,  include having a lowered heart rate, clearer eyes and skin, better memory and concentration, and improved digestion. Good health invites a calm, clear mind that is free of many of the habits that often lead to toxin buildup.

While there are many approaches to detoxing—including the asana and food guidelines presented on these pages— they aim for one simple thing: to help the body do what it’s already trying to do. Your body is always getting rid of toxins but you can aid that natural process by making detoxing a practice.

A yoga sequence like the one suggested here can support the natural detoxification process by increasing circulation, compressing and twisting internal organs, and encouraging relaxation, says Weill. Inverted poses like Viparita Karani (Legs-up-the-Wall Pose) use gravity to stimulate lymph and blood circulation. Inversions help to drain lymphatic and venous fluids from the legs and pelvis, and so enhance detoxification.

Do you detox regularly or would like to give it a go?

Your balancing confldently in half moon pose and the pose feels firm and steady There’s onlyone problem: You’re hyperextending the knee of your standing leg. When you extend, or straighten, your knee beyond a straight line, it’s called hyperextension, which can injure the knee and other parts of your body It’s quite common among yoga students at all levels, and certain asanas can exacerbate the condition ifyou repeatedly do them incorrectly Fortunately you can learn to practice in a way that both aligns and protects your knees and makes them stronger and healthier.

WHATS MY LINE?

When a knee that isn’t prone to hyperextension extends, its ligaments—the cords of connective tissue that join the thighbone to the shinbone —pull taut and stop the two bones at the pointwhere they lie directly in line with each other. If your knee hyperextends, that means its ligaments are too long, and so theydon’t stop the bones untilyour leg has moved beyonda straight line. If you’re uncertain about whether your knees hyperextend, stand sideways in front of a full—length mirror, gently press your knees backward until you are unable to move them back any further, and envision an imaginary line running down the side of your leg from your hip joint to your ankle. If the center of your knee ends up behind that line, it is hyperextended.
Standing with your knees locked back in hyperextension can cause a host ofproblems inyour knees and also inyour legs, hips, and spine. In addition to overstretching the ligaments, hyperextension stresses the front of the knee joint surfaces and weakens the quadriceps muscles. Over time, this misalignment may create deeper hyperextesision, ligament strains or tears, cartilage degeneration, and arthritis of the knee joint or kneecap. What’s more, ifyou push the knee back with enough force, you can tear a ligament, most likely the anterior cruciate. Standingin hyperextensionputs excess pressure on your heels and the front of your shins, which can lead to inflammation.

UTIHITA TRIKONASANA (ExtendedTriangle Pose) looks like its name. It can be a challenging asana for some practitioners. You can see several triangles in the pose:Your hands and back foot are the points of one; your two feet are points of another; and your torso, arm, and front leg form the sides of yet another. And Triangle is one of the first poses yoga students learn. Ideally you feel firmness in your legs, a lengthening of your spine, fullness in your chest, and freedom in your neck and shoulders. Trikonasana also increases the flexibility and strength ofyourlegs and lowerjoints (ankles, knees, and hips). If you have tight hamstrings, forward bends might aggravate lower-back pain. It also teaches movements that will prepare you to practice inversions, twists, and backbends.When I first attempted triangle, I thought that if I could reach my hand to the floor and that was the main intention. I didn’t understand that in reaching to the floor, I had sacrificed the alignment of other body parts. My knees drooped, my hips flew backward, and my shoulder slumped for-ward. I had yet to learn to use my muscles to support me so that I had a strong foundation from which to extend.

BUILD A BASE

The main triangle that you can see in the pose is the one at the bottom, where the floor is the base and your legs are the sides. The feet and floor form the foundation of the structure. Take time to create a firm, balanced, stable base. Your bones form the frame of the pose, and your muscles help align the bones. The quadriceps, calves, and gluteal muscles must be actively engaged. Straightening the legs may not, at first, seem difficult, but the challenge lies in doing so without collapsing into the ankles, knees, or hips. You’re collapsing if it feels as if most of your weight is on your front knee or shin. Your upper body should feel as though it is lifting off your lower body As you ground your back leg and heel, lift the front of your pelvis toward the ceiling.

Your abdomen and sternum should extend toward your head. Your arms are straight and firm in this pose. Your bottom arm doesn’t bear muchweight, but it helps you extend. It should feel as though the arms are reaching apart from the center of the chest. Lengthen the bottom side of your rib cage to be as long as the upper side so that both are parallel with the floor.

Were you considering starting the New Year in a healthy way? We all have such good intentions in the New Year and then life seems to get in the way, there may be a solution for all the time starved people out there. One to one yoga sessions or private yoga sessions, the yoga teacher comes  to you mats and incense at the ready. Let’s face braving the cold dark nights is a mini challenge in itself before you have even got on the mat.

Private yoga sessons are an excellent way to achieve the benefits of yoga, track your individual progress, and save time by never having to leave home.  Each hatha yoga class is designed specifically for you, and will focus on exercises for your body type, taking into consideration your fitness level, stress level, and your personal health and goals.

You’ll get more hands on attention than you would ever get at a public class. Each sesson will be adapted to meet your individual needs.  A complimentary wellness consultation is included in your first session.

Dipping into the world of one-on-one yoga classes can be an exciting challenge. Such settings have a different intensity from group sessions, and they offer a chance to really get to know your teacher.

Often private classes move at a mellower pace, as teachers focus on alignment challenges specific to each student. To do this well requires a flexible sense of what a yoga practice entails.

Some teachers, including Kevin Perry who teaches a wide selection of classes, prefers to teach private sessions, Perry adds, “Private sessions give me the opportunity to do a whole-body evaluation of a person, and to test their full range of motion. Then I have more to offer them in a public class because I know them so well.”

Some would say your offering more than the typical workout guidance given by a personal trainer. We look at yoga as a tool for transformation. So whether I’m talking to somebody about posture or something else, in the back of my head I’m really thinking about how yoga can help transform that person’s life in a positive way.

Yoga has become a very popular exercise among people all across the world. Celebrities are also adopting this practice in order to strengthen their bodies.

More and more people are beginning to at least try yoga because their favorite celebrities are trying it. The yoga industry has grown considerably since many celebrities have admitted to practicing yoga on a regular basis.

Jennifer Aniston has recently been shouting from the rooftops about yoga and appears in the introduction to the workout video featuring her pal and yoga instructor, Mandy Ingber. “She brought yoga into my life,” says Aniston. “It completely changed my life.”

“It’s one of the most fun workouts I’ve ever had,” Aniston says in the video. “So have fun and work hard because it will totally pay off.” Would you be more likely to try a certain yoga style if it had a celebrity endorsement?

Do tight shoulders limit your backbends? When you reach your arms high overhead, do your lower ribs stick out in front? Do you feel a pinching sensation on top of your shoulders when you practice Downward Facing Dog  Pose (Adho Mukha Svanasana)? If you answered yes to any of those questions, the problem might be tight latissimus dorsi muscles.

These muscles connect your upper arms to your lower back. When you raise your arms overhead, the “lats” stretch, so tight lats make it difficult to reach up. Stretching them is not hard, but the best way to do it effectively is not always obvious. Learning how to loosen your lats is worthwhile, though, because it will improve your range of motion in every yoga pose that requires you to lift one or both arms above your head. What’s more, looser lats can make it easier to do everyday activities such as changing a light bulb or getting things off a high shelf, and can even help protect you from rotator cuff injuries.

To find out how tight or loose your latissimus dorsi muscles are, try this test (if you have a shoulder injury, do not do the exercises in this article unless you are under qualified supervision). Lie on your back on the floor with your arms by your sides. Feel where the back of your rib cage touches the floor, taking special note of the point of contact that lies closest to your waist. Turn your palms up, then lift your arms up and overhead to the floor, or as close to the floor as they will go without you bending your elbows or separating your arms wider than your shoulders. For most people, this movement will make the lower ribs lift off the floor in back and jut out in front. Now return your arms to your sides and repeat the same actions, but this time, as you reach overhead, press the lower rib cage—the point closest to your waist—firmly into the floor to prevent it from lifting up at all. This will probably create a sensation of stretch on the outer sides of your armpits and make it harder to reach the floor. The stronger the stretch and the greater the restriction of movement, the tighter your lats are (although other tight muscles may increase the limitation).