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Yoga improves strength, balance and flexibility
ABOUT PATTY COOK
Patty received her yoga certification from the New Age Center in Nyack , New York, under the direction of Paula Heitzner,RYT. She is a member of Yoga Alliance and has been teaching and directing the hatha yoga program at Chosun Taekwondo Academy & Hatha Yoga Center for 15 years. Her background includes receipt of a BFA from Florida State University in dance technique. She received a scholarship at the Alvin Ailey American Dance School in New York City , then went on to study movement technique with Martha Graham, Merce Cunningham, Viola Farber and Dan Wagoner. She also teaches modern dance technique at the Moving Company Dance Center in Warwick , New York. “Patty has an uncanny sense of being able to meet each student in their practice and to help them grow”
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Start learning yoga
Yoga can improve breathing
Yoga’s focus on conscious breathing and connecting each move to the breath is critical for overall health and well-being. Conscious breathing (pranayama) can bring immediate calm, whether you’re stuck in traffic, feeling anxious before a meeting, or struggling to fall asleep. The benefits of breathing properly are backed by both modern science and millennia of human wisdom.
First begin with how you’re feeling—physically, energetically, mentally, and emotionally—and consciously relax the major tension holders in the body (the forehead, eyes, jaw, shoulders, belly, palms of the hands, and soles of the feet). Take a few deep breaths to ground your attention in the present moment and transition from the activities of the day into a space of simplicity, serenity, and mindful awareness.
– Kripalu.org
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Yoga can improve focus
Yoga’s encouragement of focus doesn’t end with the breath, either. Yoga is as much about training your mind as it is about your training your body, and any good yoga practice will stress the importance of being mindful and focused throughout each move and moment in each session. The mind is almost as important to physical training as it is to yoga. But anyone who is looking to improve mental clarity or change up the ways in which the brain is challenged in training will benefit from adding yoga to their routine.
– awma.com
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Master yoga techniques
Yoga enhances flexibility
Yoga is perhaps best known in fitness circles for its ability to improve flexibility, and that benefit can translate to physical toning and even martial arts. If you’re looking to improve the range of motion in your joints beyond the kind of flexibility training that warmups in physical exercise demand, yoga might be exactly what you need. The various postures are designed to stretch the muscles, add fluidity back to the joints, and improve flexibility in general. Having this increase in flexibility will improve your muscular toning, strength, and coordination.
– amwa.com
Yoga takes you into the present moment, the only place where life exists.
The practitioner can gather his/her chi, and draw the attention inwards to optimize personal performance. Yoga provides the critical focus and awareness of surrounding conditions.
