Yoga, Health, and Wellness Articles + Recipes

"Feel the fear, and do it anyway." - Susan Jeffers Sometimes fear works in our favor and motivates us, however, most of the time things that scare us are based on nothing more than a story of thoughts. However, we have the ability to ignore, quiet, and overcome any fears if we're brave enough to and yoga can help. Sometimes fearful, made up stories of the future can hold us back from experiencing some of the magic that life has to offer. We have to be brave and get out of our comfort zones to take chances, have new experiences and greater satisfaction. It can be easier to stay and feel stuck and safe, instead of choosing to be brave though. For most, the familiar is more comfortable than the unknown, and it's preferable to stay within the boundaries of what you know, instead of diving into unknown possibilities.

What scares you? For some people, it’s heights or public speaking or spiders. Halloween celebrates thrills, chills, and things that go bump in the night. While Halloween tends to be a fun holiday defined by disguising our true identity with make-up and costumes, it echoes how many of us deal with our fears the other three hundred and sixty-four days of the year - hiding behind a mask. Yoga provides a safe space for us to examine our fears and offers tools to become more courageous. The Yoga Sutras state that the fear of death is the biggest fear we face and is the basis for all other fears. In the second pada, Patanjali refers to this concept as abhinivesha. Learning to live in the present moment is a powerful way to stop worrying and being scared of the future. Fear can only exist in relation to what you anticipate happening. Fear doesn’t exist when you are in the moment. Every minute of your day is an opportunity to move from a place of courage or from a position of fear.

One of the foods our cleansers struggle with giving up most is SUGAR. Added sugar is everywhere, even hidden in your favorite salad dressings or condiments, which makes it particularly hard to avoid, and the more you eat it, the more you become reliant on it. Sugar can lead to health issues such as chronic weight gain, an overgrowth of candida, blood sugar imbalance, depression, anxiety, insomnia, and more. It’s also been linked to an increased risk for more serious health concerns like heart disease, diabetes, and cancer. During the Conscious Cleanse, you’ll give up added and refined sugars completely, but if you think you might have a sugar sensitivity, you may need to do even more to tame your sugar cravings (take our Sugar Sensitivity Quiz here). Many fruits, grains, and other healthy foods still have naturally occurring sugars that can sabotage your health if you’re sensitive to sugar.

Turmeric, the powerful golden root that makes our favorite golden milk lattes, is most commonly known for its anti-inflammatory properties. Since I was a young child, my mom taught me how to replace taking ibuprofen and other pharmaceutical anti-inflammatory drugs by instead drinking turmeric tea, or even soaking the desired body part in hot turmeric water. What I didn’t know my whole life, was that turmeric does so much more for the body than simply reducing inflammation and making delicious lattes. Here are 8 benefits of turmeric you might not have known before: Cures and prevents some cancers Could Turmeric be a new cure for cancer? Although there aren’t too many studies out there yet, Curcumin (the active ingredient in turmeric) has been shown to inhibit proliferation, invasion, angiogenesis, and metastasis of different cancers through interaction with multiple cell signaling proteins. Additionally, Turmeric has been shown to prevent the growth of cancerous cells and prohibit growth as seen in different testing.

Many people shy away from fear and see it as a negative, a danger and something to be avoided. However, fear can sometimes be good for you! Fear can keep you on your toes and help you experience new things. Here’s our top 10 reasons why a dose of fear every now and again can be good for you. Fear keeps you safe The fear instinct is the bodies’ internal danger alarm. The feelings of fear compel you to take action against danger. Without the fear instinct, you wouldn’t have an awareness of threats around you - so you wouldn’t be around very long! Fear gives you the flight or fight reaction to make decisions when you may be unsafe - such as if a car drives towards you when you’re crossing the road. Without fear - you wouldn’t be able to make a decision to help you stay safe.

Need to make a major shift in your perspective or boost your confidence? We’ve got you covered this week with poses designed to help you feel strong, focused, and humble. Whether you love to balance on your hands and take flight or if you fear falling on your face, this week we’ve got four classes for you to get engaged and turn your world upside down. These practices are empowering and invigorating. Regardless of how you feel about inversions, these postures are excellent for your circulation, mental focus, and overall mood. It’s helpful to use your full yoga practice to keep your spine flexible, your hips open, your core and upper body strong, and your attitude positive. You may have heard yoga called the Fountain of Youth, and often going upside down is what helps keep your skin glowing with the boost of fresh blood from the heart to the head.

I have had a problem for a few months already, but it is one of those good problems – how to eat all the beautiful produce I get?! In Estonia summers are rather short, which means that most of the crop is at its best at the same time – zucchini, tomatoes, cucumber, kale, you name it! And, even if I have my rooftop garden, my mother’s garden and my grandmother's garden, I still also like to go to the farmers market too, because, well, I love going to the market to look at the abundance of produce. I do need to hold myself back with shopping, though. I really really hate throwing away food and always try to eat everything from root to leaf, so I always try to make the most of everything I have. Oh, I wish I could somehow spread the harvest over the whole year! But I can’t, so this time of year my 5 portions of fruit and vegetables a day is easily 15 or 20 portions of fruit and veggies, and everything else has to wait until I run out (although I do miss lentils and pasta already).

Addiction is a threefold disease. It affects the mind, body, and spirit in various ways. While there are many traditional methods of treating addiction with behavioral therapies, more and more programs are beginning to incorporate holistic methods into their treatment programs. By taking a holistic approach to treating addiction, the healing process occurs on the mind, body, and spirit. As a result, individuals in recovery are given tools to achieve and maintain lasting recovery. One holistic method that is becoming increasingly popular in the treatment industry is yoga. It is a safe, healthy, and natural medicine that can greatly enhance the recovery process. Since addiction affects the whole person, the whole person must be treated. Yoga allows people to learn how to connect the body, mind, and breath to focus their attention inward and gain self-awareness. Why Yoga?

Love, it makes the world go round. All you need is love. It’s so simple right? Actually, maintaining and nurturing loving relationships in our lives can take effort and practice. However, showing your love to others, as well as yourself, can make a huge positive impact in our lives. Love comes in many forms, from our significant others to family, to friends and even pets. Feeling loved can harbor a sense of caring, and inspires you to make others in your life feel good. It’s really quite contagious, so here’s our top ways to help you show love to others (and a few to show some love to yourself too). Listen to others

One of yoga’s most beautiful benefits is how it can shift your emotions in a pure, positive way. Even if you come to the practice for other reasons, your emotional makeup will transform, whether you’re trying to or not! Our subtle body, which is a blueprint of our physical body, contains our emotional energy. Through targeted practice, we can enhance how we feel. The subtle body contains the chakras or emotional energy centers. In order to feel more loving, we want to make sure our energy is balanced from the base of our spine or Muladhara (Root) Chakra to our Sahasrara (Crown) Chakra. In order to tap into your own heart and open to more love in your life, you’ve got to be willing to release fear. Yoga practices that create more space in the Anahata (Heart) Chakra will create space in your physical body to experience joy and love. The Anahata Chakra contains the essence of compassion and selflessness and symbolizes when we rise above our egos to care more for others than ourselves. Anahata is associated with the element of air, the color green, the sense of touch, and the thymus gland.

We thought this was the perfect time to share a Conscious Cocktail recipe! Since we eliminate alcohol during the cleanse, this recipe is a great way to transition into your 80:20 eating plan. For more information about our 80:20 Lifestyle Program, click here. This recipe features a spirit that got a lot of attention this summer – mezcal! Mezcal, like tequila, is a distilled spirit made from the agave plant. While tequila is only made from blue agave plants, mezcal can be made from any agave plant. When making mezcal, instead of steaming the agave before distilling as is customary for tequila production, the agave is cooked in large earthen ovens with charcoal and lava rocks. This is what gives mezcal its signature smoky taste.

Being “Nomadic” - the idea of traveling the world, bouncing from place to place doing as you’d like, exploring culture, exploring untapped parts of the world, and most importantly, better exploring yourself, is quite the popular trend these days. Often I get asked “how do you do it? How do you travel the world so much? What are you doing for work?” When my answer to them is: "I teach yoga", most people question how I do it. After all, teaching yoga isn't a job that is known to make you rich, nor fund you the needs to travel long-term. The short answer in how I travel and teach yoga is Yogatrade, which has allowed me to find teaching jobs all over the world. But to be honest, it takes a lot more than just finding a job to take a risk, leave your friends and family, and move across the world. If you've been playing with the idea of teaching yoga abroad, here are a few small steps to mentally prepare yourself:

If you’ve never tried this invigorating and fast-paced practice of power yoga, you might be wondering what it’s all about. Here’s our rundown on what power yoga is, where it came from, and how it might improve your health! What is Power Yoga Power Yoga - it sounds daunting, but what actually is it? Power yoga is a sequence of postures that are specially designed to build on strength, stamina and flexibility, all while being fast moving. Power Yoga is derived from the Ashtanga yoga tradition, which can be equally as physically demanding, but works through building heath in your body, and moving through the vinyasa sequences in a fast paced way. Unlike Ashtanga, power yoga practice doesn’t have a set sequence of postures, and any class can be different from the next. However, it will usually start with Sun Salutation poses, to build heat within your body, and will often feature a strong focus on yoga poses that will build up strength and get your heart pounding and body sweating - power yoga can be a full on cardio workout!

​Are you ready to feel empowered, strong, and challenged this week? Power Yoga is a sweaty Vinyasa flow class with increased intensity, usually through a faster pace or an emphasis on strength. Or both! While Power Yoga does focus more on the physical body than some more spiritual classes, you’ll still gain all the emotional and mental benefits too. Here are 5 reasons you should try these invigorating Power Yoga classes this week. 5 REASONS TO PRACTICE POWER YOGA 1. Build Stronger Muscles, Bones, and Joints

Pumpkin pesto? Most of you probably think I am nuts since surely pesto is made out of basil, right? Well – yes, and I LOVE traditional pesto, but since I have grandparents who grow pumpkins and there always seems to be too many of them I need to get creative, and I promise you, pumpkin pesto is the next big thing! If possible, then I always recommend choosing smaller pumpkins, since they tend to have more flavor. My favorite is Hokkaido, which in addition to being ultra-tasty is also extremely high in protein. Just as the traditional pesto, my pumpkin pesto contains parmesan cheese. My diet is strongly plant-focused, but I am not vegan or even vegetarian, so I go for parmesan in this recipe, but if you prefer a vegan option, it can be substituted with nutritional yeast.

Surya Namaskar, also known as Sun Salutations, is a set of helpful yoga asanas that can open up a world of benefits for your physical and mental health. As the name suggests, Surya Namaskar means bowing in reverence to the sun. The sun is the source of all life forms on our planet. Solar energy is the most nourishing life force, without which all living beings (plants, animals, and humans) would cease to exist. In yoga, the Surya Namaskar is a practice that seeks to pay homage to the sun and show gratitude for the importance it holds in our daily lives. While Surya Namaskar is a healthy exercise for your body whenever it is practiced, early morning hours are popularly considered the best and most auspicious for these asanas. Early morning is usually when it is calm outside, helping your mind to also be at its most peaceful and still. This meditative state is beneficial when practicing Surya Namaskar. It allows you to awaken your body, focus your mind, and experience a feeling of gratitude as you begin a new day.

We’re excited to share a unique new program, which is the perfect fusion of Pilates and yoga, from Claire Petretti Marti. While Pilates and yoga have some similarities, in practice, they are quite different. The fusion of these two practices offers unparalleled benefits for your body, mind, and spirit. The two modalities complement each other and adding Pilates to your current routine can help you take your yoga practice to the next level. What is Pilates? Pilates is an exercise method created by Joseph Pilates and documented in his 1945 book, Pilates Return to Life Through Contrology. In Pilates, the core is called the Powerhouse and the emphasis is on strengthening the deep abdominals, the obliques, and the back in order to create a resilient support system to protect the spine. Joseph Pilates believed that age isn’t gauged by years, but by the suppleness of the spine.

If you practice yoga, Pilates can help to complement your yoga practice. Yogis who practice pilates as well, can create greater stability, better alignment and have stronger cores. This deeper strength can give greater control over your movements, allowing you to move between poses and hold them for longer. Pilates is an 85 year old system of body conditioning, which can complement asana practice. It’s focus is on building and engaging a strong core - essential for advanced yoga poses. It was developed by Joseph Pilates, who studied a number of forms of exercise including yoga to come up with the practice. Similarly to yoga, the focus is on connecting the mind and body to create the movement, but the movements themselves are very different. How Pilates and yoga are different is that while yoga holds each pose for a while, or flows through in vinyasas, Pilates is a practice which one repeats precise movements up to ten times in a rhythmic flow. The method to pilates is an emphasis on the controlled flow of movement.

The mornings are getting cooler here in Colorado, the leaves are changing up in the mountains, and the Fall Equinox is less than a week away (where did the summer go?!). The change of season always brings a new crop of fruits and veggies into season which makes it that much more exciting. Apples are one of our favorite autumn fruits, so we wanted to share a smoothie recipe we’ve been loving lately – Apple Pie Smoothie! This smoothie tastes like fall in a glass, and gives you all the apple pie flavor you love without all the added sugar. Apples a great source of fiber, plus they’re rich in immune-boosting vitamin C and antioxidants. Even though they contain naturally occurring sugars, they have a low glycemic index because of their high fiber content, making them a great low sugar option. Besides adding great flavor, Ceylon cinnamon helps to regulate blood sugar levels, making this the perfect smoothie to enjoy when you’re craving something sweet but want to avoid the mid-morning crash. As the mornings get colder, you can make this a warm smoothie by heating up the almond milk in a saucepan over low to medium heat. What’s your favorite fall treat?

Yoga is a great way to stay healthy and keeping the body supple. However, it offers amazing benefits to oral health as well. Thanks to these benefits, you must consider incorporating yoga in your life for your dental care. 5 benefits of yoga on dental health include: Reduced Inflammation High stress levels cause an increase in the production of cortisol, which is the stress hormone. This increases inflammation which will worsens the swelling of gums if you suffer from them. Gum swelling will increase the risk of gum diseases.

We’ve all probably experienced procrastination whether its at school, at work or in our home lives. Some tasks and chores just seem impossible to keep focused on, and procrastination can seriously hinder our productivity levels. Here’s 10 ways to help avoid procrastination. 1. Get Organized You won’t be able to get anything done if you don’t know what actually needs doing! Buy a planner, use apps, or set up your own personal organisational system to keep track of all tasks and assignments that need doing, and by when. This will make it easier to stay on track and know what needs doing, and when. 2. Set achievable goals

​After a great yoga practice, you’ve probably experienced how your mind feels more clear, calm, and balanced. Many practitioners find the mental benefits of yoga to be the most important, even more than a strong, supple body. Who doesn’t want to be focused, motivated, and able to experience life to the fullest? This week’s classes will release stress and boost your ability to focus and motivate yourself. Interested in why and how yoga does this? Step back about 5,000 years and tap into the wisdom of the Yoga Sutras. Yoga Sutra 1.2 Citta Vritti Nirodhah is often translated as: Yoga is the ability to direct the mind without distraction or interruption. This skill is difficult, takes constant practice over time, but can be achieved! Patanjali outlines a practical how-to manual to reach a state of yoga: the eight-limbed yoga path. The eight limbs are:

The autumn is slowly sneaking in here in Estonia, and for me, it always means some changes on my menu. I still love salads, but instead of leafy greens that are main heroes in my summer salads, they are now a little heartier. Hence barley in today’s delicious bowlful. Barley is somewhat a national food for us Estonians, or at least it used to be. It is traditionally cooked with potatoes and pork, and then lightly mashed to something called ‘Mulgipuder.’ Mulgipuder is often served with crispy fried pork fat (greaves in English, I think) and sour cream. I don’t even remember when was the last time I had it, but now thinking about it I just started graving it… Especially the leftovers heated up on a frying pan, so it turns nice and crispy… mmm! Talking about Estonian kitchens, it is traditionally a cross between German (sausages and sauerkraut) and Russian (potatoes, a lot of meat, soups) but today leaning more towards the clean Scandinavian kitchens. So here was a sneak peek to Estonian cuisine.

Coconut oil is truly a superfood. It stands out from all other oils due to its extremely high nutritional content. If you’re already consuming coconut oil regularly, that’s great! We will provide you with information on how it benefits your body. If you don’t regularly consume coconut oil, you might want to try incorporating it into your diet by the end of this. Let’s get started! Coconut Oil is Anti-Microbial Coconut oil has been known to kill harmful microorganisms in your body. It contains helpful fatty acids that do this, specifically Lauric acid. Lauric acid accounts for around 50% of all the fatty acids found in coconut oil. Once you digest the coconut oil, the Lauric acid creates a different substance in your body called monolaurin. Together, these two things have been scientifically proven to kill any harmful pathogens in your body. Whether it’s bacteria, fungi, or even a virus, coconut oil has the power to kill them.

Life is pretty busy, and although we might love the idea of slowing down, taking some time for ourselves, and reaping the benefits yoga practice promises, sometimes in practice, it can be hard to simply just find the time. Yoga urges you to slow down, but sometimes, work, housework, responsibility and family duties don’t give you an opportunity for some time off to roll out your mat. If you’re finding it hard to juggle a busy schedule, you might have brushed off yoga as something you just don’t have time for, and start denying yourself those minutes in the day that are just for you. Taking time for yourself is important, and yoga can massively benefit both your physical and mental health - so don’t be so quick to write it off as something not important. Even the busiest of people can benefit from all yoga has to offer - here’s some tips on how to fit yoga into your busy schedule. Keep Your Yoga Mat in Eyesight