Quit Smoking - Can Yoga Help You Kick the Habit?

Yoga is said to offer a whole host of benefits to practitioners including the development of long, lean muscles, increased strength and vitality, better circulation and lowered stress levels. But yoga can also have some curative benefits as well including the potential to help you to quit smoking.

A smoking habit is a powerful addiction. Most smokers are very much aware of the dangers of smoking, and have tried to quit many times before. People who want to quit but are afraid to because they don't want to gain weight will be glad to know that using yoga as a way to let go of cigarettes will ensure that you avoid this troublesome side effect of quitting. The weight gain associated with quitting smoking is caused by replacing the habit of smoking with the habit of putting too much food in your mouth. With yoga, we will be replacing the habit of breathing in cigarette smoke with deep cleansing breaths of healing oxygen that will fill your lungs with clean air, clear your mind and rejuvenate your body.

Yoga works in several ways to help you to quit smoking:

o Helps you to cultivate enough willpower and discipline to quit smoking

o Gives you the tools to manage your body's cravings for nicotine

o Puts you deeply in touch with your body and breath; you will no longer want to pollute your newly healthy body with the deadly toxins from smoking.

Specific Yogic Techniques to quit smoking:

o Pranayma (deep, controlled breathing)
The deep breathing pranayma techniques actually heal your body as the nicotine is leaving the body and lungs. Deep breathing exercises also help at those when strong nicotine cravings occur. Practicing these exercises in addition to regular yoga asana practice eventually replaces the smoking habit and the craving begins to diminish until they have vanished completely.

o Jala Neti
Jalaneti is the practice of using a small vessel called a neti pot filled with warm salted water to gently flush the nasal passages. Jala neti works to clean the nasal passages, but it also serves to stimulate the pituitary gland in the brain, which awakens the Ajna Chakra located behind the forehead. Jalaneti, when performed before meditation helps to create a space for clear and unobstructed breathing.

o Meditation and visualization
The practice of meditation brings you to a place of relaxed awareness where you can access your inner strength and wisdom. While in meditation you can visualize all of the stress, worry, tension and negative emotions are flowing away from your body. You can also visualize yourself as you intend to be, a healthy, happy, non-smoker.

Yoga helps you to cultivate a new healthier lifestyle. It increases lung capacity and through practicing the asana, meditation, visualization, jala neti and deep, pranayma breathing the urge to smoke and pollute the body eventually simply fades away.

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Krisnamacharya Yoga Film 1938 (silent)

This is a film made by McPetruk in 1938 showing the Great yoga teacher demonstrating asana and pranyama. He was the teacher of BKS Iyengar and Sri K. Pattahbi Jois, founder the Astanga style of yoga.

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Prasara Yoga 1/2 Spinal Twisting Pose by Scott Sonnon

Prasara Yoga 1/2 Spinal Twisting Pose: Ardha-Matsyendra-Asana by Ultimate Fighting Championship Coach Scott Sonnon www.KnotIntoYoga.com

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5 Free Games to Entertain the Kids When Traveling by Car

When you are planning a big trip by car, you need to consider how you will entertain the kids.

Sure a portion of the trip may be ruled out with sleeping (if you are lucky), your kids will no doubt be wanting some snack time also.

However when they are awake you want to be able to keep them distracted, and focused on something other than 'how long till we get there'.

Sure there are plenty of games on the market to keep your kids amused. Nintendo DS, Leapfrog Leapster, MP3 Players, Portable DVD players and if you can afford them, then why not. They will all offer a great level of distraction for your children.

But in today's financial market, we can not all afford these toys. Some of us are lucky enough to afford the vacation in the first place.

So we need to look at frugal ways to entertain the family in the car.

Below we have listed five games for your family to play whilst traveling to your destination by car. First and foremost they are free, which is what will definitely appeal to the parents and they are fun, which will appeal to the kids.

1/ The Game of Cricket: One person bats and scores a run for every car you pass. However if you pass a truck consider that out and move onto the next person. You decide how many rounds you will have and the person with the most runs wins

2/ Paper, Rock, Scissors: Players count to three then make their hands either, the shape of a rock (clenched fist), the shape of paper (flat hand) or the shape of scissors (hands clenched with index and middle finger stretched out into the shape of scissors). Rock smothers scissors but is smothered by paper. Paper smothers rock but is cut by scissors. Scissors cut paper but are smothered by rock. Winner is the best of three

3/ The Rainbow Game: Each person in the car chooses a colour. You decide what the target is, depending on how attentive the people in the car are. In this scenario lets choose 10. Each time you see a car in your choose colour, say the colour for confirmation and add it to your tally. The person to reach the target first is the winner.

4/ The Letter Change Game: Someone start by saying a word and then work your way around the car, with each person saying a different word, yet only changing one letter. E.g. Game, Same, Tame, Fame, etc. This is a great one for those older kids in the family.

5/ Guess the Animal Game: This is a bit like, 'Who am I' except is based on animals. This is a game aimed at the younger kids in the car. Take it in turns of being the animal and try and get everyone else to guess what you are. E.g. I am gray, I have big ears, I have a trunk etc. Or to put another spin on it, you can get the people guessing to ask the questions and the person playing the animal just answers 'yes' or 'no'. When someone thinks they know what it is they can guess.

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Build Muscle Strength Through Yoga Exercises

Yoga. Just the sound of the word can turn people off. I can picture my mom with her floor mat sitting cross legged and stretching her facial muscles and believe me the memory is not one I really care to have, so believe me when I say yoga and strength training are not two things I thought really belonged in the same sentence. But I can admit when I am wrong, and I am wrong on this one. Yoga isn't what I remember and to be honest, I think twenty or thirty years ago, it didn't get a good introduction to America.

As I said, times have changed. Now most gyms offer yoga classes and they aren't just about stretching, although 'just' the act of stretching can increase your strength and fitness all by itself. Yoga is a total mind-body connection experience that can really take you by surprise as you exit the class for the first time. You will be challenged and you will use muscles that you didn't even know existed. And you will be challenged no matter what type of yoga class you take.

So with that let me also say that all yoga is not created equal. There are classes that challenge you more and are more 'athletic' as opposed to stretching and breathing. If you take bikram, vinyasa, 'power yoga', or ashtanga yoga you are in for an endurance building challenge. Those are among the yogas that will give you more of a strenuous workout and can improve your core strength and give you cardio-vascular conditioning. That is accomplished by constant motion between the asanas (poses).

Because yoga techniques generally only work with body weight the entire practice is more 'gentle' with its demands upon you. For this reason it is often used as a therapeutic method to help with healing injuries and pains. The stretching combined with strengthening can help with all sorts of injuries from repetitive strains to back pains. As with any sort of training you don't want to just jump in without checking first with your doctor or therapist, but generally speaking, because of the nature of yoga, it is complimentary to most recommended courses of action for physical therapy.

Yoga classes can be found at most gyms, but you can also find a lot of instruction and videos that can take you through routines at home. I would recommend taking a class with an instructor for anyone who is interested in getting into it, because a certified instructor can help you understand the routines better and help prevent bad habits before they can start. Form is very important in all training and yoga is no exception.

So if you are looking for something to break up your regular routine (and I highly recommend changing up fitness habits to challenge your body) think about checking out a few yoga classes. I think you will be pleasantly surprised and glad you did.

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Get Rid of Belly Fat For Good With Home Fitness Workouts

If you are thinking of buying that sauna belt that promised to get you a flat belly, do not fall for it. Just take a walk and see the people walking around with loose belly fat. If the gadgets and mechanisms really worked, do you think these people would have been fat?

The best way to lose belly fat is to have a fun dynamic workout program that you can do at home as per the guidance of fitness experts easily available on DVD series. Some of the best fitness trainers have launched a variety of home fitness workout programs that have a combination of yoga, strength training and cardio-exercises that give you a full body workout.

There are a number of home fitness workout programs which have specific exercises targeting belly fat such as Rev Abs and Hip Hop Abs which help to strengthen the muscles and reduce fat. Additionally, you need to ensure that the diet complements your workout program. Having junk foods and then working out is not going to show you any results while a high fiber and healthy diet combined with abs exercises will sculpt your body. You will also need to know about foods that fight fat.

Additionally you can try meal replacement shakes or protein shakes that help to reduce calories. Crunches, sit ups and push-ups can also help you warm up for the intensive home fitness workouts that target abs to help you get that washboard stomach and if you continue, 6 packs abs. It may seem strenuous or difficult in the beginning but as you progress, you will find it easier and the melting belly fat is a motivating factor to keep going at it. Dump junk food and start on a path of good health with home fitness workouts that ensure that you lose belly fat fast.

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Basic Yoga for Dummies

Clip from the DVD which is available on our website

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