Round Out Your Practice: Spirit

Meditation isn't always as easy as it sounds. It's a practice of noticing, interrupting, and returning to your immediate senses. And it's no easier when done at home, without a teacher to guide you.

OM: Chant three times.

MEDITATION: Sit in a comfortable cross-legged position. Place your palms on your thighs. Open your eyes about halfway and rest your gaze on the floor five feet in front of you. Focus your attention on the breath. Whenever you realize you've gotten caught up in a thought, label that activity "thinking" and return your attention to your breath. This will happen over and over, and it's no problem. Meditation is a practice of noticing, interrupting, and returning to your immediate sensory experience. Practice waking up and letting go as a way to get to know yourself better, to understand your own habits—which will, in turn, lead to understanding others better and feeling more connected to them. Sit like this for at least 10 minutes.

WARM-UP VINYASA:

Cow

Cat

Cow

Down Dog

Plank

Down Dog

Then lower onto your hands and knees, tuck your toes under, and come into a squat with your heels lifted off the ground. Come up off your hands and bring them into prayer position. Rise all the way up on your tiptoes and then lower back to the squat. Work on zipping your legs together to begin developing your midline connection. Come back onto your hands and knees.

Repeat the sequence three times.

SUN SALUTATION:

Mountain Pose

Upward Salute

Standing Forward Bend

Right step back into a high lunge

Down Dog

Plank

Knees-chest-chin

Baby Cobra

Down Dog

High lunge (right leg)

Standing Forward Bend

Upward Salute

Mountain Pose

Repeat the sequence on the other side, then a second time on each side.

Then do another version of Sun Salutation:

Mountain

Upward Salute

Standing Forward Bend

Flat back

Four-Limbed Staff Pose

Upward Dog

Downward Dog

Right leg Warrior I

Right leg Warrior II

Four-Limbed Staff Pose

Upward Dog

Downward Dog

Left leg Warrior I

Left leg Warrior II

Four-Limbed Staff Pose

Upward Dog

Downward Dog

Jump forward to flat back

Standing Forward Bend

Upward Salute

Mountain

FEATURED SEQUENCE: Perform the sequence presented twice, once to each side.

Ardha Chandrasana (Half Moon Pose)

Virabhadrasana III (warrior Pose III)

Adho Mukha Svanasana (Downward-Facing Dog Pose)

Vasisthasana (Side Plank Pose)

Anantasana (side-Reclining Lef Lift)

Urdha Mukha Svanasana (Upward-Facing Dog Pose)

Gomukhasana (Cow Face Pose)

Ustrasana (Camel Pose)

Bharadvajasana (Bharadvaja's Twist)

Simhasana (Lion Pose)

Adho Mukha Svanasana (Downward-Facing Dog Pose)

After the last Downward Dog, lower your knees to the floor and rest in Child's Pose.

INVERSION: Headstand. Draw the legs into the midline to create the necessary stability to relax your breath and mind.

CLOSING POSES:

Bound Angle Pose

Revolved Head-to-Knee Pose

Seated Forward Bend

Supported Shoulderstand

Knee-to-Ear Pose

Then do Corpse Pose, resting in the confidence that the ground will hold you. Open up to the big blue sky, which is just like your own vast mind.

OM: Chant three times.

Cyndi Lee is the founder of OM yoga studios in Manhattan and East Hampton, New York. She is the author and artist of OM Yoga: A Guide to Daily Practice; OM at Home: A Yoga Journal; the OM Yoga in a Box series; the book Yoga Body, Buddha Mind; the OM Yoga Mix CD series; and the OM Yoga DVDs.

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