Yoga Poses for Stress Relief

Practicing simple yoga poses and breathing techniques can assure that you’ll have at least a few minutes to sort through the depths of your frizzed out mind while you’re on the move.

1. Pose: Chair Twist:

There is nothing worse than waking up feeling nauseous on a Sunday morning when you know you have a paper to write.  Instead of laying in bed for the majority of the day, try a chair twist to give yourself an internal massage and be on the road to recovery!

• Start with the right side of your body facing the back of the chair and hold the sides of the chair back with your hands at shoulder height.  Make sure your hips and torso are facing forward and your shoulders are relaxed down.
• As you inhale, press your sitting bones into the seat of the chair and the top of your head toward the ceiling. 
• As you exhale, twist to the right from the base of your spine. Stretch your torso as you did previously before the first twist, and on your next exhale, twist up the middle of your spine without pulling on the chair as you twist.
• On your final exhale twist up through your upper spine. Turn your head to look over your right shoulder and hold the pose for about a minute.  Slowly return to your starting position. 
• Repeat these same steps on the other side.  Twisting massages your abdominal organs and
• improves digestion!

2. Pose: Reverse Prayer:
It is important to give yourself a second to calm down and compose yourself.  Reverse Prayer stretches your wrists and shoulders (which are probably tense and achy) while allowing you to breath and work through those knots in your neck.

• To start, bring your hands to your lower back with your palms facing each other. 
• Bring your hands as close together as you can in a prayer position and bring your fingertips up your back as far as you can.  Hold for about 30 seconds (or however long feels good!) while concentrating on your breath.  For those 30 seconds, allow yourself to forget about the work that is not getting done and the waiting texts that need a reply.  It’s important to give yourself just a few minutes a day of breathing exercises!  Feel refreshed?  We thought so.

3. Pose: Neck Stretch:
You’re sitting in class when your professor asks everyone to pass Monday night’s assignment forward.  Assignment?  What assignment?  For a moment, you panic and try to think of excuses you can recite at the end of class.  Relax. Unfortunately, there is nothing you can do but wait for the 50 minutes to painfully drag on. In Yoga for Stress Relief, says, “one of the main areas where physical tension accumulates is in the middle of your shoulders and at the nape of your neck.  By contracting and stretching these areas, you can release tension throughout your whole body.”  Try this simple neck stretch.  You’ll be able to relieve yourself of the stress caused from not completing that homework assignment.

• Sit with your shoulders and back straight and keep your arms loose by your sides. (Make sure you are not clenching any of your shoulder or neck muscles—they should be loose and relaxed.)
• As you inhale, move your head backward.
• As you exhale, move your head all the way forward (make sure you don’t move your body forward) until your chin is pressed into your chest. 
• Repeat this two or three times.
• Lift your head up as your inhale back to a normal sitting position.