Even busy people can reap the benefits of yoga practice. A short yoga workout can be completed in 10 to 15 minutes. Yoga Journal writer and yoga expert Natasha Rizopoulos emphasizes that even short sessions of yoga can benefit your body and mind. After 15 minutes of yoga poses and deep breathing you should feel more alert, awake and flexible. Before you go into deep, stretching yoga poses, warm your body up with several rounds of sun salutation A, which is a traditional yoga sequence of poses linked together with the breath.
Reclining Twist
Use this flowing supine spinal twist to warm-up your core. Lie on your back. Bring your knees in slightly toward your chest. Reach your arms out to your sides in a T shape. Keep your lower back pressing into the floor as you lower your bent legs to your right, then back up and over to your left. Your knees do not need to touch the floor. Focus on maintaining strength and control in your core muscles. Inhale as you lift your legs up and exhale as you lower them to one side. For a cool-down, take your knees all the way over to one side and hold the twist for seven to 10 breaths. In this variation, you can rest your legs on the floor, a bolster or a block.
Standing Forward Bend to Standing Half Forward Bend
With your knees slightly bent, reach your hands to the floor or a block. Let go of tension in your upper body and back. On an inhale, bring your palms to your shins and raise your torso up until it is parallel to the floor. Lengthen your spine and pull your shoulders back toward your hips. Keep equal pressure in your feet. Exhale and flow back down toward your forward bend. Inhale and rise back up into standing half forward bend. Repeat up to one minute. You can also hold each pose independently. Hold standing forward bend for up to one minute and standing half forward bend for about three breaths, according to Yoga Journal's guidelines.
Triangle
Stand with your feet about four feet apart. Turn your right foot to your right. Reach your arms out in a T shape. Reach your right hand far out to your right, shifting through your torso, not the lower half of your body. Tip your right hand straight down toward the floor and touch your leg lightly above or below your knee. Let your left arm reach straight up toward the ceiling. Hold for five to seven breaths. My Yoga Online highlights that triangle pose stretches and strengthens your hamstrings, spinal muscles and calves.
Prayer Squat
Take your feet wide apart. Let your feet point mildly out to your sides without compensating your balance. Bend down until your knees are in a 90-degree angle. Bring your hands together in a prayer position. Press equally into your feet and keep your knees over your ankles. Hold prayer squat for 30 seconds to one minute for an intense leg strengthener, or flow in out of the it with the breath. To do so, rise back up to your starting, standing straddle position on an inhale. As you exhale, dip back into prayer squat. Repeat the flow for up to one minute.
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