Yoga For Beginners
from bodywisdom media, inc.
Yoga instructor Barbara Benagh has practiced and taught yoga for nearly 35 years. She discovered yoga while living in England and began teaching there. She moved to Boston and opened The Yoga Studio on Beacon Hill in 1980.
In addition to her local classes Barbara teaches yoga seminars throughout the US and internationally. She is a regular contributor of articles to Yoga Journal magazine. She has several audio CDs of live classes available as well as DVDs, the latest being Yoga for Beginners released by Body + Soul magazine, and Yoga for Stress Relief that includes a discussion on meditation from the Dalai Lama.
Barbara was kind enough to answer some questions from Amazon.com about this unique line of yoga DVDs.
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I was drawn to working with Bodywisdommedia because they produce DVDs they are interactive. Rather than a "one size fits all" single routine that is typical of most products, these DVDs offer choice, allowing the user to customize and change their yoga practice to suit their needs. No two persons are the same so the ability to change your practice - easing shoulder tension one day and an invigorating morning wake up the next - come as close as possible to allowing you to address your individual needs at home. Not only do people have different physical needs, but they have different time constraints as well. If you have only 20 minutes, there is a practice for you but there are longer practices as well (some as long as 90 minutes) that address the total body/mind connection. The sheer number of yoga sequences offered on each of these DVDs is a first. They are incredibly comprehensive.
How were you able to get the Dalai Lama involved?
This project dovetailed perfectly with the Dalai Lama's message that modern stress is one of the greatest obstacles to our mental happiness and physical wellbeing. Because we are long-time sincere practitioners, having a 30-minute lecture of the Dalai Lama teaching how to meditate on the Yoga for Stress Relief DVD was a perfect fit. Bodywisdommedia also has a broader relationship with the Office of Tibet and are releasing historic lectures with "A Path to Happiness" being the first one.
How will potential buyers of these DVDs know which one is right for them?
The titles are very indicative of what appears on the DVD and therefore a good guide. I really enjoyed making Yoga for Stress Relief because it is incredibly relevant. We strove to make the sequences accessible to as many people as possible, whether they are a beginner or long time practitioner. Yoga for Beginners is a great, non-threatening place to get started and includes lots of sound technique developed over my 30 years as a yoga teacher. Power Yoga for Every Body is a bit more challenging taking you from the beginning level and gradually progressing to much more demanding routines.
From the Editors of Body + Soul Magazine comes a new line of DVDs designed to excite, inform, inspire and encourage your quest toward a balanced and healthy whole life.
YOGA FOR BEGINNERS is the perfect way to be introduced to Yoga and it helps you to explore and experience the numerous benefits of yoga. There are 8 routines to help build strength, increase flexibility, improve your health and vitality and transform how you look and feel.
Routines are led by renowned instructor Barbara Benagh who expertly leads you through tailored workouts ranging from 10 to 60 minutes. YOGA FOR BEGINNERS was filmed on location at one of the most beautiful, tranquil beaches in the world, Half-Moon Bay, Antigua, which adds to the overall experience of tranquility.
DVD HIGHLIGHTS:
-8 Customized, Targeted Routines
-Exclusive Interview with the Instructor
-Routines from 10 - 60 Minutes
-Includes articles from Body + Soul magazine
Fat Free Yoga - Lose Weight & Feel Great FOR BEGINNERS & BEYOND w/ Ana Brett & Ravi Singh NOW W/THE **MATRIX**
from www.raviana.com
NOW WITH THE ALL NEW DESIGN YOUR OWN WORKOUT MATRIX MENU OPTION Experience Kundalini Yoga's sophisticated approach to effortless conditioning. Breathe, move, stretch, relax, meditate, celebrate! Boost your metabolism. Slim down, tone and feel inspired. These workouts and meditations will help you optimize your glandular system, bring emotional healing, reduce problem areas, and help you attain your personal ideal. This conveniently chaptered 90 min. DVD offers four 20 min. workouts (plus two meditations) to help you reshape your body and your life! This DVD starts with a breathing exercise for energizing and to curb impulsive habit patterns. Then the first segment Start Your Engines, features exercises to boost metabolism. Our favorite is the cardio warm-up called 'Ravi Rolls' with the breath of fire. The Fight Fire w/Fire segment focuses on abdominal strengthening and toning. These are exercises anyone can do, but you will really feel the burn. Segment 3: No Impact Aerobics really gets your circulation moving. You haven't lived until you've tried Frog Pose and Piston Pose! Your Life is in Your Own Glands will optimize hormonal balance. The two meditations on this DVD are for calming and emotional healing. The soothing Breath Meditation w/Hands Like a Teapot is more relaxing than a day at the spa! This DVD is for all levels. Modifications are given so that everyone can always participate. Long time yogis will find much new material to add to their yoga repertoire. This DVD features an inspired musical score by Tom Carden.
Yoga For Weight Loss - Beginner & Beyond (2007)
by Michael Wohl
from bodywisdom media
Reshape your body and feel great with these easy to follow routines. Now you can burn calories while toning and stretching your entire body. These practices will leave you feeling invigorated, more energetic and de-stressed.
Three Sections Of Routines
Getting Started Routines
As You Progress Routines
EXCLUSIVE BONUS SECTION: WEIGHTS & BANDS:
Integrates weights and resistance band work into yoga routines to intensify the workout.
With the variety of of routines, this DVD is perfect for both the beginner and seasoned student alike. You will feel younger, more fit and in shape with these targeted and effective routines.
This stunning and beautiful DVD was shot at one of the most majestic, tranquil beaches in the world, Half-Moon Bay, Antigua!
This revolutionary, interactive DVD allows you to choose from 12 customized routines ranging from 15-60 minutes to get you toned and feeling great. This special, easy to use system allows you to find the routine that is just right for your needs. Veteran instructor Maggie Rhoades gently guides you through these proven and effective routines.
Element: Ballet Conditioning
from ANCHOR BAY
The instructor, Elise, was kind enough to answer some questions from Amazon.com about the Element line of DVDs.
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Elise: A dancer's silhouette is the ideal physique for a woman today. It provides strength through lean, elegant, streamlined muscles. The strengthening of the dance conditioning movements will help melt away fat while creating lean musculature that is still feminine and graceful. The stretching element of dance creates length, not only in the muscles, but in the spine as well. Training with ballet conditioning will give a woman a strong, tall slender body.
How did you manage to create a ballet conditioning program that doesn't use a barre or any other equipment?
Elise: I created a workout that uses the strength of the core to create balance and stability in the body. The sequences on this dvd are both accessible and challenging for anyone! Many ballet conditioning exercises actually don't use the barre as a weight-bearing tool—it's only for balance. In this DVD a beginner can use a chair to aid in balance, as they build core strength. A more advanced practitioner can do much of the series without the aid of a chair, simply by bracing the body with the strength of the abdominals, and a lifted, elongated spine.
Who is this workout good for?
Elise: This workout is amazing for women and men of all shapes and sizes! Ballet Conditioning uses one's own body weight as resistance, so it is safe to do every day, for women AND men… from the strongest athlete, to the ultimate newcomer to fitness. It works to build strong, lean muscle, raise the heart-rate, and speed up metabolism. Dance also helps create rhythm, grace, and balance while building a supple flexible spine. .
What do you think consumers will find different about Element DVDs from other workout programs?
Elise: I know that consumers will enjoy the pure elegance of these DVDs. This is what truly sets the `element' series apart from other brands of DVDs. The Element DVD's encourage a solid mind/body connection, which encourages practitioners to explore their physical edge, while being truly mentally & emotionally present in the moment. These programs are fluid and graceful in their movement, and provide a HUGE physical fitness element in a nurturing and encouraging environment. .
Tell us about the connection with this DVD and the efforts to reduce global warming.
Elise: Element DVDs support the harmony of mind and body, which encourages a social and global awareness. This harmony encourages us to do what we can to make a difference in the world. For every four Element DVDs sold, a tree will be planted in a national forest. Consumers are therefore doing their part to reduce their carbon footprint, and the dangerous effects of global warming. If we work together, we can spread health and happiness one deep breath at a time.
Ballet Dancers always have slender bodies that are both strong and lean with lovely proportion and gorgeous body lines. One of the greatest secrets to a dancer's body is ballet conditioning which focuses on all muscle groups. In this unique program your muscles will work smoothly in unison to create a long streamlined silhouette with flat abs a lean lower body and beautifully defined curves. Moving gracefully and fluidly through this series of exercises you will strengthen and stretch your way to a dancer s body.Element is proud to support the Arbor Day Foundation. For every four Element DVDs purchased a tree will be planted (up to 20000 trees annually). In addition to generating oxygen trees provide air pollution control and decrease atmospheric carbon dioxide levels thereby reducing global warming. www.arborday.orgElise Gulan has over 18 years in dance education including Ballet Pointe Tap and Jazz. She was a principal soloist for the Virginia Ballet Company where she danced for seven years appearing in productions such as Copelia Swan Lake and Nutcracker Suite. She brought her love of expression through movement to her new career as a certified personal trainer and instructor of Yoga Core Fusion® and Core Energy Flow®. Elise enjoys helping her students to find their inner strength and to energize their joy of life through physical and mental fitness.System Requirements:Length: 51 minsFormat: DVD MOVIE Genre: HEALTH/FITNESS/DANCE Rating: NR UPC: 013131535198 Manufacturer No: DV15351
10 Minute Solution: Blast Off Belly Fat
by Andrea Ambandos
from ANCHOR BAY
Presents five ten-minute workouts designed to strengthen and tone the abdominal muscles.
Genre: Exercise/Fitness
Rating: NR
Release Date: 6-FEB-2007
Media Type: DVD
Kundalini Yoga for Beginners & Beyond NEW! Now with the **MATRIX** MENU OPTION!!!
by Ana Brett & Ravi Singh
from www.raviana.com
NOW FEATURING THE NEW DESIGN YOUR OWN WORKOUT MATRIX MENU OPTION!!! Kundalini Yoga for Beginners & Beyond has helped to establish Ana Brett & Ravi Singh and their signature yoga style as the most exciting new trend in yoga and fitness. This DVD contains exercises for flexiblity, strength building, aerobic efficiency, stress relief, back care, and much more: all with a through the roof fun factor! This amazingly effective daily workout features two 25 minute sets which can be done individually or together. Set one, Rise & Spine, will help you maintain a healthy back and raise your energy high! Set two features an original and fun version of the 'Five Tibetans,' exercises to keep you supple, youthful and vital for life! Also included: breath primer, meditation, deep relaxation, and a great soundtrack by Tom Carden. Discover why Ravi & Ana's client lists includes Madonna, Donna Karan, Gwyneth Paltrow, and the Red Hot Chile Peppers. This conveniently chaptered DVD, with the recently added Matrix gives you the option of designing your workout based on the time you have: pick and choose whichever segments you want to include in your workout and let them play in whatever order you'd like! This best-selling DVD has everything you need for high caliber fitness, peace of mind, and to give your life a total boost!
Yoga For Inflexible People
by Michael Wohl
from Bodywisdom Media, Inc.
Yoga isn't just for people who are already supple--it's a way to become more flexible. Yoga for Inflexible People presents modifications and props to make traditional poses accessible to people who could not otherwise perform them comfortably or correctly. You get more than 35 workouts and about four hours of instruction and practice in all. Choose a general workout, focus on an area of the body (shoulders, legs, hips, and back), or select a peaceful or energizing workout. Within each category, you have a choice of several different 15- to 75-minute series (some seated), much more variety than most videos offer. Some of the poses are beginning level; others are not. Leader Judi Rice demonstrates well, instructing by voice-over, though her expressionless face lacks warmth and personality. You'll need a yoga mat, blocks (or large books), a long strap or belt, a chair, and blankets. --Joan Price
Yoga For Inflexible People is for anyone who considers themselves inflexible. The yoga postures developed 5,000 years ago were not created for people who are already flexible, but rather to help inflexible people become more flexible. A wide range of poses are taught and modified to help both beginning and intermediate students experience the benefits of yoga. The modifications includes suggestions for the use of props, which can be either actual yoga props or items you have around the home, such as a belt or books, to assist you when you feel you need additional assistance. Of course if you do not need props, you do not have to use any.
Customized workouts allow you to progress at your own pace and the DVD contains dozens of routines which designed to carefully guide you along your journey into yoga.
When Yoga For Inflexible People was released, the Yoga Journal declared it "One of the most intelligent and useful presentations served up in a long time" and praised it as a DVD "...for all beginning students whether they are inflexible or flexible."
Yoga For Inflexible People continued to be commended as the Yoga Journal rated the DVD as one the Top Yoga DVDs ever produced. (December 2006)
Pilates During Pregnancy, Vol. 1
by Steve Forner
from reForm Pilates
Pilates During Pregnancy with Niece Pecenka - An inpiring Pilates based routine adapted for busy women in all trimesters who want to feel fit, healthy, and fabulous.
Pilates requires you to move consciously - using the breath to revitalize and energize - something you will need to depend on during and after childbirth. Every movement in Pilates emanates from the "center" - helping you focus on those muscles necessary for labor and delivery.
This routine is comprised of two distinct sections to make the most of you time.
Section I - abdominal and breath work = 15 minutes
Section II - side leg series, lower body work = 30 minutes
Sections I and II can be combined for a longer workout depending upon your time and energy level.
You will need a minimum of three blankets, folded and stacked. So Let's Move!
A.M. and P.M. Yoga
by Steve Adams
from Living Arts
A.M. Yoga for Beginners
"The morning is a precious time," says the narrator of A.M. Yoga for Beginners. "Just as the sun rises and falls, so do our natural rhythms. The morning is perfect time to open our bodies and center our minds." This 20-minute yoga practice with supple instructor Rodney Yee is the perfect way to start your day by energizing your body and calming your mind. Filmed on the beach at Maui at sunrise, the video starts with a 4-minute Conscious Relaxation focusing on breathing, then glides into a 14-minute series of yoga poses that are simultaneously relaxing and energizing. It ends with a 2-minute seated Guided Meditation to center your body and mind. Yee's instruction is detailed and gentle. The video is beautifully filmed: you watch the waves roll in as Yee demonstrates yoga poses on a sandy beach. The yoga practice awakens and stretches your muscles gently, leaving you balanced and focused. "Yoga is the foundation of my day," says Yee. "A few minutes in the morning will help give meaning to your day." --Joan Price
P.M. Yoga for Beginners
"The evening is the perfect time to calmly transition between being active and being quiet," says Patricia Walden, instructor of P.M. Yoga for Beginners. "One of the greatest gifts yoga has to offer is deep relaxation." This 20-minute program is designed to balance, calm, and revitalize you at the end of the day. It starts with centering poses: gentle stretches bringing awareness and quiet to your senses. Next are standing poses to release tension, increase circulation, expand the lungs, and help you breathe more deeply. Next, forward bends cool the body and bring quiet to the nervous system. The final restorative poses are so relaxing that you may fall asleep. Walden tells you not only how to do the poses, but what you should feel, and how to quiet your body and your mind. Instruction is soothing and explicit. Although this video is aimed at beginners, seldom are modifications given for the less flexible novice, so if any pose causes discomfort or seems impossible, don't push beyond your personal comfort level. The video was filmed on the windswept sands of Death Valley. --Joan Price
Shiva Rea - Yoga Shakti
from Gemini Sun Records
Comprehensive but user-friendly, reasonably challenging but accessible to a variety of levels, Yoga Shakti is inarguably one of the best yoga products on the market--no small achievement when one considers just how many of them there are. Instructor-creator Shiva Rea, a California-based yogi of considerable international renown, specializes in vinyasa yoga (a vinyasa is essentially a series of flowing, connected poses, incorporating breath and movement and cultivating heat, strength, flexibility, and balance). Four complete practices are presented, ranging in length from 42 to 85 minutes and including Basic Flow (for beginners), two more vigorous Solar Flow sequences, and a Lunar Flow sequence falling somewhere in the middle in terms of degree of difficulty; familiar poses like sun salutations, forward bends, lunges, twists, and inversions are featured, although Rea adds many of her own touches (such as the four "dancing warrior" sections, sun salutation variations designed for intermediate users and focusing on hips, backbends, and so on), and there are also sections devoted to pranayama (breathing exercises) and meditation. It's all good, but the principal innovation of Yoga Shakti is the "yoga matrix," which allows users to customize and program their own workouts, drawing on portions of any or all of the four sequences to create series of various lengths and levels of intricacy (some guidelines are suggested for the less experienced) and thus keep their practices fresh and evolving. One can also do the various workouts with or without the instruction audio track on (the Indian-New Age-flavored music is quite good, and usually unobtrusive), and there's even an entire second disc, containing interviews, additional instruction, travel footage (filming took place primarily in India and the Maldive Islands), and more. All in all, Yoga Shakti is most impressive. --Sam Graham
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