Scott Anderson Yoga

Pre-Yoga has become an integral part of Alignment Yoga. On the level of metaphor, Pre-Yoga is an expression of self-acceptance. In the literal realm, Pre-Yoga are those exercises that awaken and strengthen the core muscles of postural support. The human body is a marvel of engineering. For nearly every possible movement, there’s built-in redundancy. While there’s an optimal and most-efficient means to make a given movement, there are myriad other ways the body can make the same movement. In general, the optimal movement patterns live up to their label – offering optimal efficiency, grace and stamina. The other movement patterns get the job done, but often at the expense of comfort, ease and sustainability. We all have various compensation patterns in our bodies. Whether from illness, injury or stress, we have learned various ways to move and hold our bodies that are sub-optimal. Much of the fatigue people report as they reach their 40’s isn’t necessarily metabolic nor organic, but rath

Years ago I celebrated New Years with some friends in Calcutta. It was an interesting experience in so many ways, not the least of which was the opportunity to view the contents of our cultures from the inside out. After finishing another delicious meal, my host, Mr. Shivcharan Babu, offered me a digestive aid. It seemed curious to think of the contents of the gilded, silver box as anything besides tasty mints, but the choice of words was obviously deliberate. In the West, we tend to view food’s health-giving potential in terms of its nutritional content. We strive to choose the foods packing the biggest nutritional wallop (superfoods), and go to great lengths to ensure their freshness. I find many of my Indian friends, on the other hand, have little interest in fresh vegetables, and find discussing the relative nutritional merits of food quite puzzling. Why focus on what’s in the food (the external) when you can focus on our body’s capacity to extract the available nutrients from what