by Cathy Wurzer, Minnesota Public Radio

April 24, 2013

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Editor's note: This is our 12th report following University of St. Thomas professor Bruce Kramer as he copes with life after being diagnosed with ALS, also known as Lou Gehrig's Disease.

MINNEAPOLIS -- The ancient discipline of yoga keeps attracting new followers. By some estimates, 15 to 20 million Americans now practice one of its many forms. Devotees say not only do the stretches and poses release their stiffness and stress, but they come away calmer and more centered after a session.

Yoga is not only for the able bodied. Matthew Sanford has been teaching what's known as adaptive yoga to people with disabilities since 2002 at his Minnetonka studio, Mind/Body Solutions, and at Courage Center in Minneapolis. Kramer, who now uses a motorized wheelchair as his body grows weaker with ALS, or Lou Gehrig's Disease, is one of his students. For the past few months, he says yoga has given him a greater sense of freedom.

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In a small conference room at the Courage Center in Golden Valley, the room was ringed recently with people ending their day -- most in wheelchairs. Some are on the floor, propped up with cushions and pillows. All, including Kramer, have their eyes closed, listening to Sanford.

"Balance your head over your neck. Soften the skin on your face. Close your eyes top to bottom. If you haven't, let go of your day. Prepare your mind to do yoga," he says. "On these next few breaths, imagine someone's pushing on the inner edge of your shoulder blade and you're exhaling from the back ribs forward. You're exhaling through your nose, if you can, so there's a release."

Like most of his students, Sanford is in a wheelchair. At the age of 13, he was in a horrible car accident that killed his father and sister and left him paralyzed from the chest down.

Read this article:
Living with ALS: Yoga reconnects a disconnected body

The Art of Living Foundation shares certain yoga practices that can help you get rid of neck pain.

Gone are the days when 'small is good' was the motto. Today we want everything to be better than the rest. Better house, better salary, better grades; even a better world.

The strife for perfection is driving us all crazy. You may say, 'It is all about evolution'! But the pace at which we are evolving is taking a toll on our health: mental, physical and emotional.

Our desires have taken shape of needs and the fulfillment of these needs requires commitment towards work. In due course we overstrain ourselves, converting the body to a factory. Wear and tear follows next. A very common ailment that affects most of us then is neck pain.

Cervicalgia, which is neck pain in medical terms, arises mostly from long, continuous hours of sitting in the same posture or a rough night of sleep and reduced workout.

When the causes of neck pain are so simple, why not the cure?

To do away with the 'pain in the neck', we bring to you seven simple steps (asanas or yoga postures) that are easy-to-do and won't eat into your daily busy schedule.

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Yoga poses to relieve neck pain

Melbourne, Apr. 22 (ANI): People, who practice yoga, have sex and a hot shower give themselves the best chance of having a good night's sleep, a study has claimed.

The ReDormin Sleep Study found that doing yoga can increase a person's sleep by 64 minutes, while making love and a hot shower before going to bed can each give you 6 minutes of extra sleep, the Courier Mail reported.

Janeen Davidson of Beenleigh's Yoga and More Studio said that having a hot shower cooled the body to an optimum temperature and enabled a person to sleep; she also called making love the ultimate relaxation.

She said that the yoga quietens the adrenal responses and cortisol responses and it's a calm practice which brings a person's mind to rest.

Ambarissa Stone of the Australian School of Meditation and Yoga Springwood, said that yoga really has three aspects - a person's physical, mental and spiritual state.

She said that the first one is that yoga helps to ease tight muscles, increase strength mobility and balance the nervous system.

Stone asserted that it also helped mentally, saying that the mind is most often what keeps people awake at night and during yoga it helped them to deepen their breath, which in turn helped them slow down the mind.

She added that yoga also helped spiritually and true yoga practise always included an element of meditation. (ANI)

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Yoga, sex and hot shower help you have a good night sleep