Posts Tagged James Bryan

Chair Yoga – what is it?

Chair yoga with yoga teacher James Bryan from Knoff Yoga
Chair Yoga is a set of yoga poses which uses a chair. Why a chair? Everyone has a chair, yet not everyone can do a a full yoga class. Using a chair is a very useful prop as it provides stability and safety.

As well, anyone who has attended an Iyengar yoga class, which uses props, will realise how much deeper you can go into a yoga pose with the use of props.

For Liveyogalife.com, James Bryan from Knoff Yoga carefully crafted two sets of chair yoga classes:

  • Level 1 Open is a series of classes that improves your strength, flexibility, stability and mental awareness – all the time you are sitting in a chair.
  • Level 2 Foundation takes these exercises deeper with a more energetic series of exercises that includes standing and balancing using the chair as support.

Check out all of James’ Chair Yoga classes here.

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Australian Yoga Journal – Get your FREE Yoga CD in August 2012 edition

Australian Yoga Journal - Chair Yoga with James BryanWe are once again delighted to be featured in the August / September 2012 issue of Australian Yoga Journal magazine. The magazine comes with a complimentary CD featuring a 30-minute Chair Yoga Open Level Class by one of Australia’s most experienced teachers, James Bryan. James teaches at the Knoff Yoga School in Cairns with Nicki Knoff.

In this class (Chair Yoga Level 2 Class 2 – Chest-Openers & Back Bends), James expertly guides you through postures that work on releasing the shoulders, opening the chest, and releasing tension and strengthening the lower and upper back. Once again, these focus points are high-lights to a complete and whole-body exercise.

These are a series of four guided classes that builds on the Level 1 Program with stronger and deeper physical exercises involving standing-up and using your chair either for support or for stronger and deeper stretches as a prop.

Check out the complimentary class in this month’s issue of Australian Yoga Journal magazine, available at your local newsagent today!

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The Benefits of Chair Yoga

Chair Yoga with James Bryan

Chair Yoga is a fun set of exercises, loosely based on yoga poses, that you can do from the comfort of your own chair. It is great for all levels and abilities. This includes:

  • in an office and needing an exercise program you can do at your desk.
  • with a group in a retirement village looking to maintain your active lifestyles.
  • in a wheelchair and wanting to do something by yourself.
  • recovering from an injury and wanting to increase your core stability and strength quickly.

The benefits of chair yoga are numerous:

  • improved fitness from the comfort of you own chair.
  • more energy.
  • improved flexibility and strength.
  • able to do the class in a group or by yourself.
  • improved breathing.
  • low impact exercise that you can do anywhere.
  • feeling more relaxed.

In these classes you will learn gentle yoga postures, breathing techniques, meditation and relaxation methods, designed to develop physical fitness and clarity of mind.

James Bryan is a yoga teacher with over 30 years experience and designed two Chair Yoga series for you to choose from.

For Open / Beginner / Foundation Level – Check out Chair Yoga Series of Classes. Exercise from the comfort of your own chair with experienced Cairns-based yoga teacher James Bryan. No yoga experience required.

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New Product Release: Yoga with a Chair Complete Set

Experienced Hatha Yoga Teacher - James Bryan

Check out this new release – the complete set of 7 Chair Yoga Open Level Classes.

These classes are designed to support you to maintain and enhance your fitness, and quality of life. The physical exercises (called yoga postures) together with the breath-work provide a holistic program supporting you to keep your body, mind and spirit active and healthy.

These classes have been design for use by anyone in the comfort of their own home, or in a group with the assistance of a diversional therapist or suitable qualified health professional.

Each class covers – centring, breath-work, yoga postures, guided-relaxation, and positive philosophy. They provide a well-rounded practice to stimulate your body, mind and spirit.

Level 1 is designed for where you are solely in your chair. Level 2 are more active classes compared to level 1, and have been designed for use by anyone active and stable on their feet, and are specially useful if you need the support of a chair for some balance or support.

Its really easy to start – all that you need is your chair.

Level 1 Class 1 – Breath & Foundation: With this class you will experience a complete practice that exercises your body and stimulates your mind. The intention is for you to feel energised, centred, calm and relaxed. It focuses on stretching your arms and sides, and increasing mobility through twists.

Level 1 Class 2 – Hamstrings & Core Stability: Building on from Class 1, this class further exercises your body and stimulates your mind. It focuses on gently stretching your arms, sides and back, increasing mobility through twists, and increasing your core stability. The intention is for you to feel energised, centred, calm and relaxed.

Level 1 Class 3 – Lateral Stretches & Twists: This class further explores increasing mobility in your arms, and side, and works to stretch your legs, and further develop your core stability. You will exercise your body while stimulating your mind. By the end of the class, you will feel energised, calm and relaxed.

Level 2 Class 1 – Balance & Standing Postures: This class builds on the concepts & principles from Level 1, James takes you one step up into this active set of Level 2 classes. In Class 1, you are introduced to standing postures that work on your balance and grounding. Explore traditional postures like Triangle Pose, Plank Pose, and Downward-Facing Dog, among many others, using a chair for both support and to take you deeper into the pose.

Level 2 Class 2 – Chest-Openers & Back Bends: Building on the foundation from Level 2 Class 1, James guides you through postures that work on releasing the shoulders, opening the chest, and releasing tension and strengthening the lower and upper back. Once again, these focus points are high-lights to a complete and whole-body exercise.

Level 2 Class 3 – Grounding & Leg Stretches: Here James Bryan builds the foundation work from Classes 1 & 2, exploring deeper hip, groin, and hamstring stretches. This holistic class gives you a complete body-mind-soul routine, with James’s consistent emphasis on breath-work, and positive philosophy to assist you in taking yoga off the mat!

Level 2 Class 4 – Core Stability & Twists: This is an energetic class which integrates the balancing and grounding work established in the previous classes, and which focuses on deeper abdominal work, twists, and back bends. A good class for integrating the philosophy, breath-work, strength & stability cultivated through these series of Chair Yoga Level 2 classes.

For Open / Beginner / Foundation Level – Check out Chair Yoga Complete Set (Classes 1 to 7). Exercise from the comfort of your own chair with experienced Cairns-based yoga teacher James Bryan. No yoga experience required.

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Thoughts on Meditation

Yoga Teacher - James Bryan

Written by experienced yoga teacher James Bryan from Knoff Yoga School in Cairns, Queensland

For those of us who practice Hatha Yoga (asana, pranayama and meditation), when we are pressed for time, meditation often gets set aside – we want to do it, but how to fit it in our busy day? To get the full benefit that Hatha Yoga offers, we do need to meditate and in this article, we will look at a few reasons for setting up a daily routine to include it.

Patanjali, the father of Yoga, recommends an 8-step program which includes the practice of:

  1. Yama – our attitudes towards our environment and consists of five restraints
  2. Niyama – our attitudes towards ourselves and consists of five observances
  3. Asana – the practice of body/mind exercises
  4. Pranayama – the control and expansion of vital energy
  5. Pratyahara – the internalization and resting of the mind by disconnecting it temporarily from the sensory organs
  6. Dharana – the ability to direct and concentrate our minds
  7. Dhyana – sustained concentration or meditation
  8. Samadhi – self-realization or super-consciousness

This is based upon:

  1. Awakening the Body
  2. Awakening the Breath
  3. Awakening the Mind

… or, moving from the gross to the subtle. Another way of looking at the intent of Patanjali’s traditional sequence is comparing to a child’s developmental stages of crawling, walking, running. You need to learn how to control the energies of the physical body, which is tangible, before we will have success with the less tangible breath and the ephemeral mind.

The effects of yoga practice are cumulative, this is, they build upon each other and overall it is greater than what would be achieved from doing the asana, pranayama and meditation separately – the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.

Because the body and breath have already been awakened by the time we are ready to meditate (with traditional sequencing), the meditation can be more powerful and effective. Keep in mind that 10 minutes of focus is more beneficial than 30 minutes of fuzz. No part of yoga practice is about chronological time; it is always about the awareness/consciousness we attain.

“A slack spine equals a dull mind”. When meditating, it is vital to sit correctly with a properly activated and elongated spine. To do this we need to slightly flatten out the lumbar (lower back) and cervical (neck) curves. Internally we balance along the median plane by aligning the soft palate of the mouth over the perineum – then pressing down into the sitting bones and lengthening through the crown of the head. When sitting properly, the mind is energized and meditation will be more successful, i.e. alert and attentive to whatever meditation technique we are using. With correct posture and technique, the spine should be longer after the finish of meditation than when we started.

In Vipassana Meditation it is recommended to sit for 2 hours per day, 1 hour in the morning and 1 hour in the evening. Because we encourage the practice of Hatha Yoga for 1 to 2 hours per day, as well as meditation, the overall time commitment is impractical for those with work, family and life responsibilities. We found that when meditating for 2 hours (in addition to asana and pranayama), some of the time we would be mentally drifting off because we were tired, i.e. non productive time. This experience taught us to adjust the Vipassana ‘chronological’ recommendation (doing time) and focus on the quality/clarity – “quality vs. quantity”, that is, making the best use of our limited time.

Meditation is highly beneficial BUT ONLY when we are awake, alert and attentive. If you are tired and falling asleep, go to bed!

Regardless of the type or style of yoga we practice, the ultimate goal is the same – Samadhi, which is super-consciousness or experiencing a profound sense of belonging in the universe, of oneness with the life-force sustaining all of nature. We require a strong body and nervous system in order to achieve this desirable goal. We obtain a strong body and nervous system from practising asana and pranayama. The Buddha did 6 years of austerities (yogic practices) before reaching enlightenment. By his example, we see the importance of asana and pranayama in any meditation practice.

In Patanjali’s teachings, we see that all of the 8 Limbs of Yoga are equally important, and with experience in practice it is obvious that they are all spokes in the same wheel – each contributing to the overall integrity and strength of the whole.

Once students are competent with the Beginner Level syllabus (Knoff Yoga) they should easily be able to complete it in 45 minutes (including relaxation and pranayama) in order to fit in 5 minutes of meditation – for a total daily investment of 50 minutes. This is not too much to ask for health and well-being. It is possible to get up an hour earlier to make space in your life for yoga.

Once students are competent with the Foundation Level syllabus (Knoff Yoga) they should easily be able to complete it in 1 hour and 10 minutes (including relaxation and pranayama), in order to fit in 20 minutes of meditation – for a total daily investment of 1 and 1/2 hours. Yes, this is a considerable slice out of the day, but it can be done by getting up earlier and dedicating yourself to becoming the best person you can be.

Make sure with your meditation, you are focusing on quality and not quantity. 5 minutes of sitting with a dull mind is 5 minutes wasted.

Experiment with the practice and see what works best for you.

Yours in Yoga,

James Bryan

James has a range of products available for you – from Chair Yoga for all levels to Pranayama for beginners and intermediate:

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Notes along the Path

Yoga Teacher - James Bryan

Written by experienced yoga teacher James Bryan from Knoff Yoga School in Cairns, Queensland

If we use the metaphor of hiking in the wilderness as an example of our yogic adventures, then we understand that a relatively small amount of time is spent on the mountain tops – the ah-ha moments, and the majority of the time we are down in the valleys – on the mat slogging away. Becoming clearer on the yogic path and dropping social and mental limitation is comparable to reducing the weight of our backpack – lightening the load!

Physically we take the uplifting path (light/vibrant body), but mentally we must descend through the beta, alpha, theta and delta mental states. As we learn to focus the mind more and more to illuminate the hidden parts of ourselves, we start to release the suppressed contents of our sub-conscious and eventually approach the threshold of the unconscious and eventually the super-conscious mind.

This spiritual evolution is not linear and contains both steps forward and partial retreats. We are told by the ancient yogis that any effort extended is never wasted. Obvious signs of progress are increasing feelings of compassion and clarity.

Feelings of isolation and separation are signs of experiencing the world through the predominance of one cerebral hemisphere; in our culture normally the left (analytical, linear, fight or flight activation, etc.). As we progress and learn how to access and activate both hemispheres simultaneously, not only do we access more brain power, but we also experience profound feelings of unity and harmony – because we are no longer divided within ourselves. Moving from beta… alpha… theta… and finally to delta brain waves… results in complete co-operation and utilization of our separate selves and is the end game of yoga = Samadhi.

When we designed the Knoff Yoga program of 5 levels: Beginner, Foundation, Intermediate, Advanced and Master, we wanted a clear path for our students to follow. Our experiences taught us that most students (and teachers for that matter) are stumbling along in the dark and are very lucky not to trip and fall. One of the pitfalls of the Western approach to yoga is to make asana the total focus and omit the synergistic tools of the rest of the 8 Limbs of Yoga. Another is the window shopping approach, i.e., yoga this week and pilates the next. We designed our program to include 5 elements: Meditation, Pranayama, Asana, Relaxation and Philosophy. If any of these integral and essential parts of the yogic path are missing, then our students will not receive the promised benefits they read about in yoga books.

In feudal Japan, the Samurai warriors had only 8 sword movements to fight with. Their techniques had to be totally practical because their lives depended upon it. Today in Kendo there are 100’s of sword movements – what has happened? We kept this in mind when designing the Knoff Yoga program and see great value in the K.I.S.S. (keeping it straightforward and simple) approach to yoga – providing it works of course.

Our passion is to share the physical, mental and spiritual benefits of yoga. Our goal is to offer training that is transformational, and imparts the techniques and philosophy of yoga as well as the enthusiasm to make yoga a life-long choice. We understand that Knoff Yoga will grow and prosper in direct relation to the positive impact it has upon the lives of our teachers and students.

The path of yoga is not easy, nor is it always fun, but it is always worthwhile. 95% of the effort required is in just getting on the mat with no compromises and no excuses. You will always be glad you made the small effort for a substantial return of good health and well-being.

James has a range of products available for you – from Chair Yoga for all levels to Pranayama for beginners and intermediate:

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