Tanja Alexandra Kern 
Greetings to you, dearest reader, can you believe it is already 2017?
Most of us have been more sedentary over the holidays and colder/rainy or even snowy winter weather.
So, here’s my challenge to inspire your yoga practice in the new year:
– To all of you who haven’t done yoga before, beginners or if haven’t practice in a while: The time to begin (again) is NOW!
The following sequences may have some yoga poses that you may like to try, for your consideration. This way you can join our challenge.
You Are Amazing Yoga Sequence Flow
Yoga for a Better Night’s Sleep
Yoga to Boost Your Immune System
– To all practicing Yogis and Yoginis: Supercharge, Deepen and Radically Improve your Yoga Practice, Enhance your Alignment and Enjoyment of Asanas, Let your Body, Mind, Spirit and Heart Receive the Benefits of your regular Yoga Practice!
One day at a time I challenge you to find one yoga pose. It can be a pose that you really enjoy or one that you would like to work on, or both. 🙂
To improve, deepen and enhance your practice I encourage you to send me a photo of you in the pose or describe what your challenges are, to support you in understanding the alignment, staying safe and then giving yourself permission to fully enjoying your yoga practice.
By practicing, even if just one yoga pose, for 8 days you will improve your practice. It doesn’t matter if you only spend a few minutes or an hour. Let go of pushing yourself into the pose, trying too hard and just let your breath take you into the pose. If you are one of my lovely yoga students please feel free to ask me about your challenges before or after class.
And when does it start? There is no time like the present moment. It starts Now, Today! You can do it! Just find a few minutes today and join us! It’s not too late to join us even on day 2.
Everyday we will focus on a specific quality:
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Day One (Friday, January 6th): Breath ~ Lengthen and expand your breath, feel your breath and connect your movement with it.
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Day Two: Mindfulness ~ Feel the air touching your skin, your sitting-bones grounding you, and your spine lengthening. Notice.
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Day Three: Awareness ~ Become aware of the sensations in your body, the fluctuations of your mind, the rhythm of your breath, etc.
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Day Four: Comfort ~ Find your alignment and then begin to soften into your pose.
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Day Five: Play ~ Give yourself permission to have fun while practicing yoga, roll around, cultivate an inner smile, laugh out loud, enjoy.
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Day Six: Drishti ~ Find a gazing point that is still somewhere in front of you, maybe on the floor, and focus your awareness on that point.
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Day Seven: Power Center ~ Focus on and connect to your Solar Plexus Chakra, connect to your inner power, keep the core gently engaged through your practice.
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Day Eight: Bringing it all together ~ Melt into the pose(s) and let your breath, asana, mind and body become one. Open your heart and enjoy your practice.
Are you open to share your experience? I would love to hear from you. How has this challenge affected you, your yoga practice, your body, mind, spirit, heart, emotions, balance, harmony, strength? Has it brought up mind-chatter, doubts, fears, should’s or have to’s?
I would so appreciate if you would share your experience with me, and maybe even share it online, to 
support, encourage and uplift others. Even if you had a difficult time, know that you are not alone, and that whatever you experience, others will benefit from by reading about it.
Follow us, interact and post your experiences and/or pictures everyday of this 8 Day Challenge on either Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, or leave your comments underneath this post on the Mendocino Healing webpage.
Let’s do this together! Are you ready?
Many blessings from my heart to yours,
Tanja
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Tanja Alexandra Kern
6 Comments
Thank you for sharing your experience, Lindsay! So glad it helped you to calm down and get ready for your day.
Many blessings,
Tanja
day two: very interesting for me. i couldn’t imagine feeling the air on a bundled up body, so i sat in my underwear, facing one of our big windows, my right side near the wood stove which was soon toasty.
one body side warm, the other cool. cold feet. then my thoughts flittered off to ponder the fact that my credit card was AGAIN compromised and shut down. 3 times in one year. ok, let that one go. suddenly i felt how intensely grounded i was – my root chakra was doing it’s thing!! such an intense wonderful feeling. i just sat there for a good while and was grateful that i have a warm house, yoga, my friends and especially YOU, my wonderful yoga and spiritual teacher.
Thank you for sharing, dear Sabine! <3
day three – i wonder why child’s pose is not one of my favorites. hard for me to relax into it. i continuously feel my shoulders tightening. i then relax them and after a while there they go again. it’s just not a really comfortable pose for me. stretching my arms out in front of me hurts my shoulders, so i fold them in. i felt all of this over and over again and probably need to do more of it rather than be grouchy.
Thank you for sharing, Sabine. There are other modifications in Childspose that I am happy to show you. Thank you for doing the Yoga Challenge with me! 🙂
I was a bit stressed this morning trying to get out of the house for an appt and the phone ringing repeatedly. Figured this was an ideal time to stop and sit down (radical idea!) and just breathe before I jumped in my car. I counted my in breath and then doubled the count for my exhale. In literally 2 minutes I was calmed down and ready to drive. Now why don’t I remember to do that more often?! Thanks to Tanja’s yoga challenge I remembered that tool and remembered how effective it can be.
Lindsay