or take the bickecycle out in the frish air

As far as yoga, any practice should lead you in a good direction. Just open your mind and your heart to it.

As far as yoga, any practice should lead you in a good direction. Just open your mind and your heart to it.
You need to understand your "SELF". This is acheived with meditation. Meditation is a form of "YOGA". For your info there is no meaning for the word YOGA. It is a synonym used to describe the various excersises. YOGA Asanna as it is called in India has 8 levels of which meditation is one. Thru meditation all your questions will be answered. To achieve your objectives first you have to identify a "GURU". This guru will be your guide to attaining the level of understanding your "SELF".
Yoga Tips for Ladies: Upward Facing Dog

Upward Facing Dog is a easy to moderate position and is great for strengthening shoulders, triceps, quads, and back. Also stretches the front body.

1. Place your palms flat on the floor next to your shoulders, with your fingers pointed forward. Extend your feet out behind you.

2. Press your body up and bring your chest to the ceiling, arch your back, and extend your neck by lifting your chin.

3. Lift your quads off the mat by putting some weight on the tops of your feet. Be sure to keep your arms close to your body, keeping your elbows soft.

4. Hold this pose for 5 to 8 breaths.
Pranayam. Or deep breathing will help you immensely. Before you start, sit with your legs crossed (or any other comfortable position), close your left nostril with ur index finger and breathe in deeply through your right nostril. Take in as much air as possible.Now exhale through your left nose with force. Repeat the same with procedure (inhale) with the left nostril and exhale from the right. Dit for 5-10 minutes. Then start the deep breathing with both the nostrils, hands on the knees. Breathe deeply, taking in as much oxygen as possible. Release with force. It may cause a head rush as the brain gets a lot of oxygen,,this will help you in meditating and relieving stress. You can if needed chant om but its not essential.Just keep your eyes closed and concentrate on ur breathing. Deep breathing -breathe from ur stomach. All the best!
It’s funny you ask this question because I just happen to be deeply indulged in the Tibetan book of living and dying.

As an old Yogin once said, A mystik that can turn the ground into the ceiling or levitate does not impress me much, what truely impresses me is the ability to turn a negative energy into something positive.

So as you can see, this is not something that is easy, it is all a state of mind. From what I gather, the key is to catch your self in mid thought whenever something (negative and positive) is happening and figure out what the source of it is. The next step is to release the thought from your mind so that you are free from thought. After a prolonged period (it often takes years) of this practice and meditation, you will find yourself in situations in which you are able to realize the nature of the discussions and be able to turn them positive.

This is the path to enlightenment… being able to become self aware of every situation and have a free mind from all thought (which is much more difficult than one would think).
Recent medical studies have shown that a regular practice of yoga and meditation is effective at lowering levels of anxiety.

Excessive anxiety can be alleviated through a slow, gentle yoga practice focusing on postures that calm the heart and the mind, balance the emotions, and release body tension.

Pranayama (yogic breathing) and meditation will also be helpful to calm the mind and body, and to reduce stress and negative thinking.

Physical sensations alone are not the core of the illness. Fearful thoughts, unpleasant emotions, avoidant behaviors, disturbing sensations, and deteriorating relationships all collude with one another to maintain panic. Thoughts such as the fear of dying or of having a mental breakdown are common. Even mild anxiety can trigger an attack, and any disturbing emotion can be interpreted as a precursor to full-fledged panic.

Yoga tells us that before searching for a cure it is important to look deeply into the nature and causes of illness. It is also important to get an idea of how things will be when symptoms have been removed, because otherwise we may have illusions about what recovery will be like. For example, eliminating anxiety is not the outcome of treatment for panic-the outcome is the ability to manage anxious feelings.

Yoga training can be particularly useful here, for yoga teaches us how to interact with the nervous system. If we want to soothe and strengthen it, we need to learn deep, relaxed yogic breathing. Regardless of the pathways of arousal, breathing is the language of nervous system balance and control.

Practicing yoga is a good way to learn breathing skills, for it is a gradual process, often needing considerable support over a period of time. Yoga teachers quickly recognize when a student is having trouble (as is often the case with panickers), and they know a wide variety of alternate practices that will help the student master breathing skills.

Yoga psychology also suggests many techniques for resolving conflicts, including acknowledging and accepting the conflict in all its depth; recognizing the need for some kind of change; resisting the inclination to act out feelings or to do nothing; exploring alternatives; communicating with others without blaming them; accepting feedback from others; using discrimination in accepting or rejecting alternatives; surrendering to necessary losses; acting with determination; accepting outcomes with equanimity; working calmly on a problem even if a negative outcome, or no outcome, seems inevitable; and letting intuition suggest new possibilities.

These strategies are derived from what in yoga are called the yamas and niyamas-the attitudes toward life that are the basis of all yoga practices.

Trianga Mukhaikapada Paschimottanasana :

Trianga means three limbs or parts thereof. In this posture the three parts are the feet, knees and the buttocks. Mukhaikapada corresponds to the face touching one leg. In Paschimottanasana the back of the whole body is intensely stretched.

Technique :

Sit on the floor with the legs stretched straight in the front.

Bend the right leg at the knee and move the right foot back. Place the right foot at the side of the right hip joint, keep the toes pointing back and rest them on the floor. The inner side of the right calf will touch the outer side of the right thigh.

Balance in this position throwing the weight of the body on the bent knee. In the beginning body tilts to the side of the outstretched leg, and the foot of the outstretched leg also tilts outwards. Learn to balance in this position, keeping the foot and toes stretched and pointing forward.

Now hold the left foot with both the palms, gripping the sides of the sole if you can then extend the trunk forward and hook the wrists round the outstretched left foot. Take two deep breaths.

Join the knees, exhale and bend forward. Rest first the forehead, then the nose next the lips and ultimately the chin of the left knee. To achieve this widen the elbows and push the trunk forward with an exhalation.

Do not rest the left elbow on the floor. In the beginning one looses the balance and topples over to the side of the extended leg. The trunk should therefore be slightly bent towards the side of the bent leg and the weight of the body should be taken by the bent knee.

Stay in this position from half a minute to a minute, breathing evenly.

Inhale, raise the head and trunk, release the hands, straighten the right leg and come to the position.

Repeat the pose on the other side, keeping the right leg stretched out on the ground, bending the left knee and placing the left foot by the left hip joint. Stay for the same length of the time on both the sides.

Please note that some yogic practices can have harmful side effects if practiced incorrectly. This is why it’s important to find a good teacher. You can use yogafinders.com to look up yoga teachers in your area. Ask about a teacher’s training and the length of time they’ve been practicing yoga as well as how long they’ve been teaching. Ask to take a drop-in class before signing up for a series with a teacher you don’t know.

Below are three simple practices which will reduce anxiety.

1. Asana — Viparita karani. Lie down on your back on the floor near a wall and stretch your legs up the wall. If your hamstrings are tight, have your hips away from the wall a few inches. If your hamstrings are flexible, have your hips closer to the wall, or gently touching it. If your forehead is not parallel to the ceiling, place a neatly folded blanket under your head. Allow your arms to rest on the floor, a few inches from your body, with the palms facing up. Breathe through your nose. Receive the breath, rather than take it. Allow the breath to breathe you. Soften the belly and allow the breath to come in and out without any attempt to control it. (This may sound odd, but try it and see. Yoga is a science and this relationship with the breath is something you can experiment with for yourself.) After 5 minutes with your legs stretched up the wall, bend your knees, roll to your right and stay on your right side for a few breaths. Then push your left hand into the floor, using the strength of your upper body to bring you back to a sitting position. Let your head come up last.

http://yoga.about.com/od/yogaposes/a/legsup.htm

2. Pranayama — Nadi shodana (alternate nostril breathing) Please note. Pranayama should be done gently and steadily when beginning. NO Forcing of the breath or aggressive inhales/exhales. Persons who smoke should not practice most pranayamas.

Sit upright with your legs crossed, with your spine in a long line (not a military posture, though) with your shoulders above your sitting bones. You may sit in a chair with both feet flat on the floor and parallel to each other. You may sit on the floor with your back up against a wall. Exhale completely out of both nostrils.
Close your right nostril with your right thumb or index finger. Inhale gently and steadily through your left nostril. Close your left nostril with your right ring finger or your left index finger. Exhale through your right nostril. Inhale gently and steadily through your right nostril. Close your right nostril and exhale through the left nostril. Inhale through your left nostril. Close the left nostril and exhale through the right. (Basically, you’re inhaling through the nostril you just exhaled from, then you close that nostril and exhale out of the opposite nostril.) When the sun is up, finish by exhaling out of the left nostril. When the sun is down, finish by exhaling out of the right nostril.

Meditation–There are so many styles of meditation! Finding a good teacher is so helpful! If you’d like to start on your own, sit upright (see instructions for pranayama above) gently close your eyes and observe your breath. Feel your breath–feel the breath breathing you. (see viparita karani above.)Notice when the inhale turns into the exhale. Notice how the inhale begins. Make no judgments about what you observe–simply feel and notice the breath. If your mind wanders, come back to observing the breath, without judging yourself for it. (or notice the judgmental thought and let it go.) Begin with 5 minutes a day for several days (perhaps a month.) Then increase a few minutes and do that for a month or so. Working up to 20 minutes of meditation a day will be very beneficial. A longer meditation practice is also wonderful, but a teacher is highly recommended for guiding a longer meditation practice.

And when you can clearly see that life and those dreams in your mind’s eye; how confident you will walk and how proud you will feel–Start walking and feeling like that today.

Thoughts become things….choose the good ones!

What is Prayer? Well its Talking to GOD.

What is meditation?

Well its Listening to GOD

Doing these 2 things Daily Can Easily release tension and Anxiety aswell as Give you that positive Energy BOOST.

How?

Ok Well Here it all is.

What are you doing when you pray?
Asking for Guidance, Admitting you might need help, and acknowledging a problem/trouble.

Meditation is the difficult part, that actually requires you to relax and let go, and LISTEN. Many people find this difficult to do.

What are we listening for?
Well we hope to relax enough to clear our minds and Accept that either the problem is NOT going away, or We are able to see a proactive solution.We are also hoping that we are creating a positive state of mind , clarity, and imparting a Positive internal spiritual energy that can last the day.

You should come away from a meditation feeling energized and refreshed and ready to start your new day..

Here is a Bahai Prayer Website….
http://www.bahaiprayers.org/

Your welcome to pray using any form of prayer.

and here is a website for Relaxation techniques
http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/agoraphobia_retire/42059/2

Hope they help.

Good Luck

Meg