An Introduction To Mats
Posted on September 8, 2008 - Filed Under Yoga
A thick flat pad made of material is a mat. It may be made from a piece of fabric or foam, covered in plastic or fabric, or even made from a synthetic material. The earliest mats were interlaced blades of grass placed at a 90-degree angle to form a web-like structure and were probably the first type of floor covering used by man.
There are several types of mats available today. Mats have gone from being merely functional to having multi-dimensional uses. Different types of mats available include entrance mats, interior mats, anti-slip mats, logo mats, anti-static mats, anti-fatigue mats and scraper mats.
Entrance mats are used to minimize the spread of dirt and water inside the premises and provide a surface that is safe and slip resistant. They store the dirt and dust at the entrance and keep inner premises clean. Mats used indoors protect indoor surfaces from wear and tear, and dust. They can also be ornamental if the user has an aesthetic eye. They are generally used in and around the areas that have heavy usage. Anti-slip mats provide safety to a user in slippery surroundings. These may be used either indoors or outdoors as needed.
Scraper mats are outdoor mats on which heavy sand and soil can be wiped. Such mats can be seen near golf courses where the players are expected to clean their shoes and then walk in to the club. Stiff brushes are also provided to brush off whatever the mat cannot scrape.
Anti-fatigue mats are used by people who need to stand for long periods. Such mats provide a cushion to the leg muscles, allowing them to expand and contract to ensure proper blood flow and thus reducing fatigue. The use of anti-fatigue mats has been known to increase productivity. Some safety features like non-skid and safety borders to increase visibility are also added to anti-fatigue mats.
Anti-static mats are used to eliminate electrical shock damage in computer rooms and electronic assembly areas. In addition to being a safety aid the cushioning in these mats provides a certain level of comfort to the user.
A popular type of mat is the logo mat. These mats have a dual role. Their use popularizes a corporate name and protects the area from soiling. Any kind of mat can be converted into a logo mat. This can be done by contacting the mat manufacturer and placing an order for mats with company logos on them. The type of mat would depend on the need for that particular type.
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Mats provides detailed information on Mats, Floor Mats, Yoga Mats, Car Floor Mats and more. Mats is affiliated with Feather Masks. |
Tags: Mats, Car Floor Mats, Floor Mats, Yoga Mats
Yoga Teacher Training Schools
Posted on September 7, 2008 - Filed Under Yoga
Yoga Teacher Training Schools introduce basic fundamental tools that encourage integration of body, mind, and spirit. The goal of the yoga teacher is to support progression toward personal growth, mental acuity, and spiritual awareness in his or her students.
Originating in India, the practice of yoga dates back six to seven millennia. Yoga in India remains a vital tradition as a pathway to enlightenment, a means to attaining spiritual and emotional wellbeing. Karma, Bhakti, Jnana, and Raji, are four main types of yoga, but there are many others. Each type focuses on different aspects of or approaches to personal development.
Western style Hatha Yoga has become associated with postures that aim to increase flexibility and is used more as a fitness exercise. Flexibility increases energy, stimulates the immune system, and improves skeletal and musculature tone of the body. This reduces stress, improves circulation, heightens self-awareness, and can help in the effort to lose weight. Flexibility also enhances physical stamina, balance, and coordination, which in turn strengthens one’s sense of well-being.
Yoga teacher training encourages exploration of yoga fundamentals and can deepen the experience of the future trainer in a direction best suited to the person. Training enables discovery of one’s own unique expressions and styles of yoga and creates a context for offering skills to the purposes of others. Teacher training generally exposes the future trainer to a wide range of classes for varying fitness, yoga methods, and personal experience.
Yoga teacher training develops skills in the trainer that can help bring understanding of the correlations of physical, emotional, and spiritual belief systems to his or her students. The yoga teacher can also improve a student’s skills of communication, compassion, and self-discipline, which enhance the quality of life.
Most yoga teacher training comprises 200-300 hours of study. Some yoga teacher training schools offer advanced levels of training to further and refine teaching capabilities.
If you are interested in learning more about yoga teacher training schools
and programs of study, search our site for more in-depth information and resources.
DISCLAIMER: Above is a GENERAL OVERVIEW and may or may not reflect specific practices, courses and/or services associated with ANY ONE particular school(s) that is or is not advertised on SchoolsGalore.com.
Copyright 2006 - All Rights Reserved
Michael Bustamante, in association with Media Positive Communications, Inc. for SchoolsGalore.com
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Michael Bustamante is a staff writer for Media Positive Communications, Inc. in association with SchoolsGalore.com. Find Yoga Teacher Training Schools at SchoolsGalore.com; meeting your needs as your educational resource to locate schools. |
Tags: yoga teacher training, yoga, natural healing, school, college, education, healing arts, continuing e
On The Strangeness Of Writing About Yoga
Posted on September 6, 2008 - Filed Under Yoga
For a little over a month now, I’ve been spending a fair amount of time in front of a computer screen, composing short essays on yoga-related topics. And in a way, this feels like a fairly natural, easy and mostly-enjoyable thing to be doing: I love to write, and have been exploring Yoga (in its Taoist, Buddhist & Hindu varieties) for long enough that finding aspects of these practices ~ or their related philosophies ~ to present in this way, is not a problem. Yet there’s also a feeling of strangeness about it this little gnawing sensation in the pit of my belly something which seemed to be asking for its own “exploration” and hence, this essay!
So what makes writing about Yoga “strange”? For one, I am ~ by inclination, passion & profession (in the sense of dharma) a poet. It is in writing poetry that I find the deepest joy, ease, and openness A feeling that I’m doing what (at least for now) I am “meant to be doing,” that I’m offering out into the world what I am uniquely qualified to offer, that I’m “doing my job.” Though I also very much enjoy writing prose, there is, for me, a palpable difference in the experience of the two forms. The writing of prose, for me, almost always carries with it a certain sense of tension, of anxiety. I am, in the context of prose articles, making affirmations, assertions; I’m arguing for this or that point of view; I’m proposing and defending. I place myself in relation to a specific discursive “field,” having in mind a particular “audience” whose attention, and approval (or disapproval!) I’m wishing to attract.
When ~ on the other hand ~ I’m writing poetry, the “relationship” is much more between me the “objects” of my inspiration (which for me tend to be trees & rivers & mountains and other members of the “natural world”), than it is between me and my (projected) “readers.” The writing of poetry, for me, is primarily about “listening” and then, with as much delicacy & integrity as I can muster, “translating” what I’ve “heard” into the sounds, images, and evocations of a poem Whether or not someone else approves of the poem really never enters my mind. Which isn’t to say that I don’t value the work of other poets, and feel happy when my work is appreciated by them. I read widely among other poets who I hope to be “influenced” by, and am happy to have that effect myself, on others. Yet this is secondary to the process of simply listening of allowing my perception to be “naked,” my senses “virgin” to what they’re perceiving en route to birthing the next poem. So in relation to my practice of writing poetry, writing any sort of prose feels ~ in this way ~ “strange.”
What’s also strange, in this particular (”virtual”) context, is that it is only through some strange combination of intuition and projection, that I can pretend to “know” my audience. So I’m writing about practices which, for me, are associated with the deepest forms of intimacy in a context which is about as “impersonal” as can be! Now whether or not “in-person” relationships are necessarily any more “real” or “intimate” than virtual relationships, is an interesting question. In either case, intimacy would seem to depend upon ones capacity to see or feel beyond whatever “text” it is that’s being presented, as the “first level” of contact. That “text” might be words on a computer screen, it might be spoken words, it might be a person’s physical appearance Whatever the text, my “knowing” of the person at any level beyond the most superficial, will depend ~ it seems to me ~ upon my capacity to augment intuition (knowing-from-inside, at a feeling level, and connecting at the level of Spirit/energy), and turn the volume way down on my projections (habitual associations I make, based upon that first-level “text”). But this is a topic for another essay (or, perhaps, a poem)
To write about Yoga is also to be involved in an attempt to “speak the un-speakable,” which is definitely a strange (and perhaps really arrogant?) undertaking! Yoga as a path (sadhana), as a set of techniques, instructions, philosophies, is something than can, and must, be represented in the form of words & images Otherwise, how could anyone ever begin to practice? How could anyone ever do this thing called “entering a path of Yoga”? And how could anyone ever “practice” if there were no “forms” being practiced? Yoga as fruition (siddhi or samadhi or citta-vritti-nirodha ), on the other hand, is by definition beyond all forms (including thought-forms), beyond all language It is a state of Being in which all (conventional, conceptual) “knowing” has been dropped, including our “knowing” about Yoga! Yet what’s also true is that most yogis & yoginis who have accessed this “fruition” of Yoga choose to “return” to the world of speaking & thinking & moving about within a human body which, in a strange way, brings us back to the place where this essay began: poetry
For it is often (though not always!) in poetry (of thoughts, words, and/or physical movements) that such Beings then choose to express themselves for it seems that sometimes a poem (or dance) is ~ via its gentle “listening” ~ what has the power to tease out of this Yogic silence a song a way of using language which points back to its origins, it Source, that un-speakable Silence
So for now at least, I will continue to write essays on yoga-related topics. And let myself feel curious about bringing the energy of poetry into my prose. It feels like the right thing to do. Though it is strange business indeed!
Elizabeth Reninger holds Masters degrees in Sociology & Chinese Medicine, is a published poet, and has been exploring Yoga (in its Taoist, Buddhist & Hindu varieties) for more than twenty years. Her teachers include Richard Freeman & Dzogchen Ponlop Rinpoche. For more yoga-related reflections, please visit her website: http://www.writingup.com/blog/elizabeth_reninger
Tags: yoga, writing, poetry, prose
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