Jill Miller

Embodying more than 23 years of expertise, Jill Miller’s yoga classes incorporate a rich repertoire of movement arts including modern dance, Pilates, breathwork, shiatsu, and butoh. The L.A. Times calls her "kinetically arresting” for her daring, playful and original style and her Yoga Tune Up® classes taught in Equinox Fitness clubs nationwide. Jill teaches workshops and retreats internationally, is a longtime faculty member of the Omega Institute, and has traveled nationally choreographing programs for Discovery Health Channel. She has modeled for Gaiam and her work has been featured in Yoga Journal, Fit Yoga, Breathe magazine and Yogi Times, and on NPR. Jill’s instructional programs include the Yoga for Weight Loss Workout Kit DVD from Gaiam, as well as her Yoga Tune Up® series and Yoga Link: Easy Access to an Ageless Art. For more about Jill, visit yogatuneup.com, join her group on Facebook or follow her on Twitter

I have been teaching yoga for 17 years, and one of the most frequent complaints I hear from students and yogaphobes alike is that they don’t have enough time for practice, so they avoid it altogether.

Avoiding a regular practice of stretching will never get you the healing benefits that come with the work. Even if you only do one pose a day, you will make a huge difference in your body, brain and well-being.

A few weeks ago, I taught my Core Immersion Training at the Century City Equinox in Los Angeles, Calif. Each day, we valet parked our cars before entering the club. Those who live outside of Los Angeles may have to re-read the prior sentence: Yes, we VALET PARKED our cars to go to the gym, as do thousands of other Angelenos all around the city, where valet parking is an unfortunate fact of life in a city where the car is king, and vast distances separate us from getting here to there.

Last weekend I presented three Yoga Tune Up® workshops at the Inner IDEA Conference near Palm Springs, Calif. This yearly gathering brings together the leading innovators of the mind-body fitness world to convene at the serene La Quinta Resort in Palm Desert. As always, the event saw a great turnout. My Yoga Tune Up® workshops were packed, and Gaiam and its SPRI team generously provided a variety of props for my sessions.

A few weeks ago during my Core Integration Immersion, my students did a partner exercise where they had to consciously release their hip flexors and inner thighs while a partner supported their legs. One woman, Anna (not her real name), was unable to “let go.” Her inner thighs grabbed each time they were supposed to release. She was quite confounded by the bizarre tension that seemed to have a mind of its own in her inner thighs and hips.

While I was finishing high school, my mother worked as the manager of a woman’s clothing store in the mall. My mom is intense, and whatever she does, she does with gusto. Unfortunately for her, she would ring in orders on the cash register with the ferocity of a mad concert pianist. This left her with repetitive stress injuries in her wrists, which led to the dreaded diagnosis of Carpal Tunnel Syndrome and ensuing surgery. Carpal Tunnel Syndrome implies that the median nerve that runs through the forearms into the wrist and hands has been compressed and is no longer functioning well.

Long before I was a yogini, I was a dancer — a really bad dancer. My mom enrolled me in ballet as soon as I could walk. I remember the pink tights and black leotards and the DREADED recitals. One Christmas, at age 4, crippled by stage fright, I flat-out refused to wear my Sugar Plum Fairy costume and instead watched my sister dance her way through both of our parts. She was a star, and I watched from my seat feeling queasy relief.

A strong core has been “in” for years. But the biomechanic awareness that has trickled into yoga and fitness studios has been affected by loads of misinformation and the “quick-build” mentality. Unfortunately, this can often do the body more harm than good.

A brief unauthorized biography of the core

Stacks of unfinished work, money worries … Burnt out? When was the last time you had a chance to get beyond stretching out the daily knots of life when you unroll your yoga mat? Two words: yoga retreat. It’s probably the best not-so-secret secret in the yoga world. And here’s how you can  justify taking one this year.

In this post: 3 sleeping positions that hurt! … Try yogic breathing to help you sleep better … 3 ways to sleep more comfortably on your side

INVERSIONS are coveted among yogis. Yoga is one of the few systems of health that suggest you regularly turn yourself upside down for extended periods of time. The health claims are astonishing: it reverses aging, increases blood flow to the brain, regulates pituitary and pineal glands, relieves constipation, tranquilizes and mellows the nervous system, and the list goes on. Responses vary from person to person, but a regular practice of turning upside down to one degree or another is soothing and balancing, and it can be a necessary step for many to stop their chattering minds prior to meditation.