If it’s challenging for you to find time for yoga when you’re not traveling, you might suspect it would be even more challenging on the road. Yet yoga and travel are the perfect couple. As your tight muscles stretch and your spine regains its natural curves, you breathe out the stresses of travel. As your body relaxes, your mind rests.
If you set out on your travels with the intention to practice yoga along the way, you’ll find that it’s easier than you think–and that the rewards of inner peace and physical health help build motivation to stick with it.
Here are 3 ways to incorporate yoga into your travels.
1. Follow along with a DVD
Dancer Lauren Boldt has an insane travel schedule. It’s not atypical for her to do a show in one country, drive 2 hours to catch an international flight, and get to her destination just in time to rehearse, perform, and hop on another plane immediately afterwards. With such an intense schedule, Lauren says one of the only things that keeps her sane is getting down with a yoga DVD. She says:
When I need to ‘uncrunch’ my body after a flight or long drive, yoga is the only thing that seems to work and pop my body back into alignment. I build the strength and endurance needed to make it through marathon days.
Lauren’s favorite yoga DVD on the road is Rodney Yee’s Total Body Power Yoga
2. Drop into a class
If your travel schedule isn’t as hectic as Lauren’s, make time to drop into a local yoga studio for a group class. Tip: don’t rely on Google Maps to locate classes ahead of time. Check the bulletin boards in neighborhood coffee shops, ask the locals, or use online yoga forums to find the best yoga studios at your destination.
Most yoga classes will supply everything you need, but Annie Appleby says she totes her own yoga mat to classes whenever she travels–”Going unfamiliar places with something familiar is comforting.” A die-hard yoga practitioner, Annie even invented her own travel-friendly hands-free yoga mat, which features a detachable Velcro strap. Check out her A-Line Mat at YogaForce or browse travel yoga mats at Amazon
3. Practice on the spot
But if you want to avoid carrying even a light mat, don’t let that stop you from practicing yoga on your travels. All you really need is a firm floor or a chunk of earth. Yoga requires no fancy equipment or advanced training. Whether you’re in a hotel room in Bangkok, a beach in Mexico, a shopping mall in Delhi, or a car park in Greenland, your body and mind are always with you.
Leigh from The Future Is Red says:
I practice regularly, but my favorite yoga is in a new place, particularly out in nature. Panama, it was on the dock of our seaside shack or on a cliff overlooking the early morning surfers. Vermont, it was in a clearing in the middle of the woods. Italy and France, I did yoga on various beaches up and down the coast.
Check out Leigh’s blog post describing one of her favorite mornings on the beach in Riomaggiore, Cinque Terre.
3 recommended yoga books
There are dozens of fantastic yoga books available. These are three of my personal favorites.
1. The Ashtanga Yoga Practice Manual by David Swenson
This is my #1 favorite yoga manual for 3 reasons:
- Spiral binding lets you lay it out flat so you can refer to it while practicing.
- Short-practice diagrams help you squeeze yoga into those busy days.
- Extremely detailed explanations of foundational techniques.
>>Buy Ashtanga Yoga Practice Manual from Amazon
Here’s a short video of David Swenson teaching the Sun Salutation so you can get an idea of his teaching style.
2. The Heart of Yoga: Developing a Personal Practice by T. K. V. Desikachar
My first yoga teacher
>>Buy The Heart of Yoga: Developing a Personal Practice
3. Light on Yoga: The Bible of Modern Yoga by B. K. S. Iyengar
An excellent definitive guide to the philosophy and practice of yoga. The text includes complete descriptions and illustrations of all the asanas and breathing exercises.
I want to help you find your calm center and experience travel with courage, curiosity and compassion.
Hello. Fantastic job, if I wasn’t so busy with my school work I read your total site. Thanks!
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