The newest craze in Toronto, Canada is ganja yoga. About a dozen yoga enthusiasts gather to smoke marijuana and then do yoga. Dee Dussault, who runs the sessions from her home, nicknamed ‘Follow Your Bliss’, say “When you’re high, you can focus on your breath”. Ganja yoga follows other new trends in yoga, such as ‘hot yoga’. ‘circus yoga’ and ‘hip-hop yoga’. Dussault adds that there are benefits to smoking cannabis before doing yoga. “For some people, it makes them uninhibited and open to the idea of the heart chakra, for example.” Chakras are part of Indian medicine....

BOSTON, Aug. 21 (UPI) — Yoga may positively affect mood and decrease anxiety — and may be therapeutically beneficial for some mental disorders, U.S. researchers said. Researchers at Boston University School of Medicine say they found a connection between yoga and levels of a neuro-transmitter called gamma-aminobutyric. Increased gamma-aminobutyric availability is linked to greater relaxation, less anxiety and anti-convulsive effects. The study findings, published in the Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine, indicate those who practice yoga report greater decreases in anxiety...

By Jennifer LaRue Huget Does embracing yoga mean saying goodbye to cheeseburgers? One of the persistent debates in the yoga community is whether yogis should be vegetarian. One side finds evidence in ancient texts that eschewing meat is among the central precepts of yogic tradition. Others find in yoga’s teachings a more inclusive bent, a belief that yoga is for everyone, no matter what they choose to eat. Data seem to support the latter stance. A 2008 “Yoga in America” survey conducted for Yoga Journal magazine found that almost 16 million people in this country practice yoga,...

Three yoga teachers address potentially harmful mistakes and offer easy ways to correct them. By Jeannine Stein Yoga is more than just striking a pose. But how you strike that pose is nonetheless critical. Maintaining correct form is essential not only for building a solid yoga practice but also because improperly doing the same yoga poses repeatedly — even the most basic ones — can lead to strains, sprains and chronic aches. Yet it’s easy to go awry. Many popular classes are overcrowded, making it difficult for teachers to correct every swayed back and hunched shoulder. Read more…

Laughter is believed to help breathing, circulation, relieve stress, reduce pain, lift your mood and give your mind a rest. Joan Cary Whitney Munro did not think that as a fitness specialist and mother she had to take a class just to learn how to laugh. But she signed up for laughter yoga class and second-guessed herself all the way to the American School of Laughter Yoga in Chicago. Two days later, she returned home exhilarated, eager and certified to teach laughter therapy to the seniors she helps at Fairview senior living community in Downers Grove, Illinois. Read More…

Meditation appears to build up cortex, MRI scans find FRIDAY, Feb. 26 (HealthDay News) — If you’re trying to reduce your sensitivity to pain, Zen meditation may help by actually thickening your brain, new research suggests. The authors of a new study, published in a special issue of the journal Emotion, reached their conclusions after comparing brain thickness in 17 Zen meditators and a control group of 18 people who didn’t meditate and hadn’t practiced yoga or suffered from chronic pain, brain disease or mental illness. Read More…

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