Yoga Exercises From Home - Beginner's Guide

Yoga training is good for both body and mind as it focuses on breath, balance, flexibility, and controlled movements that will increase your strength and mobility over time. During a yoga session, all the exercises are meant to flow naturally and combine as they glide over each other in a holistic and coherent practice. Here, we select and explain some of the simplest and most common exercises you can easily do anywhere, so you can get a taste of this amazing yoga universe.

Mindfulness is a state of mind that can enhance the experience of yoga and meditation. Check it out here!

Also read: How to get started with training

Mobility Training

If you sit still a lot, it can tighten muscles, lead to poor posture, and strain your back. Training mobility helps you have a body that can better handle everyday movements and reduces the risk of back, neck, and shoulder problems. Additionally, mobility training contributes to better technique in strength exercises and improves your range of motion.

Also read: injury prevention training

What is good mobility?

In the body, we have many muscles that are actively used to bend and stretch joints. If you are stiff in these joints, it can lead to less stability and balance.

Mobility is mainly about the ability to move one or more joints. In other words, move without pain. Exercises within mobility training include all forms of stretching and flexibility exercises. The more mobility you have, the more agile you can perform activities.

Also read: Why stretch after training?

Movement training is something you should incorporate if you have stiff muscles in everyday life. This may be due to being inactive and not using your muscles sufficiently. See simple tricks to increase mobility in everyday life.

Yoga Exercises for Beginners

When you first start practicing yoga, it's important to have comfortable and flexible workout clothes that allow you to move freely, without tightening in uncomfortable places during the session. Read here about Famme's best yoga clothes for women to find the right yoga pants, yoga leggings, and yoga sweater or top.

Also read: Training at the office and home

Seated Position

Most yoga sessions start in a seated position with legs crossed and wrists resting on the knees. From there, you work your way up to a standing position with other yoga exercises. In a seated position, you practice breath and often do some pleasant stretching exercises.

Procedure:

• Sit with your legs crossed on a yoga mat. Cross your legs in a way that is comfortable for you.
• "Head over heart, heart over pelvis". Extend the chin over the heart, and lift the chest so it's sitting over the pelvis. This memory tool helps you sit with a straight and upright back.
• Sit on a cushion or a folded blanket to lift your hips to help straighten your back.
• Relax all muscles and nerves, including your face. You often don't think about frowning or tightening your jaw, but try to relax all the nerves here too!
• Breathe.

Cat/Cow

From a seated position, you often move (slowly) to a position on all fours. A position where you are on your knees, stretching your arms straight down towards the floor.

Procedure:

• From this all fours position, you inhale, arch your belly and back down towards the floor, lifting your chin up towards the ceiling. This is the "Cow" pose.
• On the exhale, you arch your belly and back up towards the ceiling while tucking your chin down towards the floor, preferably toward your chest. This is the "Cat" pose.
• Position yourself in such a way during these stretches that you feel a stretch in the shoulder blades and lower back.

Downward Dog

From a cat/cow position, you typically move into a downward dog position for a good stretch in your arms, back, and legs. Don’t forget to breathe! All exercises should be performed with control on the inhale and exhale.

Procedure:

• From a bridge pose, where you are on all fours with a straight back and neck, curl your toes under. Inhale and lift your knees off the mat.
• Point your nose forward and draw a line down towards the floor. Exhale as you push your hips up with your legs and arms.
• Stay in this position, feel where it stretches, and adjust while taking some long and deep breaths.

Mountain Pose

When you feel finished in downward dog, and ready to move on, we want to stabilize and ground ourselves in mountain pose.

Procedure:

• From a downward dog pose, lift your gaze upward, and look forward with your head.
• While your arms and legs are still planted on the ground, decide whether you want to take short or long steps forward until you reach your palms with straight legs.
• Then release your arms, and let your upper body hang so you feel everything stretching down towards the ground by pure natural forces.
• Ensure that your feet are solidly and steadily planted on the mat. Either completely together or hip-width apart.
• Inhale slowly as you roll your back up. Imagine you have a seed in your lower back that is sprouting up towards your neck and focus the energy on all joints until you reach a standing position.
• Exhale once you reach standing position (mountain pose) and take some time to feel how everything feels.

Warrior Pose

From a standing position, the possibilities are endless, but for beginners, it's a simple exercise to transition into both warrior pose one and two.

Procedure:

• From standing, draw one leg back with a good distance. The foot you lean on points forward in the same direction as the upper body, while the foot behind points to the side.
• Bend the knee of the leg you are leaning on and move into a one-leg lunge.
• Straighten your back (head over heart, heart over pelvis) Inhale, and stretch your arms up over your head towards the ceiling. This is warrior pose one. Exhale.
• To transition into warrior pose two, inhale and stretch the arm that is on the opposite side of the leg you are leaning on back over your head. Then extend the arm to point towards the other leg that is planted behind you, and exhale.
• Then switch sides and do the same exercises on both the right and left legs.

Lizard Pose

A lizard pose is perfect for a final controlled stretch before stretching and concluding breathing exercises.

Procedure:

• From warrior two, plant both hands in line with the leg you are leaning on at shoulder width.
• The palm on the same side as the bent leg should be placed inside the foot.
• You can choose whether you want to lower your arms for a deeper stretch or lift or lower the knee behind. Listen to your body.
• Switch sides after a while and do this exercise on both the right and left legs.

Explore our beautiful collection of yoga clothes for women to give yourself extra soft and comfortable yoga sessions going forward.

Increase Mobility in Everyday Life

To improve your mobility in everyday life and moving forward, you can take three simple steps:

• Spend time in the position you want to become more flexible in. If you want to increase mobility in squats, you should spend time sitting in a squat.
• Do it often. You achieve better progress by working on mobility more frequently. Set aside 10 minutes every day for mobility training.
• Strength training. By training exercises with a large range of motion, strength training will contribute to increased mobility.

Also read: Effective strength exercises for the whole body, and Exercises with our resistance bands

Mindfulness

Many might think that mindfulness is a state of mind where one has to dig deep to find oneself. It is actually an ability to be attentive, open, and present in the moment. It can be very beneficial to use mindfulness techniques during yoga exercises or meditation.

Also read: Pregnancy training

Mindfulness is a subjective experience, and it can be felt anywhere. It is a natural mental state where you take in what is happening around you - and you feel a sense of calm. This ability can easily be lost in the busy everyday life.

Also read: Sleep and training

One way to approach mindfulness is to be aware of your body, emotions, thoughts, and mental state. These help you become more aware.

Body

Lie down in a comfortable position:

• Feel each part of your body.
• Listen to your breath. How are you breathing? Where is the breath coming from?
• Feel how the breath moves in your body.

Emotions

Direct your attention to your feelings:

• Do you have positive, painful, or neutral feelings?
• Do you feel cold or warm?
• Is there tingling in your body? Do you have pain anywhere?
• Notice whether these feelings strengthen or diminish with open presence.
• Does it change?
• Do not analyze your feelings. Just register them and how they feel.

Thoughts

After you have felt and located your feelings:

• Where are your thoughts? Observe them.
• Do not judge yourself or correct them.

Through this exercise, you observe yourself from the outside and simply register all thoughts.

Mood

Lastly, feel the experience in your body:

• Where is your attention, your thoughts, and how does it feel?
• Do you see a connection between how you physically feel your body, what you think, and how it makes you feel?

By being able to see and acknowledge this, you can figure out what your thoughts actually do to you. This makes it easier for you to know what to do if certain thoughts arise in everyday life. This can help you manage stress and is excellent to practice together with the yoga exercises.