Align Your Spine Yoga:
Different Themes
Core Opening Theme:
The purpose of this Theme is not to "get better" at the poses, but to use them as tools for immediate and profound effects - through your whole body and into your mind. Core Opening is the foundation of our practice, fulfilling yoga's primary goal: to quiet the mind and open your to your deeper inner experience.
Abdominals Theme:
I stopped teaching and practicing Pilates when I discovered this Core-Opening approach and heard this powerful teaching: "Your abdominals work for you once you’ve released your spine."
At first, I was skeptical. But when my deep tensions started releasing through the Align Your Spine spinal sequence. I got stronger, lighter, and even noticed improvements in my digestion - without needing my usual Pilates routine.
In this theme, you will discover how easy it is to activate key muscle group - your abs, arms, and legs - while keeping your spine open, supple, and strong. You will explore the science of true structural support using props, precise alignments, and adjustments that help your abdominals work efficiently! These poses also cultivate mental clarity.
Abdominal Theme II:
This deeper series offers new insights into the difference between your abdominal and your spinal muscles - something few people are ever taught. Discover the power of hollowing and its healing effect on digestion. You will carry this newfound clarity into more challenging poses, unlocking strength from the inside out.
Backbends Theme:
"Unravel the tensions that cause your body to crunch forward as you age."
This series teaches how to lengthen a short, “mounted” sacrum - one major cause of back pain. You will release stored tension before your spine gets “frozen” in a crunched back with a forward-thrust head. You will also learn how to unlock the vertebrae behind your heart - key to long-term improvement in your neck and shoulders.
Standing Poses Theme:
Yes, we do Warrior poses and other standing asanas - but the Align Your Spine way! Discover how your bones support you as you simultaneously engage your abs, arms and legs. Feel strength and decisiveness rise from deep within as you master these powerful poses.
Forward Bends Theme ("Heart Openers"):
Forward bends promote a sense of surrender, serenity, and inner bliss. These poses gently soften the heart and melt away tensions in the neck & shoulders. Learn to move effortlessly and discover what it means to surrender - not just in class, but in your everyday life.
Neck & Shoulders Theme:
This approach is radically different from conventional treatments, yet you will feel its effects in just one class. Your neck and shoulders, not by working directly on them, but releasing your spine from tailbone up. This grounded opening lifts your whole spine - from tail-to-top. Let's lengthen a hunched over back and a forward thrust neck. Experience powerful release - physically, mentally & emotionally, all at once!
Balance & Inversions Theme:
These two types of poses are paired because they share a core principle: finding true balance without over-tightening, Learn to stand in your bones and ground through your feet, cultivating both physical stability and inner peace.. Then, apply these principles to inversions from gentle to full - with grace and confidence. This theme helps your develop vital life skills: physical balance, emotional steadiness, and mental clarity.
Classical Poses Theme:
This physically challenging theme invites you to go farther than ever before, but without strain. Many traditional yoga poses can create spinal tensions when approached incorrectly. Here, you apply everything you have learned: isolating your abs, arms and legs from your spinal muscles, keeping your spine open as you explore the full classical poses! Work hard without pushing. Strengthening your body while accessing a deeper inner power.
Vinyasa Theme:
Move and breathe in a continuous flow of openness. This these remind you: There is more available to you.
Link each pose into a seamless sequence while maintaining spinal release. Fine-tune each movement, increase your capacity for complexity, and discover how to live your yoga through life's ups and downs.
Seated Poses & Twists Theme:
The culmination of your practice, this meditative theme brings you fill circle. You began with seated poses, and now you return transformed. All the previous work has deepened your ability to sit with ease. Here, you access the inner dimensions of your own Being - what yoga calls svaroopa, the bliss of your own Being.
Twists in this series profoundly quiet the mind and help clear inner blockages, reveal the already-blissful core of your existence.
StressBuster Yoga with Therapeutic Essential Oils Theme:
Melt away stress - during the holidays or anytime - with Ryoko's StressBuster Yoga Series. This unique offering blends Align Your Spine Yoga with therapeutic grade essential oils to calm your nervous system and uplift your spirit. Come unwind and renew, body and soul.
The purpose of this Theme is not to "get better" at the poses, but to use them as tools for immediate and profound effects - through your whole body and into your mind. Core Opening is the foundation of our practice, fulfilling yoga's primary goal: to quiet the mind and open your to your deeper inner experience.
Abdominals Theme:
I stopped teaching and practicing Pilates when I discovered this Core-Opening approach and heard this powerful teaching: "Your abdominals work for you once you’ve released your spine."
At first, I was skeptical. But when my deep tensions started releasing through the Align Your Spine spinal sequence. I got stronger, lighter, and even noticed improvements in my digestion - without needing my usual Pilates routine.
In this theme, you will discover how easy it is to activate key muscle group - your abs, arms, and legs - while keeping your spine open, supple, and strong. You will explore the science of true structural support using props, precise alignments, and adjustments that help your abdominals work efficiently! These poses also cultivate mental clarity.
Abdominal Theme II:
This deeper series offers new insights into the difference between your abdominal and your spinal muscles - something few people are ever taught. Discover the power of hollowing and its healing effect on digestion. You will carry this newfound clarity into more challenging poses, unlocking strength from the inside out.
Backbends Theme:
"Unravel the tensions that cause your body to crunch forward as you age."
This series teaches how to lengthen a short, “mounted” sacrum - one major cause of back pain. You will release stored tension before your spine gets “frozen” in a crunched back with a forward-thrust head. You will also learn how to unlock the vertebrae behind your heart - key to long-term improvement in your neck and shoulders.
Standing Poses Theme:
Yes, we do Warrior poses and other standing asanas - but the Align Your Spine way! Discover how your bones support you as you simultaneously engage your abs, arms and legs. Feel strength and decisiveness rise from deep within as you master these powerful poses.
Forward Bends Theme ("Heart Openers"):
Forward bends promote a sense of surrender, serenity, and inner bliss. These poses gently soften the heart and melt away tensions in the neck & shoulders. Learn to move effortlessly and discover what it means to surrender - not just in class, but in your everyday life.
Neck & Shoulders Theme:
This approach is radically different from conventional treatments, yet you will feel its effects in just one class. Your neck and shoulders, not by working directly on them, but releasing your spine from tailbone up. This grounded opening lifts your whole spine - from tail-to-top. Let's lengthen a hunched over back and a forward thrust neck. Experience powerful release - physically, mentally & emotionally, all at once!
Balance & Inversions Theme:
These two types of poses are paired because they share a core principle: finding true balance without over-tightening, Learn to stand in your bones and ground through your feet, cultivating both physical stability and inner peace.. Then, apply these principles to inversions from gentle to full - with grace and confidence. This theme helps your develop vital life skills: physical balance, emotional steadiness, and mental clarity.
Classical Poses Theme:
This physically challenging theme invites you to go farther than ever before, but without strain. Many traditional yoga poses can create spinal tensions when approached incorrectly. Here, you apply everything you have learned: isolating your abs, arms and legs from your spinal muscles, keeping your spine open as you explore the full classical poses! Work hard without pushing. Strengthening your body while accessing a deeper inner power.
Vinyasa Theme:
Move and breathe in a continuous flow of openness. This these remind you: There is more available to you.
Link each pose into a seamless sequence while maintaining spinal release. Fine-tune each movement, increase your capacity for complexity, and discover how to live your yoga through life's ups and downs.
Seated Poses & Twists Theme:
The culmination of your practice, this meditative theme brings you fill circle. You began with seated poses, and now you return transformed. All the previous work has deepened your ability to sit with ease. Here, you access the inner dimensions of your own Being - what yoga calls svaroopa, the bliss of your own Being.
Twists in this series profoundly quiet the mind and help clear inner blockages, reveal the already-blissful core of your existence.
StressBuster Yoga with Therapeutic Essential Oils Theme:
Melt away stress - during the holidays or anytime - with Ryoko's StressBuster Yoga Series. This unique offering blends Align Your Spine Yoga with therapeutic grade essential oils to calm your nervous system and uplift your spirit. Come unwind and renew, body and soul.