Shiva Rea: Flow Yoga for Beginners

good, but NOT for beginners
This is a good yoga video. It is well shot with good production values and clear narration. If one is already familiar with hatha yoga, one will not have trouble following along and doing Shiva Rea's routines. It is good for a "video workout partner," and gives you the choice of watching the set without narration.

Ms. Rea is obviously competent, talented, and very adept at yoga. She is quite attractive and demonstrates the overall forms and their "flow" well. The routines are modifications or variations of more traditional forms of yoga, but not drastically so. Some of the forms reminded me of qigong.

The set of exercises on this DVD would constitute a healthy program for someone already in fairly good shape, but I seriously doubt that a couch potato with no understanding of yoga could benefit from it. If you are elderly or have any kind of physical issue, there is no instruction aimed at helping you do the forms or modify them for your needs.

I have...

Flow Yoga For Everyone
I was so glad to get another new Shiva DVD less than 5 months since her last one. This DVD was filmed in Kauai , Hawaii as well as her next DVD's to be released this year and next year. This practice is aimed for beginners but everyone can enjoy it , the whole DVD is 70 minutes and has 4 segments (and savasana) that can be done seperately:
1. Foundation Flow - approx 14 min, Shiva starts with some breathing exercises on a rock near a beautiful waterfall and continues with simple poses like cat , cobra and some variations.
2. Beginner's Backbend Flow -approx. 20 min, there is a change of scenery and Shiva is in a beautiful garden with a lot of trees near a lake.
It is actually mainly standing poses - she prepares you for backbends in this practice with some lunge variations , chair with twists ,side bends, half splits and cobra variations and finally bow and camel. This segment might be quite challenging for true beginners but she shows easier modifications for most of...

Great Moving Yoga with Lovely Scenery
I have another hatha yoga DVD that was filmed in Hawaii, and it is just so nice to have the soothing sounds, beautiful backgrounds and gentle lighting of Hawaii helping you relax into your yoga poses. Shiva Rea's voice is smooth and encouraging, and while she is extremely flexible, she gives you hope as you go that, while you might not be limber right now, you can get that way with practice.

This tape only has four real parts. You can either watch them chapter by chapter, or all in a row. You can also choose to watch them with music only, or with her verbal prompts.

The sections each have their own location. Each is quite lovely! You get 15 minutes of basic poses, 20 minutes of a lot of standing backbends, 10 minutes of more relaxing stretches, and the 25 minutes of a long repetitive sequence. Then there is a VERY super-short relaxation at the end.

I think I was spoiled by my other DVD, because with the other one there are multiple hour-long sessions...

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