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Prasara Body-Flow Yoga is one of the three wings of the ground breaking Circular Strength Training® system.
One of the best descriptions I have run across for Prasara Yoga comes from CST Coaches Ilano and Hurst:
"Prasara Yoga is a method of physical practice designed to improve flow (Samadhi). Flow can be defined as the ability to move your body into any position or direction with grace and fluidity. In essence, flow is your unrestrained freedom of movement. Specific asana are chosen and seamlessly linked together to open your joints and strengthen your whole body."
"Prasara Yoga is a method of physical practice designed to improve flow"
-Coach Hurst & Coach Ilano
Prasara Live
Here's a little clip from a live workshop I did in Sydney Australia.
Ageless Mobility By Coach Steer
Coach Steer explains some fundamentals of Ageless Mobility
Smooth Out Your Spider Monkey Flow With the "Pocket Wheel."
This little exercise will really help you smooth out the entrance into and exit from the Wheel pose in the Spider Monkey Flow.
This is the final exercise in an incrementally progressive series. The idea is to stabilize or "post" on your support arm fully before going into or coming out of your wheel. This not only ensures that you build the arm strength and shoulder mobility needed for the movement, but more importantly helps you to coordinate the spiral lines of supporting muscles through the body (especially the "core").
I call it the Pocket Wheel because I place my free hand "in my pocket" before moving. This ensures that I am fully stable on my posted arm.
I call it the Pocket Wheel because I place my free hand "in my pocket" before moving. This ensures that I am fully stable on my posted arm.
Prasara Yoga Pocket Wheel
Exercise to improve entrance and exit into the "Wheel" pose, which is part of the Spider Monkey Flow
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FlowFit
This incredible program, from the Prasara wing of CST, alllows you to burn fat and gain muscle as you flow your way to fitness.
The FlowFit program is part of the Prasara wing of Circular Strength Training. It is one of the most innovative fitness resources to ever hit the market. It consists of a specially designed flow which takes you through all the 6 Degrees of Freedom (see below).From the RMAX International website:
"FlowFit is a 4-Phase, incrementally-progressing multi-movement chain from Prasara Body-Flow Yoga - uniquely constructed based upon Scott Sonnon's years of championship coaching and competing at an international level in multiple sports."
One of the beauties of FlowFit is its adaptability. I have introduced completely sedentary people to this program using the first level of difficulty and have challenged the fittest of athletes with subsequent levels.
Using only the resistance of your body weight, FlowFit will pack on functional and beautifully proportionate muscle mass. This means that you will not get bulky, but will build an athletic looking physique with muscles that are practical in real world applications. The full-body nature of the movement chain also taps into the bodies various energy systems to create an excellent cardio-vascular training effect.
Aside from the obvious fitness benefits of this program, its manipulation of the neuro-immuno-endocrine response (see below) has a direct and immediately positive effect on our health. In just 14 to 18 minutes, you can guide your body to break through the barrier of discomfort into its next gear, achieving what is often referred to as 2nd wind. This up-shifting of the NIE carries a whole host of health benefits.
FlowFit and Sophistication
This clip introduces the CST principle of increasing sophistication through the FlowFit program
Coach Steer shows progressive sophistication with Flow Fit
A demonstration of sophistication by Coach Steer using the Flow Fit example
Must Have! Prasara Instructional DVD!
This DVD goes in-depth into the 5 A-Series Flows of Prasara Yoga.
We've been waiting for this one for quite a while. I can't tell you how excited I am about this DVD. The original was amazing, but Coach Sonnon's Prasara has evolved so much since then. The new DVD lives up to expectations and then some. You'll find the beautifully filmed flows from the original DVD, plus detailed instructions on each pose and transition for all of the 5 flows.
See a trailer for the Prasara Instructional DVD here.
See a trailer for the Prasara Instructional DVD here.
"This ain't your Mama's Yoga!"
-Dale Moss, CST
Forward Pressure: The Yang of Yoga
Prasara Yoga balances the yielding yin side with the power of yang.
I love the way one of my fellow Circular Strength Training instructors summed up Prasara: "This ain't your Mama's Yoga!" And FORWARD PRESSURE. The Yang of Yoga is particularly representative of that statement. It is a challenging routine that builds impressive strength and power in the forward plane, while simultaneously building functional muscle mass. It is the perfect program for guys that are looking for an alternative or supplement to their conventional strength and conditioning.Most of the mainstream yoga that we see nowadays has lost this side of the practice. Originally, yoga was meant to be practiced both with power and with yielding. Coach Scott Sonnon tells us, "Yogi were each and every one tough, strong men who wrestled, swung heavy clubs (even the Indian god of strength, Hanuman, is depicted hoisting heavy clubs), performed acrobatics on ropes and pillars, and practiced very challenging gymnastic movement sessions." Prasara Yoga reintroduces this aspect into the equation, rebalancing the practice and opening up access to yoga for both men and women who want full-body health and strength.
Embracing the Transitions
Prasara Body-Flow Yoga is all about the movement in between.
Although individual asana within Prasara are important, as they help us develop correct structure, it is the transitions between asana which are the beauty and genius of Prasara. Seamless transitions serve to teach the integration of movement with both structure and breath.Prasara Yoga seeks to blend asanas (postures) together into flows. Although the experienced practitioner can craft countless combinations of asana into flows based on their needs, there are currently 10 flows which form the basic curriculum of Prasara Yoga.
The A-Flows can be found on the Prasara Instructional DVD. They are:
- *Forest Flow
*Diving Dolphin Flow
*Spider Monkey Flow
*Tumbleweed Flow
*Flock of Pigeons Flow
The B-Flows, presented in the Prasara Primer, were created by CST Head Coach Ryan Hurst.
- *Cricket Flow
*Vine Flow
*Wind Flow
*Ocean Flow
*See-Saw Flow
The Prasara DVD is best used by the more advanced practitioner, who already has a solid background in yoga or in Body-Flow, the CST precursor to Prasara. The flows are each demonstrated beautifully and accompanied by a priceless documentary style explanation of Prasara, but there are no teaching progressions or explanations.
The Prasara Yoga Primer PDF, from Coaches Hurst and Ilano, provides a step-by-step tutorial for each of the flows at the beginner, intermediate and advanced levels, including embedded video files.
Both resources are fantastic. But if you are considering CST certification. The A-flows are mandatory material for the course. Of course the best way to study Prasara is with a certified CST Instructor or Coach. You can find one on the instructor database at RMAX International.
Video Montage From the Prasara DVD
Enjoy this trailer of Coach Scott Sonnon, founder of Prasara Body-Flow Yoga, performing the various A-flows.
Prasara Yoga Series "A" Montage of Scott Sonnon
Prasara Primer DVD Trailer
This practitioner, Head Coach Ryan Hurst, is incredible to watch. He is my personal inspiration when it comes to Prasara practice.
Prasara Yoga Primer DVD - English Intro
Coach Steer's Blog
My latest musings on health, fitness and sports performance. And how Prasara Body-Flow Yoga fits into all three.
As a certified CST Instructor, my blog entries will often touch on elements related to the practice of Prasara Yoga. I hope you enjoy this excerpt and feel free to visit me there...
Fetching RSS feed... please stand byThe 6 Degrees of Freedom
Prasara Body-Flow Yoga, and CST as a whole, is one of the only systems I have seen which consciously take practitioners through the 6 Degrees of Freedom.
A balanced exercise plan should aim to take you through the 6 Degrees of human movement. This refers to the 6 Degrees of Freedom created through movement around the 3 spatial axis (X, Y and Z). Circular Strength Training and Prasara Body-Flow Yoga have adopted the nautical and aeronautical terms for these degrees of movement:- Heaving: moving up and down.
Swaying: moving left and right.
Surging: moving forward and backward.
Pitching: tilting up and down.
Yawing: turning left and right.
Rolling: tilting side to side.
Wikipedia, as usual, has a nifty article on the Degrees of Freedom from an engineering perspective. It is a little on the heavy side but interesting nonetheless.
By promoting exercise which takes advantage of all 6 DOF, we prepare the body for the demands of life and sport, which is rarely two dimensional. Prasara, and CST as a whole, incorporates this idea as one of its key tenets.
Neuro-Immuno-Endocrine (NIE) Response
Often referred to as the runners high, this phenominon is one of the new frontiers of health and fitness, and a cornerstone of the Prasara Body-Flow Yoga and CST doctrine.
And who better than Coach Scott Sonnon, creater of Prasara and COO of RMAX International to give a detailed explanation of NIE...
"I have defined Warrior Wellness as the strengthening of one's neurological, endocrine and immune systems through physical exercise. In order for your CST practice to live up to that definition, you must step through the membrane of that circulo-respiratory distress in order to trigger the neuro-immuno-endocrine (NIE) response.
Circulo-respiratory distress (CRD) is that condition of great discomfort - such as labored breathing and pumping heart rate (autonomic arousal) - that you experience when your body is about to up-shift to a higher degree of efficiency. However, if you sustain the activity, the NIE kicks in and causes a "neuroplastic" adaptation in your brain to allow you to use less effort to continue the same activity. Suddenly, the activity just feels effortless. Some call this a "2nd Wind." However, since there are ever deepening cycles of increased efficiency, it's more effective to think of this as 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and 5th, etc "gears."
The NIE response is the interconnected impact of the neurological adaptation which occurs when stepping through CRD and up-shifting to the next gear. Since the neurological, endocrine and immune systems are interrelated, an adaptation in one is reflected in the other two. Nerve impulses tend to produce their effects within a few milliseconds. While hormones can act within seconds or several hours or longer and the immune system from immediate to up to days or weeks to bring about their responses.
When you step through Circulo-Respiratory Distress and up-shift to a greater level of neurological efficiency, it's immediately marked by a wash of hormones being released throughout your bloodstream. We know the obvious "feel-good" ones, such as our body's natural morphine called endorphines.
Simultaneously the interconnectedness to our immune system activates an increased level of positive activity, which some science points to an increased "strength" of the immune system. ...More studies will continue to be released demonstrating the science behind what we've known for millennia: specific types of exercise bolster the immune system.
In other words, certain modes and types of exercise increase our health; hence, our 'health first' perspective in the Circular Strength Training® System."
"I have defined Warrior Wellness as the strengthening of one's neurological, endocrine and immune systems through physical exercise. In order for your CST practice to live up to that definition, you must step through the membrane of that circulo-respiratory distress in order to trigger the neuro-immuno-endocrine (NIE) response.
Circulo-respiratory distress (CRD) is that condition of great discomfort - such as labored breathing and pumping heart rate (autonomic arousal) - that you experience when your body is about to up-shift to a higher degree of efficiency. However, if you sustain the activity, the NIE kicks in and causes a "neuroplastic" adaptation in your brain to allow you to use less effort to continue the same activity. Suddenly, the activity just feels effortless. Some call this a "2nd Wind." However, since there are ever deepening cycles of increased efficiency, it's more effective to think of this as 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and 5th, etc "gears."
The NIE response is the interconnected impact of the neurological adaptation which occurs when stepping through CRD and up-shifting to the next gear. Since the neurological, endocrine and immune systems are interrelated, an adaptation in one is reflected in the other two. Nerve impulses tend to produce their effects within a few milliseconds. While hormones can act within seconds or several hours or longer and the immune system from immediate to up to days or weeks to bring about their responses.
When you step through Circulo-Respiratory Distress and up-shift to a greater level of neurological efficiency, it's immediately marked by a wash of hormones being released throughout your bloodstream. We know the obvious "feel-good" ones, such as our body's natural morphine called endorphines.
Simultaneously the interconnectedness to our immune system activates an increased level of positive activity, which some science points to an increased "strength" of the immune system. ...More studies will continue to be released demonstrating the science behind what we've known for millennia: specific types of exercise bolster the immune system.
In other words, certain modes and types of exercise increase our health; hence, our 'health first' perspective in the Circular Strength Training® System."
Tumbleweed on YouTube
This is me performing the Tumbleweed Flow from Prasara Body-Flow Yoga.
This flow contains some of the most subtle but incredibly rich transitions in all the Prasara flows.
Tumbleweed
Prasara Resources on Amazon
PRASARA.Flow Without Thought.
Amazon Price: $59.95 (as of 10/13/2008)
FlowFit
Amazon Price: $39.95 (as of 10/13/2008)
FlowFit II (Ground Engagement)
Amazon Price: $39.95 (as of 10/13/2008)
FORWARD PRESSURE. The Yang of Yoga
Amazon Price: $39.95 (as of 10/13/2008)
A New Way of Looking at the Body and Movement.
The concepts of Tensegrity and the Myofascial Matrix will revolutionize the way we think about movement. Prasara Body-Flow Yoga is one of the early adopters of this groundbreaking understanding of the human body.
Conventional thinking on human movement is rather reductionist and tends to characterize human locomotion as being the result of a concert of individual muscles acting individually, albeit simultaneously and in synchronization, to create a given outcome. Each muscle is perceived as an isolated entity. This understanding of muscle comes from centuries old thought based on the discoveries made by the pioneers of human dissection. By taking the composite pieces of the body apart with a knife, we adopted the erroneous impression that each muscle was isolated from every other muscle. What we missed was all the tissue and other organic material which was cut away in order to get at those muscles. This collection of connective tissue, or fascia, forms a network which envelops the entire body and forms what we can think of as the myofascial matrix. Our bodies fascial tissues have tremendous implications regarding our health, wellness, fitness and performance and CST is one of the only systems in existence which addresses this fact.Prasara and CST also take into account the fact that the human body works much like a tensegrity structure. We tend to think of our bodies as a collection of parts which are stacked one on top of the other like a simple compression structure. But the human body is in fact a much more complicated system of compression and suspension.
Tensegrity
The beautiful balance of the human structure.
Thomas Myers
is a leader in the application of Buckminster Fuller's tensegrity theories to human movement. Here is a bit of what he has to say on the subject:"All structures in the universe are supported by a balance between tension and compression, between "push" and "pull". The chair sits on the floor, the lamp hangs from the ceiling - that's all the ways to support something there are. Shear, bending, and other forces are just combinations of basic tension and compression.
We are very used to looking at and building structures that rely primarily on compression for support. The brick wall is the classic example: one brick is piled on top of the other. This is a "continuous compression" structure - where the compression created by gravity is carried from one brick to another, all the way to the ground. The bottom brick has to be compressively strong enough to carry all the bricks above it.
Nobody asks what a brick wall, or a house, which is similarly constructed, weighs. Weight is rarely a consideration in continuous compression structures. Bodies, however, are constructed with strict evolutionary limits on weight, so continuous compression is not a good model for building a body.
We have acted, however, in contemporary kinesiology and anatomy, as if this were the case.
But a body is in fact more like a balloon. A balloon is a classic tensegrity structure. The skin is the "tension member" - pulling in. The air is the "compression member" pushing out. The skin pulls in until it balances the air pushing out, and that determines the size of the balloon. Substitute a series of dowels for the air, and put rubber bands in place of the balloon "skin", and you have a classic tensegrity structure.
Substitute bones for the dowels and the fascial and myofascial membranes for the balloon skin and rubber bands, and you have "fascial tensegrity".
The Myofascial Matrix
Individual muscle action is a myth. It is more accurate to think of the muscular system as one "super-muscle" tacked down in hundreds of places.
Although it is a useful mechanism, for understanding, to conceptually dissect the parts of the whole in order to define specific actions and characteristics of each part, we must not lose sight of the fact that the human body is in actuality a whole, which acts in concert to perform every task and function, from the simplest to the most complex. Unfortunately, conventional thought tends to focus more on the constituent parts rather than the whole, especially when it comes to the musculo-skeletal system and our perception of bio-mechanics. This reductionist approach stems largely from the dissection of the human and animal body over the centuries. In our efforts to identify the parts, muscles and bones, we have cut away, disposed of and forgotten the very material which gives those parts their form and function: the connective tissue system.
One of the incarnations of connective tissue is the fascia, a fibrous web which envelops every aspect of the body, right down to the cell walls. More specifically, myofascia is the web or network which gives form to the musculo-skeletal system.
Although our reductionist view discussed earlier encourages us to think in terms of the "Single Muscle Theory," in which we seek to understand what each individual muscle does to the skeletal system, acting on its own, it is much more accurate to imagine one comprehensive muscle, surrounding the entire frame of the body, which is tacked down at hundreds of insertion points. To better grasp this concept, it is useful to look at the "Double Bag Theory."
- "The ability of the connective tissue cells to alter and mix the three elements of the intercellular space - the water, the fibers, and the gluey ground substance gel of the glycoaminoglycans - produces on demand a wide spectrum of familiar building materials in the body - bone, cartilage, ligament, tendon, areolar and adipose networks - all the varieties of biological fabric." Thomas W. Myers (extract from the Concise Book of the Moving Body by Chris Jarmey).
One of the incarnations of connective tissue is the fascia, a fibrous web which envelops every aspect of the body, right down to the cell walls. More specifically, myofascia is the web or network which gives form to the musculo-skeletal system.
Although our reductionist view discussed earlier encourages us to think in terms of the "Single Muscle Theory," in which we seek to understand what each individual muscle does to the skeletal system, acting on its own, it is much more accurate to imagine one comprehensive muscle, surrounding the entire frame of the body, which is tacked down at hundreds of insertion points. To better grasp this concept, it is useful to look at the "Double Bag Theory."
The Double Bag Theory
Without getting too involved, from the very beginning of the development of a new human organism, connective tissue begins to fold in on itself to create compartments which constitute all the constituent parts that we recognize in human anatomy. You can picture this precess by imagining a hand being pushed into a water balloon. The balloon deforms and wraps around the hand. There is then an inner bag, or inner surface, which is in contact with the hand, and an outer bag or outer surface. Our myofascia is much the same. The inner bag forms what we know as the periosteum, or the lining around the bones, and the joint capsules. The outer bag is the fascial tissue which gives muscle its form and ultimately its function. Where this outer bag is tacked down to the inner bag is known as an attachment. So this continuous network of fascial tissue houses the sum total of all the muscle tissue in the body. As muscle fibers contract in a coordinated manner, they pull along lines of myofascia to cause movement. Thomas Myers refers to these lines as Anatomy Trains.
Armed with this information, it is much easier to let go of the Single Muscle Theory and begin to fathom the idea that there is in reality only one muscle contained in six hundred pockets throughout the body.
Armed with this information, it is much easier to let go of the Single Muscle Theory and begin to fathom the idea that there is in reality only one muscle contained in six hundred pockets throughout the body.
How Prasara Addresses the Myofascial Matrix and Tensegrity
Taking care of the "outer bag" for improved health and pain-free performance.
Given that the entire musculo-skeletal system is in fact one "metamuscle" which is tacked down in hundreds of places to create muscle attachments, it is easy to see how a disturbance in the net which holds all this together can cause problems throughout the entire system. To better understand this, think of catching a thread of a sweater on a nail and having that thread pull all the way through the sweater, deforming the shape from the top all the way to bottom. The same concept applies to our bodies. Restriction, scarring, tension and adhesion in one area can cause problems in numerous other places throughout the body along lines of force or Anatomy Trains. This is why CST often alludes to the fact that the "site is not always the source." So, a pinched nerve in your neck may not originate from a structural problem in your neck but form, lets say, a tight pectoralis minor which pulls the shoulder forward and places strain along complex lines which end in the neck, causing tension and eventually injury (I should know...).
Prasara directly addresses the health of the outer bag. Prasara Yoga flows are designed to open joints and release adhesions to restore health and function to the myofascial network and allow the free flow of movement and signals along these natural lines of force. To better understand these lines I recommend the Anatomy Trains book.
Prasara directly addresses the health of the outer bag. Prasara Yoga flows are designed to open joints and release adhesions to restore health and function to the myofascial network and allow the free flow of movement and signals along these natural lines of force. To better understand these lines I recommend the Anatomy Trains
book. Circular Strength Training and the Double Bag
To summarize how the Circular Strength Training system addresses the principles of the double bag, the Intu-Flow wing of CST ensures the health of the Inner Bag (periosteum and joint capsules) by decompresses the joints, breaking up adhesions and washing the entire Inner Bag with ground substance and synovial fluid in order to bring in nutrition and wash out toxins. Prasara adds to the overall health of the system by working to release residual tension, pulp up myofascial density and resolve compensations which can lead to sensory motor amnesia. In other words, Prasara removes the restrictive forces in the Outer Bag. Finally, Clubbells work the comprehensive system of the Double Bag in order to add driving forces by placing stress on the myofascial web in three dimensions, stimulating it to lay down fibers in the web allowing it to handle more stress without more mass.
Tensegrity and the Myofascial Matrix on Amazon
Anatomy Trains: Myofascial Meridians for Manual and Movement Therapists
Amazon Price: $57.55 (as of 10/13/2008)
The Concise Book of the Moving Body
Amazon Price: $19.77 (as of 10/13/2008)
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