How to: Create an at-home yoga space

Lighting
Lighting should be soft and calming. Natural sunlight is optimum, since it energizes you (especially in winter, when lack of sunlight affects both mood and health); but if the sun is too direct, consider soft sheers over the windows. At night, or if you don’t have a window in your practice space, use candles or soft incandescents. Avoid harsh, artificial fluorescent light.

Temperature
The room should be comfortably warm. Unlike more vigorous workouts, yoga slows down your metabolism, making you vulnerable to drafts. (It’s hard to relax into postures when you’re shivering.) The practice of “hot yoga” adds to the physical benefits of the art by making you sweat and release toxins, but even a gentle yoga session should be done in a warm room.

Surrounding sounds
If you use a CD or DVD player during your practice, make sure it’s positioned well away from your workout area. Along with yoga instructional media, look for CDs of natural sounds such as birdsong or Eastern-influenced music, to help centre your mind to the spiritual nature of your practice. Some practitioners enjoy low-key classical music, since it helps focus the brain, while others find it distracting. But avoid pop or other upbeat music, which is too energetic.

Try to place your yoga space out of the mainstream of family life. It should be a refuge, not a small island in a sea of chaos. If you can’t dedicate a whole room to your workout, at least try to block it off with a beautiful screen. Eventually, you will find that your mind will automatically start to relax as soon as you enter the space.

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