Increase your focus and help improve brain power
Yoga poses to help stimulate your mind
Mar 1, 2019, 7:55 am
Increase your focus and help improve brain power with Yoga
There are so many distractions nowadays that it's so hard just to take your mind off everything and focus on one thing. I want you to try this. Really try to take a few minutes out of your day to try these four poses. Even if it is just the first one, tadasana or Prayer pose (it is harder than you think) but try it. You will be thankful to get a minute of peace, to rest your mind and focus. Considering I am still in a pretty rookie position with yoga, I brought in yoga expert Nathalie Kosman for help! For your viewing, she is doing each position pretty solid in the bottom right hand corner, as you can see I am wobblier than a poorly assembled IKEA coffee table.
1) Prayer pose or Tadasana
Tadasana is the foundational pose for all standing yoga postures and full inversions, such as headstands, handstands, etc. The purpose of the pose is to get grounded. You want to feel the ground below you, close eyes, and take a deep breath. Even though this is a beginner pose, this is a restorative and balance pose. So open your palms, rib cage, and mind. Prayer pose is considered a base pose, since prayer pose variations can be derived from this pose. Prayer pose is considered a warm up yoga pose to prepare the body for more intense yoga poses/ yoga flow.
2) Eagle Pose
You will want to watch Nathalie below in the right-hand corner for this one, as I struggled here. This posture resembles the shape of an eagle taking flight. This pose strengthens the lower body, opens the shoulders, and improves balance and concentration. Start off by setting your gaze and remember to breath and focus. Stay for 30 seconds, then unwind the legs and arms and repeat on the other side (legs and arms reversed).
3) Warrior III
Warrior III improves balance, memory and concentration, and tones and invigorates the whole body. From Mountain pose, step the right foot a foot length forward and shift all of your weight onto this leg. Inhale the arms over your head and interlace the fingers, pointing the index finger up. As you exhale, lift the left leg up and out, hinging at the hips to lower the arms and torso down towards the floor. Look down at the floor and stare at a point for balance. Reach out through the left toes and the crown and fingers making one straight line. Breathe and hold for 2-6 breaths. To release: inhale the arms up to lower the leg back to the floor and step both feet together back into Mountain pose. Hold on each side for 30 seconds to challenge your balance, and then repeat on other side
4) Supported Headstand
Finish your practice with Supported Headstand (Salamba Sirsasana) to calm your brain. For beginners, I would suggest using a wall behind, so you can practice with your feet on the wall. Come on to all fours with your heels at the wall, make sure you keep your shoulders directly over your wrists and lift up in to a shortened dog pose. Then bring one leg up at a time so your foot is in line with your hips keeping your knees bent. When you feel comfortable in position straighten both legs (think strong warrior 3 legs) to bring yourself in to the pose. Press through your feet, lengthen through your sides, engage your abdominals and lift your shoulders up away from your ears.
Check out Nathalie at The Preserve, Fit Athletic Club, and Equinox for individual or groups classes.
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Cam Smith’s reaction to making the Astros Opening Day roster is priceless
Mar 25, 2025, 4:16 pm
It’s go time! While the Astros are not the juggernaut they were over the more than half-decade stretch from 2017 through 2022 that yielded regular seasons with 101, 103, 106, and 107 wins, four American League pennants, and two World Series Champions, as the saying goes, they ain’t dead yet. There is no superpower in the American League West the Astros need to overcome. In fact, the American League as a whole is grossly inferior to the National League. As a result, a fifth Astros’ AL title in this era is not some absurd fantasy, though it is certainly unlikely. But winning the pennant is unlikely for every AL team, so if you’re a fan of the Astros there is nothing wrong with a “Why not us?” mentality. On the other hand, the floor for the 2025 Astros is lower going into a season than it has been in almost a decade. The lineup has numerous question marks, and if the terrific trio atop the Astros’ starting rotation (Framber Valdez, Hunter Brown, and Ronel Bronco) runs into injury or performance issues the Astros would have serious problems. That the Texas Rangers and Seattle Mariners both finish ahead of the Astros is clearly plausible. Play ball!
Astros history lives in these moments
It is simple fact that time marches on, but it is still amazing that the Astros are beginning their second quarter-century of play at what for its first two seasons was called Enron Field, then for the past 23 seasons Minute Maid Park, and now Daikin Park. That’s 25 seasons in the books, at least 26 more to come, with the Astros a few years ago having extended their lease through 2050. In non-specific order, I have twenty easily come-to-mind most spine-tingling moments at the ballpark. If you want 25 for 25 years, I leave five more to you.
Not all spine-tinglers on the home field are generated by the home team. Here are three produced by visiting players. In 2001, Barry Bonds smashed his 70th home run of the season to tie Mark McGwire’s single season Major League record. We know what went into the home run numbers of that era, but it was still jaw-dropping stuff. Bonds would finish the season with 73 homers. Game five of the 2005 National League Championship Series, with the Astros one out from winning their first ever pennant, Albert Pujols launched a Brad Lidge hanging slider that might still be airborne if not for the glass wall above the train tracks. It may be the most instantaneous crowd delirium to utter silence moment ever. It turned a 4-2 Astros’ lead into a crushing 5-4 loss. But, the next game Roy Oswalt pitched the Astros to that pennant in St. Louis. Lastly, the second game of the 2013 season, Rangers’ pitcher Yu Darvish retired the first 26 Astro batters before Marwin Gonzalez smacked a ball through Darvish’s legs up the middle for a base hit. Soooooo close to a perfect game. Only 22 perfect games have been thrown in MLB’s modern era (1900-today).
Now to Astro achievements. Fudging a bit by including Roger Clemens since it’s not for one specific moment. But the Rocket’s starts with the Astros were events. Speaking of Hall of Famers, Craig Biggio’s 3000th hit is an obvious list-maker. Jeff Kent is not a Hall of Famer but he was better in the batter’s box than any second baseman elected after Joe Morgan. Kent won game five of the 2004 NLCS with a bottom of the ninth three-run bomb to end what had been a scoreless game. Alas, the Astros would lose the next two games and the series in St. Louis. The crowd went much wilder over Kent’s homer than over Chris Burke’s series-winning homer over the Atlanta Braves in a 2005 NL Division Series. Burke’s homer came in the 18th inning, so sheer exhaustion held down the decibel level a little. A sleeper for the list occurred earlier in that same game, when Brad Ausmus of all people hit a two-out game-tying homer to get the game into extra innings.
Four no-hitters have been thrown by Union Station. Working backwards: Ronel Blanco last season, Framber Valdez in 2023, a combined job started by Aaron Sanchez in 2019, and the first in 2015 by Mike....yes, Fiers.
And now to the grandest home park moments of this Platinum Era in Astros’ history. Carlos Correa authored two of them, each in a game two of the American League Championship Series. In 2017 he doubled home Jose Altuve with the winning run in the bottom of the ninth. That came off of Aroldis Chapman who shall appear once more in this column. In 2019 Correa tied the series at one win apiece with a walk-off homer. Yordan Alvarez also gets a pair of entries. You know, Yordan hit just .192 in the 2022 postseason. But talk about making your hits count. In game one of those playoffs, ALDS vs. Seattle, it was a two-out three-run walk-off blast off of Robbie Ray to give the Astros an 8-7 win. Then in the final game of those playoffs, it was a sixth inning gargantuan three-run launch to dead center turning a 1-0 deficit into a 3-1 lead.
That leaves four moments that are 100 percent non-negotiable entries. While not dramatic (4-0 final score), the payoff warrants inclusion of the Astros winning Game seven of the 2017 ALCS over the Yankees. Similarly, while the moment of victory lacked drama (4-1 final), how could one exclude the Astros winning the World Series on home turf in 2022. Finally, for my money the two most pulsating, goosebump-inducing, viscerally exciting moments at 501 Crawford Street. In one of the most scintillating games ever played in any sport, Alex Bregman’s bottom of the 10th inning single gave the Astros’ their epic 13-12 win over the Dodgers in game five of the 2017 World Series. Then in 2019, Jose Altuve’s game six homer ended the ALCS (I warned you Aroldis).
Here’s to the new season! Join Brandon Strange, Josh Jordan, and me for the Stone Cold ‘Stros podcast which drops each Monday afternoon, with an additional episode now on Thursday. Click here to catch!
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