Feel the mental and physical benefits of yoga with this vinyasa-meets-yin routine
It's hard to motivate yourself to exercise on dark, rainy days. Fortunately, there are plenty of gentle ways to get moving without leaving your house.
Yoga is a great option for people looking to improve their core strength and flexibility, as well as tap into more mindful ways of moving.
Adriene Mishler—better known as Yoga With Adriene—has become the internet's most popular yoga teacher, thanks to her simple but creative routines. Her latest routine is ideal for those days when you want to get moving, but don't have much energy.
Combining two styles of yoga—vinyasa, which involves moving in flow, and yin yoga, which is more slow-paced—it will challenge your flexibility and engage a range of muscles, including the core, while also providing moments of stillness to help you relax.
Follow along with Mishler in the above video as she takes you through the routine, which combines meditation and breathwork with slow vinyasa movements and challenging yin poses.
Yin yoga encourages you to hold stretches for several minutes, which can improve flexibility and range of motion in a joint. In our guide to yin yoga for beginners, YogaWorks instructor Tamika Caston-Miller explains that one of the main benefits of yin yoga is that it can encourage mental fortitude: "Mental mastery and the ability to sit with challenge is the biggest benefit of the practice."
This routine acts as a great introduction to yin if you're more comfortable with vinyasa-style yoga. And it will be sure to provide a low-impact way to get your heart-rate up slightly and engage a wide range of muscles.
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If you want an even shorter introduction to yoga, try doing some of these beginner yoga stretches, or have a go at this 15-minute yoga flow.
Need something to support you during practice? Have a look through our guide to the best yoga mats
Alice Porter is a freelance journalist covering lifestyle topics including health, fitness and wellness. She is particularly interested in women's health, strength training and fitness trends and writes for publications including Stylist Magazine, Refinery29, The Independent and Glamour Magazine. Like many other people, Alice's personal interest in combining HIIT training with strength work quickly turned into a CrossFit obsession and she trains at a box in south London. When she's not throwing weights around or attempting handstand push-ups, you can probably find her on long walks in nature, buried in a book or hopping on a flight to just about anywhere it will take her.
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