A lot of us women have a problem - we’re always wearing a superwoman cape, which is cool, but we’re going through life at 100 miles an hour, barely ever taking a breath to slow down, rest, or even stretch our muscles. Even in our workouts we do this. If the workout doesn’t burn the max amount of calories, make us sweat and breathe really hard, it’s not even worth doing. (I know for a fact that a lot of you skip your cool downs and think spending time to stretch is a waste of time…)

Our guest today is Kassandra Reinhardt, who is on a mission to help others feel great with yoga. Her YouTube channel has over 2 million subscribers, so she’s pretty much the queen of yoga in the online space. And what I love about her, of course, is her simple approach to helping women relieve stress, especially her 10-minute routines. She’s got a pretty cool new book about the seasons that I’m excited about, too.

If you don’t solve your 100 mile an hour everyday problem and learn how to incorporate more mellow activity in your life, you’re going to burnout. Your body is going to break. So we need to figure this out for you.

My Conversation with Kassandra…

Kassandra Reinhardt, I’m so glad to have you on! I can’t think of a topic that is more necessary right now, coming through Covid and into the aftermath of what our lives look like with the stress and our tendency to burnout, especially in our fitness routines.

• Your new book is called “Year of Yoga: Rituals for every day and every season” and it’s really all about illuminating the beauty and possibility that each of the four seasons presents through movement and yoga. Tell me why this book is so important in this moment of our lives?

I’m excited about this conversation with you because like you, I discovered yoga out of a necessity - I loved high intensity training and sprinting and heavy lifting. But I discovered that when I was pregnant with my firstborn, after a bit my body wasn’t a huge fan of those methods and I needed something that kept me moving in all directions and was challenging to me in different ways. I’ve been doing it ever since. And I know you have a similar story…

• Can you tell us how you discovered yoga?

It seems like a lot of us fall into it because many of us women can get self-competitive and have the “go hard or go home” mentality, and suddenly realize that we’re punishing our bodies instead of really taking care of them. Injuries, burnout, resentment towards even working out all together… I’ve seen it happen over and over again with moms that think a good workout has to always be hard, long and sweaty for it to even count.

• Why do you think that slow, mellow movements like “yin yoga” in particular are so important for our bodies? And how can it benefit our other training efforts?
• Sometimes, when words are foreign to us, we think it’s weird and shy away from it. Can you explain what “yin yoga” is from a movement perspective?

Let’s talk about breathing for a minute. For eons, everyone who practiced yoga knew that breathing mattered - And the rest of the fitness world is just now catching on to this.

• How does the simple act of breathing have such an impact on your entire body, your nervous system?
• Why is Savasana (”corpse pose”) often called the absolute hardest yoga pose?

Ok, you are the queen of the 10-minute, bite-sized approach to routines. Obviously, I LOVE this…we’re all about Simplifying our Self-Care around here, but I know a lot of moms are still skeptical.

• Is 10 minutes even enough to make an impact on your body?
• For a 10-minute morning routine, what would you include?
• For a 10-minute evening routine, what would you include?

Wrapping up…

I always like to leave moms with one simple action step that they can put into practice TODAY. What is one simple thought or tip that you would encourage everyone listening to do today that will make a big impact on how they feel?

Kassandra, thanks for spending time with us today!

Big Takeaways

Now, listen… the most important thing that I want you to takeaway from this conversation (and honestly, the reason why I invited Kassandra on the show) is that it’s ok…in fact it’s extremely important…for your body to do more mellow, easy activity that includes gentle mobility work and a big focus on breathing. If you’re not already doing it, just start with 10 minutes or less, which is still worth doing. I know Kassandra can be a tad bit woo-woo at times, but I need you to see that this is, in fact how God designed your body - to have cycles of hard work combined with rest and recovery. If you want to be exercising and feeling physically good and stewarding your body for years to come… you better have some of this more mellow mobility work in your routine.

More Resources

THE STRONG MOMMAS COACHING PROGRAM! Registration is open right now, but only until 11/30. Hurry!

Yoga with Kassandra on YouTube

www.yogawithkassandra.com

Follow Megan on Instagram

‍