Why not stretch yourself?
BY THE start of January the Christmas excess has taken its toll.
As well as stuffing too many mince pies, all the cooking, present buying and dealing with annoying relatives has stretched our bodies and minds to their limits.
In the new year many people vow to start doing some exercise, but what's really needed is an antidote to the stress of the festive period that provides a workout for the soul and the body.
Millions of people across the world have now turned to the ancient Indian practice of yoga as an alternative to the purely physical forms of exercise we are used to in the west.
And the New Year might provide the perfect reason for you to take it up. The system of controlled movements and stretching postures used can help you tone up and increase your energy, while the relaxation techniques might help you through the depressing winter months.
Studies show that yoga can also help control blood pressure and the heart rate, and regulate brain waves. No wonder celebrities such as Geri Halliwell, Sting and Madonna regularly strike a yoga pose.
GMTV presenter Penny Smith is a big fan of yoga and has already released two videos that showed the moves which help her maintain a lithe shape. Her new video, Penny Smith's Yoga Masterclass with Howard Napper, promises to help you feel all the benefits yoga can offer after the Christmas over-indulgence.
Napper, who is a renowned teacher of yoga, uses Penny's body as a feature to show how to achieve the best and safest results for every muscle and joint.
Filmed on location in Mallorca, the video is intended to provide an insight into each yoga posture and to create a deeper and more authentic understanding of the technique.
However, Smith says the video isn't only for people who have tried yoga before.
"It actually explains a lot about the basics and how you're supposed to be feeling while doing your postures. It's a bit like dropping in on a yoga masterclass," she says.
Smith, 41, first started practising yoga seven years ago and says she can not imagine life without it now.
"Yoga gives you core strength," she explains. "It is extraordinarily good for backache and keeps you flexible into your old age so that you don't go around complaining and having to sit on hard chairs.
"I think yoga changes your life. It frees you up from all sorts of aches and pains, and just makes you feel better. I wish I had started years and years ago."
Originally, traditional yoga comes from the religious cultures of Hinduism and Buddhism, and its practice was seen as a path to happiness and inner freedom. Naturally, yoga has changed to a more physical practice since it came to the west, though many do still find something spiritual in it.
For Smith, however, it provides relaxation as the postures help de-stress the body. "It's very useful for getting to sleep. I have to get up at 4am every day and I have slept better since I took up yoga than I have ever done. And I fall asleep so much more easily, but maybe that's just age."
But Smith thinks the best thing about yoga is that it is such a different way of working out than going to the gym.
"In the gym, I used to lumber around yawning my head off and thinking about what I was going to eat afterwards.
�But because I have to concentrate so hard with yoga � to make sure I don't fall over or that I'm doing it right � I actually spend an hour-and-a-half not thinking about anything at all."
However, it is important to be realistic about what yoga can do for you. Its intention is to make you feel better, rather than provide a definitive weight-loss or fitness regime.
If you're looking to achieve the ultimate body beautiful then yoga will help, but you will have to do a lot of it and make it just one part of a more general fitness regime.
And for it to be effective at all, you have to make sure you are doing it right.
Of course, Smith's new video is perfect for anyone who's ever worried about whether they are doing their moves properly, but she thinks everyone should go to a live class every now and then.
"The way that you move in yoga, and the way that you feel your muscles working is quite unusual for most Westerners," she explains.
"We're not used to moving the smaller muscles, we're used to moving the great big ones, so you should see a trainer just to make sure you're doing it right."
But the hardest thing with any exercise is motivation. Despite all the good intentions, it's all too easy to try something new like yoga a couple of times and then just stop.
How-ever, working out with friends will give you an incentive to keep it up. On the video, Smith and Napper demonstrate `PartnerYoga', which involves using a partner's body for support to achieve fuller and longer stretches.
"Oh, it's fantastic and it's the big new thing in America," Smith enthuses. "You get a deeper pose and it's quite useful to feel how somebody else is doing something."
So find a partner and resolve to try some yoga in the New Year � it will stretch your body and your mind.
Penny Smith's Yoga Masterclass with Howard Napper, Telstar Video Entertainment, �10.99 VHS, �12.99 DVD.