Yoga with a twist If you can't take a class, just follow the numbers on the mat

Posted: March 23, 2014 at 8:47 am


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Elizabeth Morrow poses on her specially designed Yoga by Numbers mat in Bow, N.H. The mat gives true yoga beginners a step-by-step roadmap to learn poses at their own pace. AP Photos

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BOW, N.H. -- Combine Twister, paint-by-numbers and the ancient Hindu practice of breath control, meditation and poses, and you get Yoga by Numbers.

The approach -- complete with a numbered mat -- was designed by a Boston woman whose own health scare inspired her to put yoga in reach for people with physical limitations, tight schedules or other roadblocks to traditional practice.

The oversized yoga mat is dotted with big, numbered circles that look like the target in a rifle scope. The accompanying DVD gives true yoga beginners -- those who wouldn't know an up-dog from a Chihuahua -- a step-by-step roadmap to learn the poses at their own pace.

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Elizabeth Morrow was an athlete, a skier and soccer player who, two years ago, found herself hospitalized with a right lung full of blood clots, the lower lobe completely collapsed. When she was strong enough to start exercising again, she found even the easiest of yoga classes too taxing. She didn't have the stamina for an hour, couldn't hold the poses the way the instructor wanted.

So, the 32-year-old started thinking of ways to make it easier, more convenient and even more fundamental than the myriad DVDs already on the market.

"I was thinking about a paint-by-number kit where you don't need to be Picasso or van Gogh, you just follow what they tell you and you'll come out with something," she said. "I just wanted something that felt really accessible and doable for people. The image of the mat just popped into my head: 'Wow, I can do yoga by numbers as well."'

The DVD tells users exactly which circle to put their hands and feet in and allows for advancement to more challenging poses.

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Yoga with a twist If you can't take a class, just follow the numbers on the mat

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March 23rd, 2014 at 8:47 am

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