Warrior’s Edge Archive
Where will your practice lead you today?
Why Do My Wrists Hurt During Yoga?
Wrist pain is one of the most common concerns I hear from yoga students, regardless of how long they’ve been on the mat. In fact, the longer they’ve practiced with incorrect form or with their attention displaced to their wrists, the more they might complain about how much they hurt.
Instead of asking, "What's wrong with my wrists?" a better question might be whether you’ve prepared them for what you want them to do.
Why We Move Side to Side in Yoga
Consider this plus sign: +
Now imagine living your entire life moving only along the vertical line. Forward. Backward. Forward. Backward. That's how most of us move.
Yoga, especially in practices like vinyasa, reminds us that movement isn't just about going forward. Your body deserves to explore every direction.
How to Prepare Your Wrists for Yoga
Whether you’re new to yoga or not, it’s unlikely your wrists work harder anywhere else. Often, that feels confronting, especially if you spend a lot of your time at a computer or not giving your wrists any release.
It might not feel like it, but your wrists aren’t as weak as you think. They’re just being asked to do something they almost never do.
The goal isn't to make your wrists tougher, but rather to prepare them for the work they’re about to do.
Understanding the Mudras: Yoga's Hand Gestures and the Power of Intention
Every time you’ve brought your hands together in prayer at the beginning, middle, or end of class, you’ve taken a mudra. If you’ve rested your hands on your knees during your meditation, you’ve taken a mudra. If you’ve so much as given the Peace Fingers to anyone in your daily life, you’ve taken a mudra. There’s even a Gesture of Middle Finger mudra, should it ever apply.
While yoga is often associated with movement, mudras remind us that sometimes the smallest gestures carry the greatest intention.
Understanding the Niyamas: The Yoga Practice Beyond the Poses
When people begin practicing yoga, many focus on Asana, or poses, and the physical aspects of the practice. However, they may find that their practices feel stale and disconnected at some point. They adhere to every cue, find picture-perfect posture in every pose, and come to their mat, at least in some sense, every day. But something still feels missing. And sometimes, that’s a different relationship with themselves.
Enter the Niyamas, the second branch of Patanjali’s Eight Limbs of Yoga.
Understanding the Yamas: Yoga's Ethical Foundation
Most people discover yoga through movement. That's why many people are surprised to learn that, according to the traditional Eight Limbs of Yoga, the physical practice isn't where yoga actually begins. Before yoga asks us to move our bodies, it asks us to consider how we move through the world.
Those first teachings are known as the Yamas.
Mindfulness vs. Meditation: Why the Difference Matters
People use the words mindfulness and meditation interchangeably all the time.
Good news: They’re not the same thing.
Bad news: They share enough similarities that it’s incredibly easy to confuse them.
Understanding the difference changes what you’re actually trying to accomplish—not just when you sit down to meditate, but every time you step onto your yoga mat or move through your day.
Think of it this way:
Day 30: The Warrior I Became
40 days ago, I hit record on my phone, got down into plank, and started a challenge I honestly wasn’t sure I could finish.
Today, I did.
I still can’t believe it’s over, and I can’t believe even more that I actually completed it. At that, as had been the case since Day 25, I also finished all 465 on time. 30 minutes. Six intervals. Five minutes per interval. No make-ups. No other challenge. Just the monster finally conquered.
Day 28: Look What Consistency Built
Today was the first day crossing over 400 push-ups. I knew, especially after the last three days, that if I could finish these on time, I would be able to accomplish Days 29 and 30.
At that, it was such a huge milestone, and one I’d looked up to for weeks. The first major milestone came when I crossed 100 push-ups on Day 14, then again at 200 on Day 20. Hitting 300 on Day 24 was one of the hardest, but now, sitting at the 400 mark, I feel more confident than at any other point in the challenge that I can do this.
Day 25: Things Finally Take a Turn for the Better
I’ve faced a lot of challenges over the course of this wild 30-Day Push-Up Challenge, but nothing prepared me for the turnaround on Day 25. What started as apprehension turned into my actually thinking, for the first time, that I could get through this.
I did Ascension and Descension throughout the challenge because the 23-minute challenge I did six years ago required them. I was past that now, so I could change the rules if I wanted to.
And I did.
Day 23: I’ve Been Here Before
I walked into Day 23 of the 30-Day Push-Up Challenge with a prediction: I was going to surprise myself.
Just like I did six years ago when I tried this for the first time.
I fought through 23 minutes of hell doing Ascension in COVID, and for years, I wondered if I would be able to do the same thing while taking it from a Descension approach instead.
Today, I tested that theory.
Day 21: The Power of Rest
I approached Day 21 differently than I did the last time I had an Ascension Day on Day 15.
Instead of hitting the timer and immediately dropping into my first push-up to get it out of the way, I took my sweet-ass time.
That probably would’ve driven Day 1 Andrew crazy, but Day 21 Andrew knew better. He had fought battles in this challenge Day 1 Andrew couldn’t actually yet conceive, and he was going to prove why this challenge was meant for a warrior.
Day 20: When My Body Stopped Listening
I had to carry twenty-one push-ups into the makeup round, which, on previous days, didn’t feel as impossible as it did today, when I wasn’t sure I could even do one more.
This wasn’t the first time I’d battled difficult moments in my head since starting this challenge. “I don’t want to,” “This is getting hard,” and “Can I really do this?” became staples in my thoughts.
Usually, my body and mind caught up to each other and worked through whatever I faced together.
Today was different.
Day 17: I Needed a Savasana
“I need a Savasana.”
Those were the first words out of my mouth after today’s 30-Day Push-Up Challenge workout.
For a yoga teacher, it felt strangely appropriate. Savasana isn’t just about lying down. It’s about allowing your body and your mind to absorb everything that just happened.
Apparently, I needed that more than I realized.
Day 15: The Intervals Give Me Hope
Today changed my entire view on the 30-Day Push-Up Challenge.
The push-ups didn’t get any easier—I’m not sure they ever will, despite how many I do—but, for the first time, they felt possible.
Going into Day 15, I wasn’t completely sure introducing intervals was the right decision. I hoped it was.
Honestly, I needed it to be.
Day 13: Why Am I Still Doing This?
When I woke up this morning, I was dangerously close to shutting down the whole 30-Day Push-Up Challenge.
Not because I physically couldn’t do another workout, but simply because I didn’t want to.
I questioned my motives, got caught up in my head about no one else doing it with me or caring about the videos, and it all suddenly became a burden I wasn’t sure I wanted to carry. I know I created this and did this to myself, for myself, but today I wondered if any of it was actually worth continuing.
Especially since I’m not even sure I can actually make it to the end yet.
Day 12: The First Day I Failed to Finish on Time
Today was the first day in the 30-Day Push-Up Challenge that I didn’t finish within the allotted time.
When the timer ended, I still had four push-ups left.
Oddly enough, I wasn’t upset. Not because I don’t care about the rules.
But because I’d already decided what the rules were.
Day 11: The Day I Predicted People Would Quit
Long before this challenge began, I had circled Day 11 in my head. Combined with the slow rise until the challenge really gets tough, mixed with this day being the day you realized just how tough it’s going to be, made me believe it would be the day most people would quit.
The novelty would be gone. The push-ups would finally start to feel heavy. The finish line would still be so far away that it almost wouldn’t seem worth chasing anymore.
Then Day 11 arrived…and I became exactly the person I had predicted.
Day 9: The first time I failed a push-up
Today, I failed a push-up for the first time in the 30-Day Push-Up Challenge.
My arms gave out as I was pressing back up, and I collapsed face-first into the floor.
And then I laughed.
Honestly, there was something strangely comforting about it.
Day 5: Is this challenge ever going to get hard?
Five days in, and I keep waiting for this 30-Day Push-Up Challenge to punch me in the face.
So far, it hasn’t.
That’s not to say the workouts have been effortless. Push-ups and I have never exactly been friends, which is part of the reason I started this challenge in the first place. But Day 5 arrived and…I feel fine.
For now.