Thanks for your FAQ post on practicing yoga at home. I have a purely home practice now after two years in a studio because I moved somewhere with a yoga studio. I would absolutely second your thought on taking classes periodically. There would be no way that I could have started (and sustained) a home practice if I didn’t have a basic yoga background to begin with. I think it helps to be guided into a pose so you can know what poses are supposed to feel like when you’re on your own.

I’d also suggest scheduling your practice as if you were taking a class. This makes you less likely to blow it off or reschedule it for a later date (which might mean skipping it altogether).

I also leave my yoga mat out on my floor most of the time. This encourages me to come to my mat whenever I feel like it, even if it’s only for ten minutes. (This could apply to all yogis.)

Thanks again for the post. Tumblr has sort of replaced the yoga community I had to leave behind.

Oh yeah! Great suggestions! I would definitely need to schedule my at home practices.

I get a lot of questions about how to start yoga if you don’t have the money/time/car/too young/whatever to go to a yoga class. Here are a few ideas that come to mind.

[HOME PRACTICERS: if you have anything else you’d like to add about what helps you to have an active yoga practice, LET ME KNOW! and I’ll add the tips to the yoga queue.] 

My main concerns with home practices are the following:
- it’s hard to get to know your local yoga community!
- because you don’t have that instructor, you might start bad habits that can be hard to break or cause injury.

My starting point for getting into a home practice is to do what other yogis do that go to gyms or studios. Find an instructor or instructors that you ‘gel’ with. Who transfers information that speaks to you?

You can go to your library and check out DVDs. Rent DVDs from a local video store (yeah, like those exist). Netflix DVDs. YouTubes. If you have Comcast, sometimes they have some pretty good yoga practices On Demand. Find an instructor you like and press play; press play every day if you want to. If you like them that much, it’d be cool if you bought their DVD. Boom. You’ve started a home practice. 
There are also monthly pay websites like yogavibes.com (EDIT: and yogaglo.com). I personally have used yogavibes and it was easy to cancel.

[Harder option imho]: If you dont want to go the DVD/computer route, you can also go to your library and check out books that talk you through yoga poses and then search for beginning yoga routines online or in, maybe, a Yoga Journal. I would start by focusing on the yoga poses in Sun Salutations C, A, then B. Learn that basic movement then start adding the standing and balancing poses. Your breath typically determines the pace of your Sun Salutations (you move with the breath), and you typically hold standing or balancing poses for 3-10 breaths. At the beginning and/or end of your 10, 15, 30, 60? minute yoga practice, close your eyes and practice a few moments of silence either sitting or lying in corpse pose.

Final Two Thoughts
1. My first rule of yoga is Don’t be Stupid. So be mindful of your body and don’t encourage an injury by being stubborn.
2. Take a yoga class periodically. Lululemon has them for free. Most yoga studios charge like $5 or $10 for community classes. So unless you’re confined to your house or just not living in a very yoga-oriented community, this should be do-able! Also, IT’S FUN!!