Yoga mat is pretty self-explanatory : just get on it and start practicing. The block usage in yoga can be somewhat confusing.YogaPulse DVDs always show the correct ways of using these props to enhance your yoga practice.

Generally, yoga bricks are used to:

1. Bring the floor closer to you. If you are a beginner, are pregnant or simply cannot reach the floor while being in a standing yoga position, without compromising your allignment, it's better to put a block on the floor and then place your hand or fingertips on top of it. The yoga block can be placed on three different height levels: depending on where you are in relationship to the floor. You can make the block higher or lower, if you wish. Always start with a level higher, than what you think you need, gradually going down a level, if desired. Poses to use the yoga block s with include: half-moon pose, extended angle pose, triangle pose.

2. To enhance the pose's effect on you. Strategically placed yoga bricks can be used to intensify the experience in a yoga pose. Placing the block under your forehead while in pigeon pose should force you to keep your upper back in as great of an allignemnt as your hips, which are supposed to have equal weight on them in this position. Holding a block between your thighs moves your legs into their full potential while in a wheel or a bridge pose. Yoga bricks, used for this purpose, also have a tendency to focus your mind entirely on the postion you are in. As the physical experience intensifies, so does the elvel of mental concentration.

3. To help you further relax into the pose and hold it longer. While you are seated in a wide straddle forward bend, you can put your hands or your forehead on the block. This way you can focus on moving your inner thighs towards the earth, without having to worry about your upper body. In an ankle-to-knee pose, where the ankles and the knees are in line with each other, placing the forehead on the yoga block would take some of the edge off of this intense position.

4. And finally: be creative!  Yoga blocks have unlimited use in yoga practice, and you can come up with a new way to use them every day. Bricks can be used to lie on, to hold, to move. They can even be used as weights to increase the effect of the yoga poses!
And when you are done with your yoga, your kids can build themselves a tower out of these magic bricks, or you can use the blocks to put things on.