How to Build a Home Yoga Practice Week That Sticks

It’s late January. The resolutions are three weeks old, and for a lot of us this is the week the home practice quietly slips. You meant to roll out your mat. Then the week happened.

I know that feeling well. I practice every day, and I still go through phases where I lose my routine. One summer with three teenagers in the house did it to me completely, and I came out the other side needing a real reset. So I’m not going to hand you a perfect seven-day schedule. I’m going to give you a week that bends without breaking.

A Year of Yoga with Erin Sampson, a 52 week experience, over a sunset

Start with one

Here’s the smallest version of a practice that sticks: one class a week. That’s the idea behind A Year of Yoga, our free 52 week experience. You sign up and we send you one class each week, and you take it whenever you have the space and time that week. Our hope is that practicing at least one class a week for a full year lets yoga become a natural part of your routine.

One class a week doesn’t sound like much. But it’s the class you actually do, and it keeps the thread from breaking. Everything else this week is a bonus on top of it.

There’s a second reason I love it. Because the classes are chosen for you, you’ll end up trying things you never would have picked on your own. That’s how a lot of people find out they love yin, or that a power class isn’t as scary as they thought.

A week that bends

Think of your week as three kinds of days rather than seven fixed appointments.

One anchor day. This is your longer class, 45 minutes to an hour, on the day you’re most likely to have time. If you’re on A Year of Yoga, your weekly class lives here. If not, try my Little Bit of Everything class. I like classes with a little bit of everything, and this one has it: some inversions and arm balancing, plus spine and core strengthening.

Two or three short days. Fifteen to twenty minutes on busy mornings or lunch breaks. The Rise and Shine class was made so you can squeeze it in before you head off to work. On a day when you’ve been stuck at a desk or a kitchen table, the Study Break class keeps you mostly on your feet so you get up out of the chair.

One soft day. This is the one people skip, and it’s the one that makes the rest sustainable. My Relaxing and Winding Down class is focused on restoration and eventually sleep. There’s so little dynamic movement that, as I say in the class, your pajamas might even be appropriate.

That’s four to five days, and the rest are genuinely off. If life eats a short day, nothing breaks. If life eats the anchor day, you still had a short one.

When you need to start over

You will fall off at some point. Everyone does. When it happens, don’t try to pick up exactly where you left off. Do a reset class instead.

My Reset and Recharge class came straight out of that teenager summer. Sometimes a good reset for me comes from super intense moments, and sometimes it comes from quiet, restorative ones. So that class does a little of both, and it touches the entire body. It’s long, about 70 minutes, so save it for a day you can give it room.

Small things that make it stick

Keep the same spot. A corner of the bedroom or a patch of living room floor. When the mat lives there, half the decision is already made.

Warm up your spine first, every time. In my Yoga Warmups tutorial I explain that this is especially true when you’re practicing at home all by yourself on your mat. You want to open the spine in every direction, with side bending and twisting, plus some rounding and arching. It takes five minutes and makes everything after it feel better.

Expect every day to be different. Some days your balance is there and some days it isn’t. I’ve said it on camera: today’s not a great balance day for me. Your body changes and your mind changes every day. Be patient with yourself, and let the practice meet you where you are.

Don’t compare your pose to mine. It’s fine if your posture doesn’t look like mine. It doesn’t need to. I’ve gained flexibility over a lot of years of daily practice, and you’ll gain yours the same way, one week at a time.

Use the space. One of the great things about a home practice is that you can spread out. Take up the room. Do what feels good.

Your week, at a glance

Anchor day: your A Year of Yoga class, or Little Bit of Everything
Short day: Rise and Shine
Short day: Study Break
Soft day: Relaxing and Winding Down
Anytime you’ve fallen off: Reset and Recharge

If you’d like a playlist in the background, I’ve made Spotify playlists for different class lengths. And if you’re looking at the calendar and dreaming of a week where somebody else plans everything, our spring and November retreats in Nosara are the deluxe version of this plan.

But for now, just one class this week. Pick the day. Put it on the calendar. I’ll be there on the screen waiting for you.