As the holidays and family bear down on us we turn our attention toward 2014 and moving forward and advancing our practice I have complied, with tongue firmly planted in cheek, a list of reasons to continue to unfurl your mat, body and mind.

10 With a continued yoga practice at this time of year with all the holiday parties and goodies youʼll be less guilt ridden if the next day you nail a 90 minute dynamic flow class and drop 7 pounds of water weight and 900 calories. Not to mention two thousand calorie brunch afterward with friends will be well deserved and needed, kinda.

9 Being a serious yogi you have a built in excuse to get the hell out of the house for a couple hours because thereʼs nothing more fun then a full week of family reunions and secret Santaʼs. Well, that and root canals.

8 When the family gathers to exchange gifts, youʼll be so zen that when you get a gift certificate to the Meat of the Week Club for a full year shock never even registers on your face (unbeknownst to your Texas cattle rancher family, youʼve been vegan and a PITA member for 3 years). After all, you’ve practiced your poker face by holding half moon for 5 minutes in yoga class just that morning.

7 Since no one else in the family is capable of bending over and touching their toes, you will be in charge of doing a flawless forward fold and retrieving the gifts from beneath the trees and passing them out. This will be making you the bearer of good tidings; not to mention doing a vinyasa in between gifts will give you a bonus practice when most needed.

6 With your daily practice intact you wont feel guilty about getting all those hot new yoga clothes and youʼll be stoked to get to your second class that day.

5 Youʼre a holiday orphan and so are most of your transplanted friends, atheist, anti- capitalist, and occupy wall streeters, itʼs the one place where you all feel at home. This is on a sticky mat, sweating and breathing next to each other with only other serious students being in a sparse class on New Years Eve. (see advantage 1)

4 You have put in a solid year of hard work in mat to mat classes, finding the best teachers and finally having progressed to where you feel like youʼre a semi-advanced yogi badass. Although youʼve proven your love for the baby Jesus by starting your local chapter of Jews for Jesus youʼre not about to give that shit up for his birthday. As a gesture to the season and in compromise you will dedicate your Warrior Two to him all week long.