Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I consider myself a beginning/intermediate yoga student and have multiple power yoga DVDs. All of Shiva Rea's DVDs seemed to get very good reviews so I was excited when my Power Flow Yoga came in the mail. There is what they call a "yoga matrix" on this DVD, which lets you put together your own routine, and then there is 3 already put together routines about an hour each. I am not familiar with Shiva Rea or any of her sequences so I chose an already put together one called Core Power. The opening sequence was basically just doing 500 push-ups. I'm not talking about a flowing sequence with a couple yogi push-ups added in. It's pretty much just 12 push-ups, rest, downward dog over and over and over. I literally could not do it. So I stopped the DVD and decided I was going to make my own routine with the yoga matrix. The one and only option for an opener was called Twisting Kriya so I chose that and a couple other things, pushed play. Twisting Kriya is a sequence of throwing yourself from side to side to warm up. By the time it was over I felt like throwing up and decided this was NOT the DVD for me. Shiva Rea's style seems to be a lot more free than most yoga instructors and I discovered that, while good for some people, I need more structure and peacefulness in my practice. This DVD is very challenging, which I actually love in a DVD and didn't give Power Flow Yoga 2 stars for being too hard. I gave it 2 stars because I didn't care for the style of yoga, which seems more free-flow dance than vinyasa. If you can, rent a Shiva Rea DVD from the library, borrow one from a friend, or watch Shiva online before buying this DVD because you really have to like her style of yoga to get anything from it.