Degree of Difficulty: Beginner

How to Strike It: Standing with feet together, drop the tailbone down, aiming toward your heels. Roll the shoulders back and down. Squeeze your butt to align your hips over your heels. Hold it for 30 seconds to a minute and feel the burn.

Butt Benefits: "Mountain Pose is the mother of all poses," says fitness and exercise guru Mandy Ingber (pictured), author of "Yogalosophy: 28 Days to the Ultimate Mind-Body Makeover." This position is about keeping the head, shoulders, hips and heels aligned and engaging the glutes — otherwise, you're kind of just ... standing there.

Image via Mandy Ingber Yogalosophy

Cover image via Cavan Images/Getty

Degree of Difficulty: Beginner to Intermediate

How to Strike It: Lie on your back with your knees bent at a 90-degree angle, feet parallel on the floor and hip-distance apart. Once you have settled in, press your feet evenly into the mat and lift your spine off of the floor, pressing your hips up. Scoop your tailbone under, and if you like, wriggle up onto the shoulders, interlacing the fingers and clasping the hands underneath you. Slowly lower down, one vertebra at a time.

Butt Benefits: Ingber says that less experienced yogis should use a block, which "supports you and eases weight from the shoulders." Your upper bum will thank you for holding this position for five deep breaths. If that's easy for you to maintain, try raising your right leg for five breaths and repeating on your left leg.

Degree of Difficulty: Intermediate to Advanced

How to Strike It: From Crescent Pose, lower your right fingertips to the floor, six inches in front of your right pinky toe. Extend your left arm up. Open the chest as much as you can, so that the head, hips, shoulders, and heels are in alignment. After several breaths, bring your left hand to the floor and step back into a lunge.

Butt Benefits: Because you're trying to find your balance with this pose, it forces your butt and core muscles to engage to keep you upright. The stretching/muscle-building combo keeps you from getting bulky. Ingber suggests using a wall for balance if needed. For a little extra challenge, raise fingertips from the mat."

Degree of Difficulty: Intermediate to Advanced

How to Strike It: Begin in Downward-Facing Dog. Raise your right leg up behind you and swing the leg, stepping forward to the midpoint of your hands. Allow your right knee to open out to the right, angling your knee at two o'clock. Your left leg should be extended behind you, internally rotated so that your hips are squared and your knee is facing the floor. Hold for 30 seconds.

Butt Benefits: Don't clench your booty for this pose, as that will prevent you from getting a deep stretch. Instead, focus on relaxing your muscles and deepening the stretch with each breath. If you can't square your hips to the mat, Ingber suggests reclining and crossing ankle over opposite knee with foot flexed, which is easier on the knees.

Degree of Difficulty: Advanced

How to Strike It: Keeping the elbows shoulder-width apart, bend the elbows and place your hands on your back for support, if they're not there already. Lift legs one at a time. Press the hips forward and bring the feet back, keeping the legs straight. Work your hands as high up to your shoulders as you can. After five to ten breaths, slowly lower your knees down by your ears.

Butt Benefits: Like with the mountain pose, you've got to squeeze your butt in order to get your body in the right alignment for this pose. Since everything has to be tight in order to hold the position, adding it into your routine will strengthen not only your glutes but your core and thighs as well. If you need to modify the pose, Ingber says, "You can simply extend the legs up and allow them to rest on a wall, with your butt in the corner where the floor meets the wall."