Related Posts

• Born to Breathe

  

  Did you know babies can instinctively swim from their first second out of the womb? It’s true, and I highly recommend dipping your toe into the hundreds of adorable online videos demonstrating it. When underwater, they naturally know to hold their breath, and on the surface, they breathe deeply and fully, utilizing their bodies to the fullest capacity. When you notice a baby’s breath, it is obvious to see their relaxed, expansive, and unrestrained nature. It’s the way we are all meant to breathe. Yet, for many of us slightly larger humans, that skill of deep breathing disappears, overshadowed by stress and worries. The perfection of the present moment is easily lost amongst a sea of distractions. As it turns out, babies are the masters of the key to wellness. The quickest and easiest path to health is through returning to our baby bliss is through deep breathing and complete surrender to the present moment. This is the ultimate stress antidote.

• Pranayama: Just Breathe

  

  Are you ready to go deeper into your yoga practice? This week the focus is on Pranayama, which is a vital component of a complete yoga practice. We’ve got new short classes dedicated to different techniques which will impact your state of mind and your body––fast! Pranayama is the practice of extending and regulating your prana or life force. The way we breathe changes the way we feel. Yoga luminary T.K.V. Desikachar stated: “In order to influence our prana, we must be able to influence the mind. Our actions often disturb the mind, causing prana to exude the body. Through daily pranayama practice, we reverse this process, as a change in the breathing pattern influences the mind.”

• Don't Forget to Breathe

  

  When I worked as an emergency room nurse, where tension was often high and patience short, I learned the power of taking a deep breath. It’s unrealistic to ask someone to “relax” when they are in pain, anxious about what might be wrong with them, and in absolutely no control over their environment. However, whether a patient was in hard labor or having chest pain or a panic attack, focusing on deep breathing always decreased their anxiety and de-escalated the situation.

• 10-Day Pranayama Immersion: Just Breathe

  

  The Hatha Yoga Pradipika, a seminal text on yoga, states that “when the breath wanders the mind is unsteady. But, when the breath is calmed, the mind too will be still, and the yogi achieves long life. Therefore, one should learn to control the breath.” The practice of controlling or extending your breath is called Pranayama, one of the eight limbs of yoga. In Sanskrit, the word Pranayama consists of “prana” and “ayama”. “Ayama” means to stretch or extend, and “yama” means to regulate and direct. Prana is life force or energy that consists of the three gunas, or nature’s building blocks.

• Lessons on Yoga and Life from My Computer Rage

  

  I recently bought myself a new computer and became so caught up in the frustration of trying to transfer information from the old to the new that I almost found myself in tears. I am mostly a calm and balanced person, who does lots of yoga and uses breathe to get through life’s tougher times and yet when a little piece of technology doesn’t play according to plan, all that practice seemed to go out the window. Feelings of frustration and lack of control ruled as I did what the manual said to do, waited hours, and the desired effect never came. What did come, was clenched fists, shoulders around my ears, a sore jaw from clenching, back stiffness from sitting too long and a very agitated mind and mood. I felt jumpy as I lost connection with my breathe. I then got annoyed when I tried to breathe perspective back in and moments later lost the awareness. Does this sound familiar to any of you, when technology seems not to work how we want it to? I was so far from the grateful girl I try to be. Hours spent scratching my head from my computer malfunctioning, certainly was not going along with the idealistic plan that I had created of my perceived future. Rather than being present, letting go of the ideals and attachments and accepting the truth of the situation, I was going into a tailspin of frustration. Then, I started to see things began to work technologically, and I started to have lightbulb moments about what computers can teach us as humans.

• Yoga Breathing: The Three Part Breath

  

  Yama Niyama Asana Pranayama Pratyahara Dharana Dhyana Samadhi. In English (my translation): Be a good person, take care of your Self, be aware of your posture, control your energy, withdraw from your external senses, concentrate, meditate, allow total integration. These are the steps on the path, outlined in Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras, to enlightenment. I have talked about the Yamas and Niyamas a little bit, the whole world is obsessed with posture, albeit not always healthy posture, meditation is gaining popularity, and the other steps are pretty much forgotten. There are many reasons for this. It’s hard to teach the Yamas and Niyamas unless you’re ready for a self-help course with a philosophy book as a reading requirement. Sense withdrawal is the nicer way of saying sensory deprivation and that is being sold the same way tanning is sold these days. Concentration sounds boring, even though we all know it’s necessary and we could probably use it more then ever what with all the distractions of the internet. Total integration is admittedly optimistic, unrealistic, and metaphysical sounding all at the same time, so I get why people stay away.