What most people don’t realize about yoga is, unless you master the breath, you can never truly master yoga. The breath is one of the deepest foundations of yoga practice and, in my opinion, the most important part of the practice.
When you think about it, the breath connects everything … it connects our bodies to life, to our source. It connects our minds to our bodies. And it allows all three parts (mind, body, spirit or life energy) to harmonize, whether during meditation or during asanas (yoga flows) or simply when holding various poses.
Yet, unbeknownst to many of us, we breathe shallowly all day long, rarely ever using the full capacity or even close to the full capacity of our lungs … and we ALSO don’t realize that we often have moments when we hold our breath altogether, whether it’s when we are pausing, deep in thought, or when we are bracing for something, perhaps a negative reaction from someone or just a response from someone in general, when we are on our computers and multitasking, biting our lips or during other nervous habits, when we are talking with someone and waiting for the moment they’re done talking so we can respond and/or make our point, when we are skimming through social media sites and our brains are downloading a bunch of information.
All of these instances often result in pauses in our breath, constantly, throughout the day. And the rest of the time, we are shallowly breathing in and out.
You might ask what’s the big deal? We’re still obviously breathing enough to survive and get through our days, etc. But if you realize all of the benefits from deep breathing, you will understand where I’m going with all of this.
Breathing deeply actually sends a signal to the brain to calm down … essentially, it triggers the parasympathetic system, which counters our sympathetic system (mainly associated with our fight-or-flight response). Our parasympathetic system helps calm the body, aids in resting and digestion, helps slow our heart rate down, decreases tension/stress, brings clarity, balance and grounding, increases intestinal and glandular activity, etc.
A good source on at least 18 benefits of deep breathing or breathing well and how to do it is this One Powerful Word article.
So, when you connect all of these dots, you might understand how just mastering your breath alone is a HUGE feat. It can take any activity you are performing, whether work-related, exercise or a yoga flow — or even if it’s just sitting quietly or meditating — to an entirely different level. People think yoga can only be done on a mat or for a period of time throughout the day, but practicing true yoga, the science and philosophy of yoga, can be done all day long, 24/7.
Obviously here, I’m just talking about one aspect of it, the breath. But, in my opinion, it’s the first aspect of yoga you want to truly master before getting into the movements and meditation and way of living. After all, breath, oxygen, prana, is what connects us to life itself. And until we fully appreciate, honor and exercise that aspect of our lives and of yoga, we won’t be able to really get a lot farther down our paths to better living.
So, while I can give you several specific breathing techniques you can do … the ones that seem to work the best for me and are the simplest to do are Three Part Breath and Alternate Nostril Breath.
The Three Part Breath is when you breath deeply into the diaphragm, feeling the belly expand and then continuing the inhale upward, so you will feel your ribcage expand and then your chest expand before you slowly exhale from the chest back down to the diaphragm, perhaps even squeezing the abdomen slightly at the end to get out all the air.
And you repeat this for a few minutes or as long as you need to. You can do this all day long if you wanted to 🙂
Alternate Nostril Breath is a bit more involved, but still pretty easy to do. You take your thumb and ring finger (I usually use my right hand, but whichever is more comfortable) and you close your eyes, press the thumb against the right nostril blocking the airflow and exhale completely out of the left nostril, then you inhale through the left nostril, you can pause briefly at the top of the breath if you’d like, then lift up the thumb and bring the ring finger down against the left nostril as you exhale through the right one. Then inhale through the right nostril and repeat back and forth … again, for several minutes or even just one or two minutes. This particular technique helps bring clarity to the mind and also helps bring peace, serenity and relaxation. It is a good technique to do before meditating, in the morning or even at night before bed.
There are so many other kinds of breathing techniques, but I think starting with the basics is the best way to start anything 🙂
If you’d like other techniques or have any questions, please feel free to contact me at my gmail address: cshofar@gmail.com, or call 440-382-0188.
Have a beautiful, relaxing, love-filled day my friends <3
Love,
~C~
When you own your breath, nobody can steal your peace. ~ Author Unknown