Yoga – Welcome to Full Life

Cool Yourself Off on a Hot Day with Sitali Breath Practice

Though the hottest part of summer may be over, the sun is still strong. If you are not able to dive into the ocean, or the mountain lakes that still contain snow islands, and you find yourself overheating during the day, you can always stop for a cool breath.

Yes, you read that right. While it is important to hydrate, a cool breath can help relieve the heat in your body. Try this, Sitali Breath:

Take a seat in the shade. Make sure your body is comfortably upright and you have a natural lumbar curve.

If you can curl your tongue into a tube, do so, and with the end of this tongue-tube protruding slightly over your lower lip, take in a breath.

If you cannot curl your tongue, then simply place the tip of your tongue on the back of your top teeth and gums at the roof of your mouth. Take a breath, inviting the air in over the surface of your tongue.

Your mouth functions like a swamp cooler~ as the air blows over the moist surface of your tongue, it cools. That cool air is drawn into the body.

After your first cooling breath, exhale slowly through your nostrils, inviting yourself to relax. Then, take another slow, cooling breath and another slow exhale through your nostrils. Keep going for a few minutes. Invite the cool air deep into the body to refresh and relax you. Then enjoy a cool glass of water or some delicious fruit. Tune into the tastes, sounds and other sensations and enjoy these moments of self-care.

Yoga practice can be incorporated into moments of our day. The root of the word yoga means to yoke together, unify. We learn skills and then we begin to invite the practices to infuse our daily lives until all of our moments are the practice.

When we awaken to present moments: pause to hear the birds in the trees, feel the air, slow our breath, we live truly, in the here and now. This present-moment living can help us to regulate our nervous and endocrine systems because we let go of the shadows of the past and the anxiety that may come with the unknowns of the future.

I have found myself adding little practices to my life lately. I have felt busier than usual with workshop and retreat opportunities arising, and the planning that comes with this. Something new! And while this is all very exciting, I can feel anxious about doing well. But if I stop, sit down, breathe, and feel the moment, I can shed some of this anxious energy. It’s like a breath of lemonade on a hot day…

Practicing The Brahmaviharas- Loving Kindness

As we know, yoga sets the stage for us to deepen our enjoyment of life. Through postures and breath we learn to pay attention, to turn our gaze and senses inward, to live in the present moment. These practices help us build resilience and patience.

The practice also invites us to deepen into ourselves through the koshas, the sheaths of our being. We watch the breath, the mind’s influence on the body, the body’s influence on the mind, and we learn how to steady all three. And as we begin to take more pause time, we develop the ability to turn towards the deeper practices of our wisdom body– our Vijnanamaya Kosha.

The Brahmaviharas are considered the Four Immeasurables. They include the practices of Loving Kindness- in Sanskrit, Maitri, Compassion- Karunā, Appreciative Joy-Muditā, and Equanimity- Upeksā.

These Immeasurables predate Buddhism and are discussed in early yogic texts. As these Immeasurables have been taught and studied in Yoga, Buddhism and Jainism, the different perspectives have influenced one-another.

I love the practice of the Brahmaviharas. They have literally changed my life. I didn’t realize repetitive practices could slowly change the way I viewed the world, myself and others. These practices are often simple and seem connected deeply to my own wisdom and to my awareness that we are all interconnected.

Here is one simple example: In the shower each morning I begin my loving kindness meditation. I make deep wishes of well-being for myself and others. Each day they may vary a little:

May I be filled with loving kindness for all beings.
May I be well.
May I be at peace.
May I be filled with joy and truly happy.
May I do good work in the world and make offerings from my heart.
May I be kind and compassionate.
May I recognize my place in a larger community.

Then I expand the wishes outward– towards my children, my parents, my friends, my students, people I see in town regularly and do not really know. I then expand farther, to whole communities, cities, countries, landscapes… out to all beings on our small and beautiful planet.

I think this is why Trommer’s poem speaks to me. (Press here for the poem.) The practice of the Brahmaviharas has helped me to know better that inner thrum that reminds us of our shared humanity. I like being a river of blood, one of the notes in a symphony, a part of the one big conversation. I like being one dust particle among many dancing in the light.

I try to really picture the people, the places, the beings I am wishing loving kindness for… Of course I can see the faces of my children– and do not see the faces of the people from Ukraine, Texas as clearly… and yet I imagine this love, these good wishes flowing outward, into all communities.

Loving kindness practice asks us to consider what love and happiness are– If I am to share love with those close to me, I have to be aware of my feelings as they arise. Thich Nhat Hahn has a beautiful little book called Peace is Every Step and in it is a chapter called Living Together.

In Living Together Thich Nhat Hahn tells us that when we live with others we cannot be happy if those we live with are unhappy. They cannot be happy if we are not happy. So we very carefully need to watch our own feelings in these relations– and with kind speech, let these loved ones know if we feel knots developing in our relationship. If we do, clear and loving communication can help us to untie the knots. If we untie knots when they arise, we won’t end up with many knots in between us, and we will be happier.

Practicing awareness and clear speech with those we live with is another loving kindness practice. Making sure we don’t develop resentments, hurt feelings, misunderstandings which I often feel growing in the tissues of my body; in my gut, in the tension in my shoulders and jaw. I like the image of untying knots that come up in our relationships with others, and keeping the area between us clear and open.

And as I think of those I love, I realize I do have some knots to untie. And as I write this I realize I will meditate on how to put my feelings into words with kindness and make sure when I speak I am also ready to take the time to truly listen to their perspective.

May you all be well– mind, body, heart and spirit. And may the practice of loving kindness and the other immeasurables help you to live happier lives.

Namaste.

What is Yoga?

The root of Yoga means to yoke, to unite. One of my first teachers taught me yoga is a practice of re-membering, of putting ourselves back together again, consciously. With each ah-ha moment, we get to know ourselves better. Yoga is a delving inward towards our true and essential nature– through the shrouds and traumas of life towards our inner essence, which has always been there and is interconnected with all beings and with our planet.

Yoga is not a form of exercise– though the asanas, the postures, do strengthen and stretch the body. Yoga is a practice of awakening. And paying attention to the physical body is certainly a part of this practice. This is a developing awareness of our Anamaya Kosha– our food body. And yoga takes us deeper and deeper into our energy body, our mind, our intuition, and our interconnectedness.

Through yoga we can calm and reset our nervous systems. We can expand our capacity to engage the ventral vagal nervous system and live more conscious, contented, compassionate lives. Through yoga we can learn to nurture and nourish ourselves and to become more present for others.

The restorative practice is of equal importance to the physical work of the practice. It is in these practices we learn to question the PUSH life can become and to invite balance– We learn to play as well as work. We learn to listen as well as speak. We learn to deeply relax as well as GO. In the restorative sections of practice we may move beyond trying to please others towards nurturing and caring for ourselves.