Often I wonder if my yoga students feel like I am a broken record player. I talk about breathing throughout every class and every centering usually starts with me talking about breath...
Find a comfortable place and close the eyes. Start to bring your awareness to the breath. Don't make any move to change the breath, that will come later. For now I just want you to witness your own natural breath. Start to notice the length of the breath. Is it short or long? Is the breath shallow or deep? Do you notice the breath more fully at the tip of the nose, the chest and collarbones, or the stomach and solar plexus? Can you follow your breath as it moves into your body and as it makes it way back out? Now notice is there a texture to the breath? Is is smooth and fluid or is it jagged and rough? Can you feel the temperature of the breath? As you witness your breath I want you to start to develop a relationship with it, can you describe it to a stranger? Think of the breath as if it is your best friend...because it is. Your breath is with you for life. Your entry into this world is accompanied with an inhale and you will part from this world on an exhale. Now start to bring a deeper awareness to the breath. Start to breathe deeply in through the nose and back out through the nose with the mouth closed. Feel the breath reach every cell in the body.
I tell my students to close their eyes and bring their awareness to the breath that is always there for them but they spend copious amounts of time ignoring. Breathing is natural and thank god! Could you imagine what it would take for us if we had to actively control it all the time, we would get nothing else done. As it is now, we still find that in times of stress or extreme focus we forget to breathe, but not for long otherwise we would pass out from lack of oxygen. As a student of yoga I can use breath to know more about my asana practice. The breath will let me know if I am moving in a sufficient manner or if I am giving too much of my energy away. With that said there are times when I am simply so focused on figuring out how and where to get my body to move. When I am attempting a pose that is new or that I don't often play around with I tend to hold my breath, I know this because I also find myself biting my lips. When I realize this I can redirect my focus away from the pose and back to the breath.
I guess this goes back to my 235 hour teacher training where we watched a video called 'Breathe' by Rob Bell. In the video he talks about breath. In the video some interesting ideas are brought up... one being... "is the name of God the sound of breathing?" Now I should say that I am not a religious person, simply I am spiritual. That is enough for me. I am not here to force any opinions on you. Your views are yours and mine belong to me. However the reason for this post is simply for me to say ... Don't take your breath for granted. Love it before it gets to be at a place where it is labored or difficult and you find yourself remorseful that you didn't nurture it before... and to say how much better would you treat something so seemingly normal if you took the time to realize that it is your connection. The breath is not little, instead it is so huge. So huge that I find myself at a loss to interrupt and fully describe to my students sometimes.
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