8 Limbs: Limb 4: Pranayama

“For breath is life, and if you breathe well, you will live long on earth .” ~Sanskrit Proverb

Pra: to bring forth

An: to breathe

Ayama: to stretch, expand

The breath and the mind are 2 sides of the same coin - where one goes, the other follows. Prana moves in and up and is expansive. Apana moves down and out through our body. Taking long, slow, deep breaths where one can experience the sensations in the body, breath and mind, allows us to trace the breath as it moves and to follow the energy it invites. When we change the breath, we change who we are and the ripple effect follows, changing what we know. The state of the breath and the state of the mind are interconnected.

Considerations of the breath include quality and stages. Qualities of the breath would be placement (where do you feel it?), time (how long is the breath?), texture (is it deep, shallow, smooth or uneven?), intensity (how deeply do we invite the breath in?). Stages of the breath are the inhale (puraka), exhale (rechaka), and the retention (kumbhaka).

There are a plethora of ways we can consciously experience our breath, including, but not limited to: ujjayi (“the breath of vicotry”), viloma (uneven breath, such as a 3 part exhale), nadi shodhana (alternate nostril breathing), and so on.

How you choose to practice the breath can influence your practice, allowing for the breath to be placed in different ways to warm/cool/invigorate the body, clear the mind, balance the nervous system, and so forth. Explore the breath and explore your entire practice from a new perspective!