do you know the most important part about yoga?

breathing is the key of yoga

Do you know that the most important part about yoga is breathing. Sure, flexibility, muscle strength, meditative spaciousness, spirituality, stamina and emotional clearing are all important aspects as well of this 5,000+ year old practice called yoga.

But, to get to the truth of your yoga, you must breathe. Deep inhale. Deep exhale. Keep doing it.

When in doubt or overwhelmed, just breathe. When depressed, just breathe. When overly excited about something to a point where you get nothing else done, just breathe.

yoga on your mat

It's easiest to practice the deepest meditative breathing while on your mat, emulating colors of fire and feeling in your mind—whatever guides you—as the prana moves through you in poses. On your mat it's the time when you are most dedicated to yourself to focus inward to the soul of who you are.

find a teacher who understands this

If you are being led by a yoga instructor—and you are especially stressed out—hopefully this teacher will continually remind you to breathe. It is during our most stressful times, when we need yoga most, that we forget to breathe.

We can go through our days inhaling and never truly exhaling. Just quick and light life-giving breaths will sustain us but not help us truly live. Think of this: the air we breathe has the power to infiltrate us and oxygenate our blood, bringing nutrients and oxygen to our cells and transporting metabolic waste products away from those cells. The toxins within us affect us physically, emotionally and spiritually.

breathe like darth vader

Ujjayi breath is the technique employed in yoga, also called "the ocean of breath", whereby you inhale and exhale in equal duration through the nose, allowing the breath to move smoothly through the back of the throat (with a Darth Vader sound). Part of a dynamic asana practice, the breaths envigorate your yoga practice and make you victorious (the Sanskrit meaning of ujjayi).

Full inhales to the top of your head, followed by full and deep exhales all the way down to your solar plexus are key. These breaths have the power to get through your darkest moments.

© 2013 Yoga Robin^®