How Deep Breathing Expands Your Yoga Practice
Deep Breathing in Your Yoga Practice:
Have you ever seen the yogis in class who effortlessly move posture to posture? So beautiful, right?!? Often times it even creates a craving in ourselves to have that experience too. So what is it that they do that allows their whole practice to flow so effortlessly? Let’s dive in and find out what’s so great about deep breathing in yoga.
Creating beautiful flows takes a few things, but let’s focus on one factor: the breath. YOU HAVE TO BREATHE. When you give your body more oxygen, it fuels your brain and allows your body to relax, open up and expand.
Why does breath matter so much? Let’s get nerdy 🤓
- When utilizing a deeper breath it communicates to our brain to relax by stimulating our vagus nerve. In turn, when we are relaxed we become more free-flowing in our movements. Say hello to those pretty transitions.
- Deep breathing supplies greater volumes of oxygen into our bloodstream, assisting the body in processing and removing toxins. This in turn increases blood flow throughout our bodies by letting the blood flow easier.
- You get to slow down. Even if it’s just for a few minutes. Those extra few inhales and exhales will make a world of difference when transitioning between postures. By slowing down the postures, you now have time to feel into your body and move with intention and remove the tension.
When you are flowing in a yoga class it’s so hard not to get caught up in remembering the poses, hearing the music, and trying to understand whatever Sanskrit the teacher is yelling out. These are commonly the moments you’ll unknowingly hold your breath. It happens to all of us, trust me.
When you are using your breath to guide you posture to posture it gives you an opportunity to feel into each one fully before moving to the next one. Typically this works really well because in most cases your inhales will be opening or expanding postures and your exhales will be a twist, bind, or closing of the posture. Thus it feels really natural.
Bringing Breath into Movement.
After becoming comfortable with an even breath you can use your breath to play around with the way you flow. For example; if the music playing is not necessarily a “full deep breath” type of song and you want to keep with the beat without losing your yoga practice. Instead, make your breath cycle a little bit quicker. It becomes very fun once you get the hang of it.
Another suggestion I have is trying different types of breathing that Pranayama *ancient breath techniques* offers us. Typically in yoga, the style most teachers use is Ujjayi *to be victorious*. It’s known as a powerful breath that creates heat in the body and a hissing sound in the back of your throat caused by the restriction.
NOTE: If you are prone to anxiety Ujjayi may not be the most beneficial to you while you are healing. Just work with a cosmic aka full and complete breath until you feel that you are safe and ready to feel restriction. Email me if you have more questions on this.
In the end, your breath is yours and as much as we teachers will try and guide you with it hoping to evoke certain things in you; the choice is yours. It’s up to you what experience you want to have. I suggest trying a few different ways and feel into which styles work best for your practice.
Now, when you’re practicing and you find yourself holding your breath in class and you feel your flow being blocked remember:
B R E A T H ! 🌬
If you want to look more into the breath, Click Here for one of my favorite books.
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