Pranayama breathing (which means standing deep breathing) is how we begin each yoga class. Interlace your ten fingers and glue them to your throat. Now inhale through your nose while bringing your elbows up beside your ears, to a count of six. Next exhale through your mouth while lowering your elbows and using your interlaced fingers to push your head way back. Make the “ha” sound while exhaling to a count of six. We will do two sets of ten.
The instructor tells us to use this breath to set up our whole practice and our whole day afterward. “Clean out every last bit of old air in your lungs. You are only using ten percent of your lung capacity. Your lungs, just like every other muscle in your body, need to be stretched so you can maximize their full capacity,” says the instructor.
Now I’m thinking, for 57 years I’ve only used 10% of my lungs capacity, there’s going to have to be alot of stretching going on in there. My first weeks with pranayama breathing just about killed my neck. It seemed like the first set would never end and the thought of a second set of pushing my neck back to “try to see the wall behind me” just seemed impossible. Nevertheless I would persist and “breathe through the pain and discomfort” and now, 16 weeks later, not only is the pain and discomfort gone, but I actually CAN see the wall behind me.
As I leave the studio carrying my soggy heavy mat, I sometimes feel I’m carrying my yoga experience out to the car and into life with me. Smug in the fact that pranayama breathing has set up my day, I place my mat in the backseat, much as used to place my children in a car seat, and drive away ready and waiting for whatever awaits me in the next twenty three and a half hours.
My pranayama breathing has surfaced in the way I paint a room, although I never knew it. When I begin to paint a room, I completely empty it of furniture and wash the wood floor until it shines. Just the look of the floor and the empty room has me running for my ladder and paint cans. Whenever I tell anyone this, their inevitable response is “Why would you wash the floor BEFORE you paint?” Clearly they don’t get pranayama breathing.
Recently I read somewhere everything starts with a clean canvas. Whether it’s a painting, a story, a song, or maybe just a new paint job for the living room, it all starts from nothing. I used to freeze at the thought of facing a blank page, worried whatever I’d write wouldn’t be good enough. In much the same way I’d freeze at the immense choice of paint colors in Home Depot, give up and go home thinking, “What if I painted it a god-awful color and even my husband hated it?”
The thought of starting with nothing, other than what was in my own mind and heart, was absolutely paralyzing. I couldn’t get passed the fact it might not be “good enough”. Although I did start both projects before I started the yoga, it was with much anxiety and trepidation. Over time, the true meaning of pranayama breathing sunk in, occupying the space at the base of my neck where the pain and discomfort used to reside. Each day when my head flips back and sees the blank wall behind me, the clean canvas sets up my day with anticipation, instead of anxiety. Who knew pushing your head back twenty times a day, exhaling a great big “ha” sound, could conquer such anxiety and self-doubt?
And so, as another day goes by, I appreciate and respect the power of the breath, and….I have written.
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