Pranayama Breathing

We all know breath is life. In fact, in yogic philosophy one believes we are allotted a pre-determined number of breaths for our time here on Earth. If breathing is done hurriedly, instead of slowly and relaxed, one’s life is ended prematurely. The breath in yoga is called prana, which means life force or energy. It is stored in the solar plexus and sent through the body to recharge the various parts. Yogic breathing is called pranayama.



"The diaphragm is the major muscle used for respiration. As the lungs fill during inhalation, the diaphragm descends toward the abdominal organs. During exhalation, the lungs deflate and the diaphragm relaxes."

The origins of yoga are thousands of years old. Stone carvings that depict yoga postures have been found by archeologists dating back about 5000 years. The word yoga means “union” or “to unite.” In yoga we unite the mind, body, spirit and breath. It can be practiced by anyone, regardless of age, gender, religion, or fitness level.

There are very few prerequisites to practicing yoga. Bare feet are essential, as well as loose comfortable clothing. Slow, controlled movements make sure that each posture is performed only to the farthest comfortable depth. Eating a few hours before practice, ensures that you do not have a full stomach nor an empty one. It is important to remember that you should never feel pain. Pain is your body’s way of telling you to STOP. Always respect it.

Be mindful of your breath. Your breath should be comfortable and steady while holding postures. During vinyasa (flowing movement) asana (postures), the breath should still be comfortable and steady, but may take on a more forceful quality. If you cannot breathe rhythmically, that is a sign that you are practicing too strenuously. Take a step back and slow down. Do not compete - with yourself or anyone else. This is your practice and your time. Do only what you are comfortable with and hold each posture, or practice each breath, only for as long as you remain in your comfort zone. I’ve heard a saying many times that I particularly identify to yoga. “Do not worry about your destination, enjoy the journey.” Your perfect posture is what you can do today, right now, this minute. Relax...and enjoy your journey.

As we learn to breathe properly it is important to note we are required to use our lungs correctly. Many of us use only 1/5 to 1/3 or our lung capacity, breathing only into the upper portion of our lungs. As we age and acquire more stress and tension in our lives, our breathing becomes less and less integral. Take note of your breathing pattern the next you are anxious, scared, angry or frustrated. Compare it to a time when you are feeling relaxed, joyful or content. You can affect your emotions with the rhythm of your breath. Slow, relaxed breaths promote harmony and tranquillity.

The diaphragm is the major muscle used for respiration. As the lungs fill during inhalation, the diaphragm descends toward the abdominal organs. During exhalation, the lungs deflate and the diaphragm relaxes. Slow deep breathing allows for a good massage of the abdominal organs as well as strengthening and toning the abdominal muscles.

Each of the following breaths can be performed on its own or along with an asana. If combining the breath with asana, hold the asana for as long as comfortable. If you are a complete beginner, start with about 10 seconds. Gradually increase your holding time. If you are practicing the breath on its own, begin with 5 to 10 breaths. Again, increase the number of breaths as you become more comfortable with it.

The first breath we will look at is the COMPLETE BREATH. It is the basis of all other breathing techniques. In it we learn to slow our breath from a usual 15 to 20 breaths per minute to about 6 breaths per minute. Here we begin to understand how to correctly and completely fill our lungs with the much needed life force or prana. The Complete Breath is an excellent way to begin to reduce tension.

Let’s begin by performing a few Abdominal Breaths, just to see what it feels like to use the lower portion of our lungs. Sit comfortably with your shoulders relaxed and your chin level with the floor. Your back should be erect, but not rigid. Inhale through your nose letting your abdomen expand. Allow your ribs and chest to remain soft and relaxed. Exhale, through your nose, contracting the abdomen and relaxing the diaphragm. Practice this a few times. Be aware of how you feel. With your next breath, begin expanding the abdomen then continue to inhale and expand your rib cage and then fill your chest with breath. Begin to exhale by contracting your abdomen, then squeeze your ribs together and lastly, relax your chest. Continue to breathe in this fashion. This is the Complete Breath and along with reducing stress, it improves the quantity and quality of oxygen that enters your body. It helps to combat shortness of breath, calm the nervous system and the mind, and improve digestion. This is the breath to practice when feeling angry, impatient or nervous. It lowers the blood pressure and massages the heart. As you continue to breathe, notice if you can take the breath into not only the front of your body, but into the sides and back of your body as well.

The UJJAYI BREATH (Victorious Breath) is another traditional yoga breath. It too, richly oxygenates and purifies the blood, lowers blood pressure and is beneficial to those who suffer respiratory problems such as asthma. The Ujjayi breath helps to remove phlegm from the throat and improve digestion. It calms the nervous system and helps to draw the mind’s attention inward allowing the practitioner to stay focused.

The Ujjayi Breath takes the Complete Breath one step further becoming a more dynamic breath. This time as you inhale through your nose, the breath passes across the roof of your mouth to the back of your throat with a hissing sound. It sounds like the flow of the ocean tide. As you exhale, the air is pushed out past the back of your throat, then across the roof of your mouth, out your nostrils. The epiglottis is slightly restricted to obtain the hissing sound. This one is a little tricky and may take some time to perfect.

The third breath is called the KAPALABHATI BREATH (Skull Shining Breath). It is not recommended for those who suffer with emphysema, blood pressure problems or women who are pregnant. This is a very strong abdominal breath. Slowly and fully inhale through your nose. Exhale very quickly through your nose, as though you have been punched in the stomach, by contracting the abdominal muscles back toward your spine. Relaxing the abdominal area, begin another breath repeating the same forceful action for the exhalation. The inhalation should take slightly longer than the exhalation. Many of the benefits attributed to the Complete Breath and Ujjayi Breath pertain to the Kapalabhati. The strong pumping action of this breath also stimulates the liver, spleen and pancreas and helps to relieve constipation.

By Sheri Kauhausen at http://www.rapunzelgifts.com/

Yoga for Depression - Part II (Yogajournal.com)

In Yoga for Depression, Part I I discussed the two major types of depression, rajasic and tamasic, as conceptualized by my teacher Patricia Walden (and her teacher B.K.S. Iyengar), whose work has heavily influenced my own. That article described asana practices that can help lift students out of depression. Now let's review other useful yoga practices.
Pranayama Practices for Depression

For students with tamasic depression, pranayama practices that emphasize inhalation may be useful. Of course, getting your students to focus on engaging their abdominal muscles to help squeeze additional air out of the lungs on the exhalation facilitates an easier, deeper inhalation on the subsequent breath. Such breathing practices as three-part inhalation, and Ujjayi on the inhalation with normal exhalation, are examples of practices that increase the length of the inhalation relative to the exhalation.

Students with more rajasic depression may benefit from practices that bring attention to and lengthen the exhalation. Examples include three-part exhalations and 1:2 breathing, where, for example, you inhale for three seconds and exhale for six. Strong breathing practices such as Kapalabhati (Skull Shining Breath, sometimes called Breath of Fire) and Bhastrika (Bellows Breath), which tend to activate the sympathetic nervous system, may sometimes be too agitating for those who are already restless and fidgety. Let direct observation of the student be your guide, since finding the appropriate practice is ultimately a matter of trial and error. Furthermore, since a student's condition may change day to day, what's appropriate may also vary.
Other Practices for Depression

Chanting and other bhakti (devotional) practices can be useful for depression. Walden says that these practices bypass the brain and go directly to the emotions. Not all students respond to bhakti yoga, but in those who do, it can be powerful. Chanting tends to keep the brain occupied, and it's a natural way to extend the exhalation without thinking about it. You'd therefore expect it to be particularly useful for students with busy, rajasic minds.

Meditation can be a powerful tool over the long-term to facilitate greater levels of happiness. Dr. Richard Davidson at the University of Wisconsin has done research that shows that meditation tends to increase the activity of the left prefrontal cortex of the brain. Left-sided activation has been associated with greater levels of calm and happiness and well as more emotional resiliency, rendering practitioners better able to withstand the inevitable ups and downs of life. Students who are severely depressed may not be able to meditate, even if they keep their eyes open. If that’s the case, try to initiate meditative practices when they are out of the depths of depression to help insulate them against recurrences.

Yoga philosophy can also be of help. Yoga teaches that the more you do or think something, the more likely you are to do it or think it again. Any habit—what yoga calls a samskara—tends to get deeper with repetition. Thus a negative and self-flagellating inner dialogue may not just be a symptom of depression, it may help fuel it. One practice that Walden suggests is to consciously cultivate gratitude. "Count your blessings every day," she tells her students.

It can be useful to get out a pad of paper and try to list all you have to be grateful for. When you think about all the things that had to happen even for you to be born, it's a miracle you are here. Then there are all the people who've loved you, fed you, cared for you, and educated you throughout your life. It's also helpful to be thankful for the practice of yoga, which has been passed to us from masters who lived thousands of years ago, and the line of teachers extending from them to the present day. Such an exercise is an example of what Patanjali called "cultivating the opposite." The more you practice this—even if it's torturous at first—the deeper your "gratitude samskara" will become, and the more it can contribute to your well-being in the long run.
Taking a Step, No Matter How Small

Your students' journey out of depression begins with a single step from wherever they are right now. If they are severely depressed, it may be a struggle for them to practice at all. In that case, could you get them to commit to doing a single Sun Salutation, or even a single Down Dog Pose, every day? (Of course, once they get on their mats, they may find themselves doing more.) Or perhaps you could encourage them to study their interior dialogues to understand how recurrent thoughts may be sabotaging recovery. In severe cases, especially if suicide seems like a possibility, don't hesitate to refer your students to a doctor or psychotherapist. Even if such professional help is necessary, yoga can play a complementary role, likely rendering any psychotherapy or medication more effective.

Better still, even though yoga tends to help reverse depression slowly, its ultimate aim is much higher than achieving the "everyday discontent" that Freud viewed as the goal of psychoanalysis. Yoga, in contrast, teaches that life can be peaceful, full of purpose, happy, and even joyful, and that the source of that joy and contentment is found deep inside in each of us. Various yoga practices are simply tools to help get us there.

Yoga for Depression - Part 1 (Yogajournal.com)

( Yoga Journal is one of the best magazines in Yoga and it has been a constant companion in learning a lot on tis subject ...)

When physicians use the word "depression," they don't mean feeling disappointed or blue, or grieving a loss—normal moods that everyone experiences from time to time. Clinical depression is a persistently sad, hopeless, and sometimes agitated state that profoundly lowers the quality of life and that, if untreated, can result in suicide. Doctors aim, with drugs and sometimes psychotherapy, to raise their patients' moods, but yoga has much loftier goals. As a yoga therapist, you want not only to help lift your students out of depression but to quiet their restless minds, put them in touch with their deeper purpose in life, and connect them with an inner source of calm and joy that yoga insists is their birthright.

My work with students with depression has been deeply influenced by my teacher Patricia Walden, who, as a younger woman, struggled with recurrent depression. Yoga, particularly after she began her studies with B.K.S. Iyengar in the 1970s, spoke to her in a way that no other treatments had, including psychotherapy and antidepressant medication.
Are Antidepressants Bad?

In recent years, doctors have increasingly focused their efforts in treating depression on changing the biochemistry of the brain, specifically by using drugs to raise the levels of neurotransmitters such as serotonin. This is the mechanism of action of the most commonly prescribed antidepressants, the so-called selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) such as Prozac, Paxil, and Zoloft. But there are many other ways—including aerobic exercise and practicing yoga—to raise the levels of serotonin and other neurotransmitters linked to depression.

While many people in the yoga world have a negative view of antidepressant medication, I believe that there are times when these medications are necessary and even lifesaving. While they have side effects and not everyone responds to them, some people with recurrent severe depression appear to do best if they go on and stay on medication. Others may benefit from using antidepressants for a shorter time to help them feel good enough to establish behaviors—such as an exercise regimen and a regular yoga practice—that can help keep them out of the depths of depression after the drugs are discontinued.

Still, many people with mild to moderate depression may be able to avoid drug therapy entirely. For them, in addition to yoga and exercise, psychotherapy, the herb St.-John's-wort, and increased amounts of omega-3 fatty acids in their diets can help lift mood. These measures can also help in cases of severe depression, though St.-John's-wort should not be combined with prescription antidepressants.

One caution to yoga teachers: I have seen a lot of guilt-tripping of patients considering antidepressants, which people wouldn't dare do if the medication in question was for diabetes or heart disease. I think that's partly a remnant of the outdated notion that, when it comes to psychological problems, you should just buck up and will yourself to feel better. This approach, of course, rarely works and results in a lot of unnecessary suffering. As Patricia Walden says of drug therapy, "Thank God we've got this option."

Personalizing the Yogic Prescription

You’ll want to personalize your approach for each student with depression, but Walden finds it useful to divide students into two major categories, each with its own characteristics and yoga practices that are most likely to be helpful.

Some students' depression is marked by a dominance of tamas, the guna associated with inertia. These people may have a hard time getting out of bed and may feel lethargic and hopeless. Students with tamasic depression often have slumped shoulders, collapsed chests, and sunken eyes. It looks as if they are barely breathing. Walden likens their appearance to that of a deflated balloon.

A more common type of depression is marked by a predominance of rajas, the guna associated with activity and restlessness. These students are often angry, have stiff bodies and racing minds, and may appear agitated, with a hardness around their eyes. In Savasana (Corpse Pose) or restorative poses, their eyes may dart and their fingers won't stay still. These students frequently report difficulty in exhaling fully, a symptom often linked to anxiety.
Asana for Depression

From a yogic perspective, people with tamasic depression lack life force or prana. You'll want to concentrate on practices that bring breath to the body, particularly deep inhalations. If they are able to tolerate them, vigorous practices such as repeated Sun Salutations (Surya Namaskar), arm balances, and other challenging poses can be therapeutic. The body and mind are so occupied with the practice that it's hard to brood. When teaching vigorous practices to students with depression, don't worry much about proper alignment. As long as they aren't doing anything that might cause an injury, it's better to have them just do the practice and focus on the movement of the breath. Backbends, in particular, can be stimulating and help fight tamas. These range from restorative poses such as supported Savasana (done with a bolster placed lengthwise under the torso) and supported Bridge Pose (Setu Bandha Sarvangasana) to more active poses such as Camel Pose (Ustrasana) and full backbends (Urdhva Dhanurasana). Once you've gotten students to overcome some of their tamas, they may be able to relax more deeply. If you try relaxation first, however, you may find them sinking into dark thoughts, defeating the purpose.

Students with rajasic depression also tend to respond to Sun Salutations and backbends, though some of them will find strong backbends too agitating. Vigorous practices have the advantage of helping students burn off some nervous energy, and also of being demanding enough to keep their attention from drifting.

Indeed, some students have such a tendency to brood or get swept away with anxious or negative thoughts that asking them to close their eyes in Savasana and restorative poses (and even during pranayama and meditation) may be counterproductive. Any of these practices can be done with open eyes or, if necessary, skipped entirely. In addition, Walden finds that propping students way up in Savasana, even having them lean on an inclined bolster placed against the wall, can be helpful. She'll often talk during Savasana, turning it into more of a guided relaxation practice.