A Yogi's Perspective: COVID-19

The United States diagnosed its first COVID-19 victim in early January 2020. My concern and curiosity for this person still exist today.

The CDC confirmed the United States has the most massive death toll in the world. More than 45,000 have died in the U.S. due to the spread of COVID19, and growing (at the time of publication). The once, mysterious pneumonia that sickened dozens in Wuhan China is a pandemic and has literally taken our breaths away. 

Behind every documented number, there is a name, a person, a death. Health-care workers, teachers, our precious elders in nursing homes, athletes, politicians, police officers, grocery store clerks, transit workers, parents, and their children, our grief has had no boundaries. We are living in unprecedented trauma.

As yogis, we know our yamas (social restraints) and niyamas (self-discipline). In the Yoga Sutras, our definitive collection of 196 Sanskrit texts, written between the second century BCE and the fifth century C.E., outline the eight limb paths of the purification of mind and body for yogis.

The Eight Limbs, including the yamas and niyamas, are asanas (postures), pranayama (breathe work), pratyahara (sense withdrawal and non-attachment), dharana (concentration), dhyana (meditation) and samadhi (the realization of the true self).

These fundamental philosophies are our guides to relate and make our way through the world. They are a yogi’s path to cultivating a steady mind and calming bliss. We share these spiritual, areligious philosophies with our students through lessons of mindful meditation, the physical practice of our asanas, and the instruction of conscious breathing.

Yet never in our lifetime have our challenges been so grave. Here, we know pratyahara, the conscious withdrawal of the senses — has profound meaning beyond its simplistic translation of detachment from life. As this pandemic unfolded here at home, we've responded, not with rigidity of emotion. On the contrary: We pushed aside our fears of closed studios, loss of sole proprietor incomes, canceled events, and most significant the fear of COVID-19.

We've rallied. As we found solace in our teachings, the practice of pratyahara enabled us to make space between the world around us and our responses to it. It didn't mean running away, because we don't get to exist in this world without the pain and discomfort that comes with it, but we do get to choose how we react to it. 

Like nature, we have found a way – through our cell phones, Facebook, Instagram, Zoom, on our balconies, we found a way -- and we made yoga available to everyone! Black, brown, white, low-income, and affluent communities, we choose how to respond.

The images. We all have them. They play over and over again in my head. Sometimes closing my eyes just for a few seconds breaks my heart. A bus driver, an average guy, responsible father, dedicated employee, merely doing his job, dead, COVID-19. One man, times 41,000+, and counting. Debating how and why we got here doesn't respond to the crucial need for yoga practitioners at hand. 

Our yoga challenge is embracing our intentions while learning to be uncomfortable with our fears, offering calm when we all need it most. Let's continue this conversation. How are you sharing your light?

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Renee Harriston is Yoga Therapist Candidate at Prema Yoga Institute. She teaches Therapeutic Yoga at Kula For Karma, a stress management program to those recovering from mental health, trauma, and addiction challenges. Renee is a Graphic Artist and former Journalist for CBS and NBC News.

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Feeling Anxious? How to Breathe your Way to Calm

In these challenging times, when anxiety can seem to hit us like a wave, it can be difficult to know where to turn for relief. The options for relief can feel overwhelming, expensive, unavailable or time-consuming. But of the most accessible and effective ways to bring calm is already within us – our breath.

Each of us takes as many as 30,000 breaths in a single day. Most of those breaths go unnoticed, but in fact, they can be a key tool to optimizing our health and wellbeing.  As one of the eight limbs of yoga, breath work, or pranayama, is itself a practice just like asana or meditation, and it can take different forms – from simply breathing deeply into the belly, to more advanced manipulations of the breath. Each pranayama practice serves a purpose – whether to calm anger, bring in more energy, or reduce anxiety.

So how does it work? Breath is tied to the nervous system. When we inhale, we activate the sympathetic nervous system, or the ”flight or fight” response. Think about when you are startled by a noise outside your home at night, and gasp. When we exhale, the parasympathetic nervous system is activated, enabling us to calm and enable healing. Think about the deep sigh of relief when you realize that what startled you is just the wind.

To function optimally on a daily basis, we need both aspects of the nervous system to operate in tandem to keep us safe and well. However, when anxiety is high, we need to focus more on turning on the parasympathetic nervous system and eliciting a relaxation response to bring balance.

Here are some pranayama exercises you can try to help bring calm when anxiety is high.

1:2 Ratio Breath – Perhaps the most straightforward way to use the breath to trigger the relaxation response is to emphasize the relaxing aspect of the breath as described above – the exhale. If you feel yourself getting anxious, but don’t have the space or time to sit down for a more involved pranayama practice, you can easily welcome in calm simply by extending your exhales longer than your inhales.

For several breath cycles, try inhaling deep into the belly for a count of four, and exhaling fully for a count of eight. You can do this for as long and as often as you need to help bring a sense of calm.

Nadi shodhana – This breath, also referred to as alternate nostril breathing, works to balance the subtle energetic channels of the body – the ida and the pingala, which intertwine and spiral as they move up through the central channel of the body, representing the opposing forces of light and dark, night and day, energy and rest. Just like with the inhales and exhales, we seek to bring these two forces into balance for optimal wellbeing.

To practice nadi shodhana, bring the second and third fingers of your right hand to rest at your third eye center. Rest the right thumb on the right side of the nose, and the right fourth finger on the left side of your nose, tucking the right pinky finger in. Exhale all the air out the nose. Press your thumb against your nose, blocking the right nostril, as you inhale through the left nostril. Hold at the top of the inhale, then release the right nostril and block the left for the exhale. Hold at the bottom of the exhale. Keep the left nostril blocked as you inhale through the right, hold, then switch and exhale through the left nostril. Repeat for several minutes.

Sitali – Sitali, or the cooling breath, can help pacify some of the fiery pitta energy that largely corresponds to the sympathetic nervous system being switched on. Practice this and see if you feel more of a sense of cooling and calm. 

To begin, roll your tongue and bring it just outside of your lips, so it creates a kind of straw. If you cannot roll your tongue, bring it the roof of your mouth, where your palate meets the back of your front teeth. Inhale through the “straw”, drawing the air in through the mouth, and exhale the same way. Practice this for several minutes.

Healing Breath – This is a more advanced practice for which you’ll need a partner. One of you will take the seat of the healer, and the other, the seat of the receiver. The receiver should lie in a comfortable position to enable relaxation, while the healer sits next to them, as still as possible, maintaining a neutral mind. The healer will then gently rest their second and third fingers gently on the receiver, and mirror their breathing. Stay like this for up to 10 minutes.

This can help the receiver feel connected and supported. If the receiver works to breathe through the left nostril only, and the healer through the right nostril only, the two sides are balanced and healing can take place.

The ability to simply notice the breath and be more intentional about how it nourishes you is a hugely important step in calming your mind and body. Taking that a step further and implementing these pranayama practices can be transformative in helping manage during these anxiety-ridden times. Try them for yourself next time you feel overwhelmed or worried.

Interested in PYI's COVID19 response initiative - including breath exercises to prevent and manage the disease?  Please join our mailing list today.  

LINKS:

Calm with Yoga – Pranayama for Anxiety: The Ancient Drug-Free Solution
Kripalu – A LifeForce Yoga Breating Practice to Ease Anxiety and Depression

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Hannah Slocum Darcy is a yoga teacher and a student at Prema Yoga Institute. She specializes in accessibility and adaptive practice for many life stages and scenarios.

Connect and Balance During Spring & the Upcoming Pink Supermoon

"In just-spring when the world is mud-luscious
and... puddle-wonderful"

e. e. cummings

 
In Ayurveda, every season has a dosha, or set of qualities, associated with it. Winter, governed by Vata dosha, has been cold, dry and dark. But when the sun stays around for longer, everything gets warmer and the ground begins to thaw, making mud often the first sign associated with Kapha season.  Kapha season starts out wet and cold in March and ends up wet and warm, in May and June.

And Ayurvedically, it’s been an interesting time this past month to say the least! With COVID-19 happening, we’re being told to do the opposite of what we instinctually want to do since March is early Kapha season, a time when the world is slowly coming out of hibernation, but we’re all “hunkering down”.

Yet don’t despair. The spring flowers are still poking their heads above the mud, the birds' ecstatic singing signals mating season has begun, and soon young fawns will be born. It’s also a good time to reconnect with the upcoming April’s full Pink Moon. The name Pink Moon comes from one of the first spring flowers, Wild Ground Phlox, as they cover the ground like a pink blanket

On the night of Tuesday, April 7, venture outside to catch a glimpse of April's full Pink Moon. This full Moon—which is a supermoon, the first full Moon of spring, and the Paschal Full Moon—will be visible after sunset and reach peak illumination at 10:35 P.M. EDT. We’re in a series of supermoons, which are 15% brighter than a typical moon, but this April moon will be the brightest of 2020!

And here are other ways for you to savor the beauty of the skies and the season this spring using all five senses:

Sight: See the light, make space for the light.

Shake out winter blues by letting in the light, fresh air, and de-cluttering the space(s) in your environment, mind, and body. Start by cleaning your closet and filling a donation bag with the clothes you no longer wear but just keep around in case you might want them (hint: if you haven’t worn it this winter, you likely won’t wear it next winter). Get rid of the random knickknacks around you, organize papers, and streamline your space by reducing clutter which can be stressful. Create a peaceful space with room to breathe. Clean your house with homemade concoctions including lemon and vinegar.

For your body and mind, do vigorous yoga flows such as sun salutations to create more space and cleansing that our bodies need this time of year. And for pranayama, Kapalabhati is a great antidote for seasonal allergies and mucous congestion.)

With the full super moon coming, also make sure to embrace your lunar side to with chandra namaskara, or moon salutation. The 15 steps in the sequence are here by Yoga International represent 15 tithis, or lunar days.

Taste: Lighten up and have vigilance.

In the winter months, we naturally gravitate toward sweet, sour, oily, and salty foods to mitigate the dry, light qualities of the cold (vata) season. But now we’re feeling a lot of vata going on due to recent events. Despite needing to work in more pungent, bitter, astringent, dry, and light tastes to reset the weight of heavy kapha season, both kapha and vata need warmth to keep agni going, said PYI Faculty, Ali Cramer, in her recent Kapha busting workshop via Zoom.

She recommended getting good routines established and having them not be negotiable – such as eating three meals a day, dry brushing, and exercising regularly to keep lungs healthy, and endorphins to keep depression at bay. The consistency in practice will help keep momentum and strength in our health going forward. For food, work in natural fats like avocados, drink Tulsi tea, Triphala powder in water before bed, and cook your greens like kale and collards.

Hearing: Tune in to birdsong.

Meditating in nature is a foundational practice that I follow during all seasons, but spring is one of my favorites. With flashes of color, from red cardinals, robins, and other bright winged colored birds, and the sounds of bird song, the very music and sights herald the changing season. And if you pay close attention, you can even get to know individual birds since they usually stay close to one location for the season. Re-connecting and observing individual animals in their natural habitat can also help us avoid a term called, species loneliness, which is a sense of isolation and sadness coming from human estrangement from other natural species.

Smell and Touch: Appreciate new growth and life.

As the days grow longer and warmer, this beautiful time of year inspires us to appreciate the renewal of life. Be mindful and fully take in all the new growth around you with your senses of smell and touch – touch the soft tree leaves growing, smell the spring rain, put on some gloves and dig your hands into the earth and smell the rich soil or plant early seeds, watching them grow in your windowsill.

As we all continue on this journey, say or sing a few words of gratitude, and remember to take time to pause and savor the mysteries of the moment while we watch the inner and outer blossoming of life.

For more information on yogic listening skills, consider PYI’s Sound Yoga Therapy online April 17-19, 2020, and our annual Ayurvedic Yoga Therapy Training with Ali Cramer and the PYI Yoga Therapy faculty.

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Katie Leasor is a second year Prema student and owner of Elements Yoga Therapeutics, a yoga therapy studio in Fair Haven, NJ.

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