Funny how you practice yoga, year in, year out, and slowly feel like the body is opening, muscles softening and lenghtening, and this is progress. And then, one day...
I got it, I actually understood, yesterday, what every teacher has been telling me all these years - 'breathe into the posture'.
I though that I knew exactly what this meant, and now I do. What happened is this.
I've been reading, studying and practicing from a book that reveals the circulation of chi within the body, a practice called 'the microcosmic orbit'. From my basic understaning chi can be very closely related to prana, but over the years I have been taught to practice pranayama, but this has only been in relation to the breath itself, but once I had a basic experience of circulating chi within the physical body I thought I'd try doing this whilst holding an asana. I'll say here that I'm ver cautious about mixing practices in case one negates or overpowers another, and if something works for me I'll stick with it all the way. Anyway...
Whilst sat in asana, and with pain in my lower thigh muscle I thought I'd try flowing a little chi, and it simple eased the pain, enabling a deepening of the posture. Wow I thought, that works, and then a qick guilt trip flew into my mind 'don't mix practices' and the pain returned, but then... I thought (with a light bulb flashing on in my mind) - This is prana.
Well, it was quite a revelation to me x
Written and published by Mark Golding - THE ORGANIC HOME
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