Have you taken time this summer for fun? It’s so easy to get sucked into the routine and responsibilities of life and the constant chatter of the monkey mind. Often, when you do create space for relaxation, your cell phone is still going off and your mind is on the past or the future, and not in the present moment.
The philosophy of yoga tells us that JOY is our birthright. It’s right there, beneath all the layers of experience and emotion and wisdom and stress. How do you connect with it? By taking a deep breath, and then another, and then another.
“The yoga tradition tells us the mind and breath are twin laws of life, they travel together. The condition of one determines the condition of the other….We experience the boundless joy deposited within the mind itself, which manifests when the mind is able to plumb its own depths.”
~Pandit Rajmani Tigunait, The Secret of the Yoga Sutras
Want to connect more with your innate Ananda, or joy? Try this pratice:
Begin standing, with your feet wider than your hips. Be sure to remove any long pendants or spectacles you might be wearing. This practices uses a 3-Part Inhale, and a Long Exhale.
Step 1: Take a short sip of an inhale through your nose, and bring your arms out to shoulder height.
Step 2: Take a second sip of inhale in through your nose, and raise your hands up to the sky.
Step 3: Take your final sip of inhale in through your nose, and return your arms to their T-shape, at shoulder height.
Step 4: Exhale with a loud sigh as you dive forward into a loosey-goosey forward fold.
As you rise up, return to Step 1, taking that short sip of air in through your nose.
Repeat 10-15 times
