Week One - Prana Vayu, One of the Five Sacred Winds

Hello everyone,

I am so excited to announce that our new yoga term will begin this Sunday July 6th at Thrive in Greystones, at 6:30pm! 

For anyone new to this space and these letters, you are so welcome!! You can scroll down to the bottom of this letter for some practical details on what to expect during the yoga practice this Sunday :)

For now though, I would love to speak about our philosophical theme for this new five week term! We will be exploring something called the vayus - the five energy directions of the body, known as the five sacred winds. 

Almost everything we know about yoga philosophy stems back to what was written in ancient scriptures in Sanskrit, one of the oldest languages in the world and the classical language of India. In Sanskrit, the word for life energy is prana. When you guide your breath consciously in yoga, this is called pranayama - which means to focus and control your life energy. Breath and life energy are synonymous in yogic texts, because the yogis saw breathing as the indicator of living. Which it surely is. If you are breathing, you are alive. Yes?

The interesting thing is that breathing is part of the autonomic nervous system, which means that it is an involuntary function of the body. We cannot help but breathe as long as we are alive, just as we cannot help but have life energy flowing through us while we are breathing. But do you always feel the fullness of life energy flowing through you? I know in my own life that I often catch myself living and behaving on autopilot. Involuntary reactions, movement made through muscle memory, mentally checking things off an imaginary to-do list...and feeling a little bit numb and stuck within that, or even sometimes (often) anxious and over-stimulated.

The yogis believed that choosing to slow down your breath, focus on your breath, experience your breath, discipline your breath, would lead to an improved life experience in every possible sense, because what you are really doing is focusing your life energy, guiding it, disciplining it, letting it move for you in a way that serves you. To breathe in this conscious way guides the prana (life energy) back into its ideal vayus and nadis, which is to say, its ideal channels and directions within the body; to cultivate and allow an unencumbered flow of life energy.

So! What are these vayus? The vayus are the five directions of energy in the body. When prana flows optimally, unrestricted, and the vayus work together harmoniously, the body is healthy and full of vitality, and you feel inspired, well, and easily delighted. This is one of the major goals of hatha yoga - to allow life and energy to flow unrestricted through the body, using asana (yogic shapes), pranayama (breathing), and meditation.

Each week during this term, we will work with one of the five vayus. The first vayu we will explore is called prana vayu. This is the direction of energy - like wind - in the body that is in charge of inspiration, intake, and forward momentum. Think, 'inward and upward'. Prana vayu dwells mostly in the area of the chest and head (head and heart) and is all to do with breathing in, bandhas (yogic locks), lifted sensations, ideas, positive expectation, hope, integrity, cardiac health, respiratory health, motivation, and vitality. 

If prana vayu is unstable, we can experience restlessness, heart or lung issues, resentment, disappointment, resistance, lethargy, bad habits, cravings, boredom and/or frustration. You can imagine a sailboat that can't quite catch the breeze. 

As always, this will be an all levels hatha yoga practice - No prior knowledge of yoga necessary!! Each class will begin with orientation and grounding, a guided breathwork practice, yoga flow and movement as well as longer held yoga shapes, and a relaxation with an optional meditation to close. If you have any concerns or questions at all, please let me know and we can chat about absolutely anything :) I can't wait to see you there!

Invictus 

by William Ernest Henley

Out of the night that covers me,

Black as the pit from pole to pole,

I thank whatever gods may be

For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance

I have not winced nor cried aloud.

Under the bludgeonings of chance

My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears

Looms but the Horror of the shade,

And yet the menace of the years

Finds and shall find me unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,

How charged with punishments the scroll,

I am the master of my fate,

I am the captain of my soul.

le grá,

Macha