Week Three - Samana Vayu, The Assimilating and Processing Force

Hello everyone,

What an incredible summer week it's been! I hope you have found time for play, rest, and rejuvenation over these amazing sunny days. Thank you to everyone who came to practice with me last Sunday, where we explored the energetic direction of 'down and out' known in yoga as apana vayu.

If you haven't signed up for the term and are still reading these emails (thank you!), I want to briefly remind everyone that the class is still completely drop-in friendly and open to all levels, all mindsets, and all bodies. I love unpacking the philosophy of yoga within these emails, but if you feel like you've fallen behind with 'the study' of it all -  please don't worry! The class itself remains a physical hatha yoga practice that is open to everyone, and you can start easily at any point during the term :) 

That being said, here is an invitation to go deeper and learn about what makes yoga tick :) Let's introduce our theme for this Sunday's yoga class! As we continue to explore the vayus, the energetic winds that govern the healthy function and flow of prana (energy) in the body, we now come to samana vayu - the absorbing, processing, balancing current that circulates and burns in your centre.

In week one we discovered prana vayu, which is an in and up energy that dwells in your chest. In week two, we explored apana vayu, which is a down and out energy that sits in your pelvis and hips. We now meet at the balancing centre of prana and apana vayu, where energy pulls up and down simultaneously to assimilate, process, concentrate, and transform. The yoga scriptures described this samana vayu as the 'middle breath'. Samana vayu helps us to keep our balance between the intake of energy (prana vayu) and the release of energy (apana vayu). When you hit two small rocks together, one moving up and the other moving down, you get a spark - fire - agni - this is samana vayu in action. 

Samana vayu dwells in the solar plexus (your belly!) and is therefore associated with the beautiful manipura chakra - where worthiness, power, and humility spins in an endless orbit of your atman, true self. This is also of course where we digest our food, process our nutrients, absorb experiences, and extract nourishment from interactions and relationships. 

Evolutionary scientists say that the development of the early human brain was significantly impacted by the discovery of fire. By learning to cook our food, less energy (prana) was used in the process of digestion, and energy was freed up for creating language, social structures, and developing highly intelligent and complex brains. You could say that this was when early humans first balanced their samana vayu; finding their ideal utilisation of energy for a healthy metabolism, social life, and clarity of mind.

In today's world, you may feel that your samana vayu is out of whack when you struggle to digest what you consume; this could be physically, mentally, or emotionally. You could suffer from bloating, indigestion, or allergies; or, like so many, you could feel dazed by an overconsumption of information and experiences, unable to process the constant influx of images, news, interactions, events, opinions, responsibilities, politics... I'm getting overwhelmed just writing about it! If early humans first balanced their samana vayu with the discovery of cooking, then today's humans may be throwing their samana vayu out of balance via mass consumerism in every sense. Unfortunately, the data is unequivocal that the physical ability of our brain to regulate the nervous system, create new neurological pathways, and interact socially to find meaning and connection, is being massively impacted. 

Buuuuuut, forgiving awareness is key to inviting shift and transformation. Always. Don't bury your head in the sand, but don't worry either. It's all okay! There is so much we can do. And in truth, the power will be in the un-doing. 

I often feel overwhelmed, and funnily enough my stress tends to register in my belly. I find yoga to be an incredible tool to calm things down and process. Really and truly. And it doesn't have to be complicated. Sometimes a big, full breath in and a longer, slower breath out - for a few minutes - can be the difference between a day where you can't seem to catch up, or a day where you sail through challenges like a smooth operator. It starts with you. And who better to kick butt?

That's all from me! I am sending you all the light in the world, and I can't wait for practice this Sunday (6:30pm at Thrive). I have big things in the works for this September, with some very exciting new yoga offerings coming to the studio...so stay tuned :)

Instructions on Not Giving Up by Ada Limón

More than the fuchsia funnels breaking out

of the crabapple tree, more than the neighbor's

almost obscene display of cherry limbs shoving

their cotton candy-coloured blossom to the slate

sky of Spring rains, it's the greening of the trees

that really gets to me.When all the shock of white

and taffy, the world's baubles and trinkets, leave

the pavement strewn with the confetti of aftermath, 

the leaves come. Patient, plodding, a green

 skin growing over whatever winter did to us, a return 

to the strange idea of continuous living despite

 the mess of us, the hurt, the empty. Fine then, 

I'll take it, the tree seems to say, a new slick leaf 

unfurling like a fist to an open palm, I'll take it all.

le grá,

Macha