As I begin my work as a practitioner, it’s hard not to be complicated. My studies covered a wide range of illnesses, diseases, and disorders, as well as an amazing array of treatment approaches, from tinctures, powdered mixtures, jams, ghees and other herbal media, to body work and treatments, to lifestyle adjustments. It is fabulously diverse and sometimes dizzying with the array.
But whenever I am overwhelmed, a reminding theme pulses through the work of my own health: Keep it simple. There are countless ways to be ill, and countless ways to rectify illness, but especially in the case of complex cases, we need to start with the simple stuff.
This article is the first in a series that I will call Foundations. The foundations are the simplest, cheapest therapies, and these therapies are also the ones that take the strongest personal commitment. The foundations aren’t about dosing meds, even herbal meds. Herbal medicines can be extremely effective but if the foundations aren’t correct, the herbs are doing the work and the body and mind are missing out on the opportunity for proaction. When you put in the work, you realize that you are your best healer. Many people who are frustrated with Western medicine want to put in the work, they know it can’t be as easy as just popping a pill, but don’t know where to begin.
And pssst, I have a secret: Many doctors wish they could prescribe the foundational work but their scope of practice doesn’t always permit docs the liberty to counsel their patients on commonly trusted holistic health techniques. I have associates in Ayurveda that partner with a Western medical clinic in Northern California and these practitioner friends report doctors’ amazement with elemental medicine and its applications, and their dismay that they can’t employ these time-tested tools.
Fret not, doctors, we’ll cover the gap. Holistic health practitoners, we’re here for you. Either as a compliment to Western medicine, or a refuge, we’re not going to ignore the basics. If you want to take your health into your own hands, I am here to describe the foundations. In the case of many non-life-threatening medical conditions, nobody should ever have to navigate the slippery slope of powerful Western meds and their side effects without first exploring the foundations. Nobody should have to suffer without the strategy of self-knowing.
The breath is the sweet song of self-knowledge. When you aren’t educated on its impact on your system, is something to take for granted, to not notice. But when you have a cold, for instance, the breath’s illuminating, cleansing, clearing, relieving effect is highlighted. Think of how you feel when snot stuffs your nose and you can’t take in a refreshing gulp of air through your nose. It can feel suffocating.
Panic attacks, bronchitis, asthma, allergies: Sometimes it takes illness to appreciate the power of fresh air taken in through the nose and mouth. The expansive, pacific, medicinal quality of the breath is accentuated by a few life experiences for me. Usually every year I try to do a big hike at Yosemite, either climbing a mountain or at least trucking up and down some major elevation in the high country. Despite practicing yoga regularly and having an awareness around the breath, I struggle mightily with breathing on these treks. The elevation, the exertion—I am humbled by the difficulty, I am reminded of the breath’s container of my essence.
These experiences always simplify complex schemes of health for me, as the breath struggles into stuck parts of my body, and emotions flood because of the breath’s unlocking. I often have to cry a few times on the journey, out of frustration first, then out of self-compassion, in order to release the stuckness that prohibits the freshness of breath from touching every pocket in the torso. As my lungs clear and the breath gets bigger, the breath starts to feel like a bow and the bones of the torso become a cello. The resonance clears pain in the lower back, clears sorrow in the lungs, clears the fog out of the sinuses, my heart suddenly feels free to feel, free to express. Freedom comes over me. If I can breathe, I say to myself at the peak, then I can do anything!
Around the time I first started my yearly Yosemite treks, I went to my first Ayurvedic practitioner. I was, frankly, a bit of a mess. I knew I needed a life change but I didn’t know where to begin. I was anxious and angry at myself for not knowing what I wanted, I was jealous of others, I was unwilling to take a route of playfulness and forgiveness in order to find my my way. Who was I? I wanted to know, but I had a cynical froth about the potential findings.
My practitioner began with the breath. We greeted each other and immediately ventured into the breath. Put your feet firmly on the ground, she said. Breathe.
Once I began to concentrate on the breath, I noticed that it was shallow. It was not going much of anywhere. She coached me and her words amazingly helped my breath mobilize. “Inhale and exhale using your nose. Breathe into the easy places. Breathe into the hard places. Let the breath wind up the spine, imagine it threading up the spine. Breathe into the neck, let the breath caress your jawline.” The breath began to cause small clicks and adjustments in my skeleton. “Breathe into your belly, make your belly big with breath. Breathe into the hips, let the breath spread the lower back wide. Let the inhalations make space, exhale what’s unneeded.” My digestion began to bubble pleasantly, a feeling of peace came over me.
My practitioner then told me to make a sound upon exhaling through the mouth. Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh. It’s the kind of sound people make in hot tubs. Before I knew about this technique, called “toning,” I had an aversion to these kind of vocalizations. My apologies to other prickly-eared hot tubbers, because now I am among the annoying people at the hot springs, exhaling with a soothing vocalization. Toning resets the nervous system, soothing and resetting the “fight flight or freeze” effects of the sympathetic nervous system, giving permission for the parasympathetic or “rest and digest” system to take over. Toning sends the message that, hey, things are actually ok here; there’s no need for the rapid breath of prey. Go ahead and take in a big, meditative breath, and exhale it with a pleasant, releasing vocalization. Your predator is not listening! Repeat: You are not prey.
Funny, upon recollection, I realize that feeling out of step with my life purpose, and uncomfortable in the world, caused a prey-like state-of-mind for me. Exploring the breath helped me realize that feeling under attack, desperate, and urgent about my life situation was robbing me of the methodical, forgiving, and calm state of mind that facilitates positive and lasting change.
At some point I realized that I had robbed myself of breath for a lot of years because I was always sucking in my stomach. Constantly compressing my belly through the years in order to look thin had limited my breath’s capacity. Breathing into the belly means breathing into the lower lungs, taking full advantage of the entire essential action. Digestion is optimized, which is more effective for “looking thin” in the long run. Sucking in may serve some purpose in the mirror, but it’s kind of gross to think that by inhibiting your digestion, you are potentially carrying a belly full of stuck stool. Not the best idea to keep that shit in! It needs to go OUT!
Breath For Digest
A constantly sucked-in stomach is a digestive nightmare—just ask anyone who wears Spanx or a girdle or even too-tight jeans after eating a gassy meal. The gas pain is tortuous and crampy, to the point of near-death-experience heights. I have become constipated from overly tight clothes! How silly.
Breathing into the belly helps the digestion. Deep Buddha belly breathing—letting the tummy expand like a balloon while inhaling, and contracting the navel upon exhale—feels almost like the organs of digesting are breathing on their own. Spaciousness comes to the gut. A calming gurgle babbles through the abdomen. This breathing technique is ultimately toning to the abdominal muscles because of the strong, though not severe, contraction of the muscles when exhaling.
Practice:
Lay flat on the floor, with knees bent and feet on the floor. The lower back should be slightly off the floor in a relaxed lumbar curve, not tucked. Interlace your fingers over your navel. Take a deep breath in, expanding the belly until eventually, the fingers slightly part due to the expansion. Feel free to count, let’s say, to 6 as you inhale, bringing mindfulness to the length of the breath. Exhale, pulling in the navel and lightly contracting the abdominal muscles, bringing the fingers back together. Try to make the exhale slightly longer, let’s say, counting to 8. Make a relaxed toning sound (like a breathy AHHHHHHH) if you wish. Begin practicing for at least two minutes per day, exploring restricted areas, attempting a lengthier practice each session.
Breath and Emotions
I want to highlight two emotional conditions that are rooted in poor breathing: anxiety and grief.
Have you ever cried your eyes out and after the drama, took a big deep breath? Did you notice what was there? Did you notice what you released? A big deep inhale after a good cry can feel like a profound reset, and the exhale is a relieving sense of release.
Grief and the lungs are connected, according to Ayurveda and other elemental medicines, and I think it’s easy to understand why. Grief causes shallow breathing, a sort of restraint and stuckness. Distrust of life, lethargy about the future, unprocessed feelings—the shallow breathing associated with these emotions can be a part of what causes ailments like bronchitis. It’s easy to understand, as well, in this lung/grief association, how smoking cigarettes or weed can be so attractive to a grieving and upset person, and also so harmful because there is already so much holding in there.
Open grief’s drapes, let the light in—breathe! Exercise and elevate the heart rate. Practice yoga postures that open the chest: supported bridge, camel, wheel. Even draping yourself over a yoga bolster can passively open the chest, disrupting the cobwebs of sadness and awakening the opportunity for new beginnings.
On the other side of the slow, melancholic breath of grief is the rapidly shallow breath of anxiety. Anxiety is a crippling affliction, affecting so many of us to varying degrees. Considering the increasingly jeopardized state of life on Earth, many of us feel disturbed to the root. We trudge on, but in private moments, many are deeply worried, if not about a warming planet, then about the many insecurities surrounding life purpose, personal economics, and plain old safety.
Anxious, and don’t know where to turn? Try the breath. Watch your breath in anxious moments. Are you unable to move the breath deeply through the body? Let’s move the breath through the body and check in again. How do you feel?
The recommended breathwork for grief is more expansive and active. The breathwork for anxiety is more soothing and relaxing. Anxious person, light some candles and spark up a sweet incense. Put on music that soothes your soul. Warm up a nice heavy rock in the oven. Dark rocks conduct heat better than light-colored rocks. Now, this isn’t an exact science—be careful, know that you might have to sheath your rock in a towel until it’s cool enough to even sit on your belly with a sweater on. In your ceremonial setting, breathe into your big, warm, heavy rock. Let it guide your breath deeper.
Breathe to trust again. Breathe to know yourself. Breathe to connect with prana, or chi, which is the “bridge between mind, body, and consciousness,” says Dr. Vasant Lad in “The Complete Book of Ayurvedic Home Remedies.” Breathe to forgive. Breathe to churn the energy system of the body. Breathe to move on. Breathe to soften stiff muscles. Breathe to alkalize the system. Breathe to regulate the blood pressure. Breathe to keep the heart healthy. Breathe to accept. Breathe to live in love.
The Yoga of Life
Pranayama is the yoga of breath; the breathing techniques I have discussed today are in the vein of pranayama. As my teacher’s teacher BKS Iyengar said, “As the leaves aerate the tree and provide nourishment for its healthy growth, so pranayama feeds and aerates the cells, nerves, organs, intelligence, and consciousness of the human body.”
Breath is the first medicine. Breath is the foundation. As my yoga teacher says, the core intent of practicing yoga postures is to get the breath established deeply in the body, aiding the mind and body in a limitless fashion.
“If you look at breath in the form of the respiratory system, it is physical,” Mr. Iyengar said. “But when the action of the breath on the mind is studied and understood, it becomes spiritual. Pranayama is the bridge between the physical and the spiritual.”
Lately, I think that life is like yoga in the sense that we are twisted and bended by relationships, happenstance, fate, and many factors out of our control. In yoga, we contort ourselves physically and how we breathe into these contortions is our yoga. How we breathe into our existence is the yoga of our lives.
Breath is the pause between what happens and how we react to those happenings. Breath is the safety valve of emotions—if we are skilled in utilizing the breath, surely we have more peace and control of our emotional reactions. Commit to the breath as a tool to understand where you're at, and commit to pranayama as an essential, foundational betterment practice. Understanding our breath, we are able to peel back the veils of knowing and comprehend our sacred selves. Practicing pranayama, we bathe our beloved selves in the divine medicine of respiration, participating with grace in the yoga of life.
Eva Saelens is a professional member of the National Ayurvedic Medical Association, with over 1500 hours of training in Ayurveda, massage therapy, and Ayurvedic treatments. She graduated from the California College of Ayurveda in 2013. Subsequently, Eva spent a year interning and studying Ayurveda, Tibetan medicine, whole foods nutrition, aromatherapy, and pancha karma at the dhyana Center in Sebastopol, Calif., and in India.