Breathing Lessons

By making it a conscious, controlled action, pranayama begins to transform breathing into a spiritual practice.

By Judith Lasater

As a child I used to play a game in the backyard with friends. We would hyperventilate and then hold our breath until we almost passed out. We thought this was great fun. Little did we realize that we were playing with one of the most powerful physiological and spiritual tools at our disposal: the breath.

We usually take the ability to draw a simple breath for granted, but our everyday language reveals our intuitive awareness that breathing is powerful and critically important. We often talk about "breathing easy" to show we've relaxed and let go of a problem or worry. We use the term "breathing room" when we need more space for sufficient air and thus life itself. And we express our intuitive understanding of the power of breath when we advise angry people to "Take 10 deep breaths" before they speak or act from anger. Actually, this bit of folk wisdom has a basis in fact. A period of quiet deep breathing causes blood pressure to drop and to stay down for as long as 30 minutes, according to the Journal of the American Geriatric Society.

The power of breathing cannot be denied. Breathing is at the center of natural childbirth training, and we are taught to breathe deeply before we face stressful situations like auditions or exams. Breathing is at the heart of virtually every meditation system, as well as most styles of asana (posture) practice. This is because when we pay attention to the breath, it brings us fully into the present. It is impossible to focus on the breath without paying attention to the here and now.

Yoga has always stressed the importance of observing and regulating the breath. The most ancient sourcebook for yoga practice, the Yoga Sutra of Patanjali, includes such practices—called pranayama—as one of the eight essential limbs of yoga. In Sanskrit, "prana" means not just breath but also the life energy that fills the universe, and "yama" means restraint or control. Pranayama makes use of the respiratory apparatus, but the focus of pranayama isn't simply on inhalation and exhalation. Rather, yogis use the breath to draw in, channel, and store universal life energy so that it can be used to facilitate self-evolution.

While Patanjali doesn't instruct the reader in specific pranayama techniques, he unquestionably includes pranayama as a very important tool for self-transformation. In fact, he claims in chapter I, verse 34 that the goal of yoga—"the resolution of the agitations of consciousness"—can be achieved by the controlled "expulsion and retention of the breath."

However, one of Patanjali's few direct comments on pranayama sometimes confuses yoga students. In chapter II, verse 49, Patanjali states that pranayama is to be practiced when asana has been perfected. What could this mean? Most of us react negatively when we hear the word "perfected." As yoga students, we learn early on that there is no such thing as perfection: Each pose is new every day, and each day every pose can teach something new.

To better understand Patanjali, we need to consider what he meant by asana and perfection. The word "asana" means "seat" as well as posture, and in chapter II, verse 46, Patanjali says that asana should be both "steady and comfortable." In other words, when Patanjali directs us to perfect asana before practicing pranayama, I interpret his teaching to be that we should be able to remain steady and comfortable in a seated meditation posture like Padmasana (Lotus Pose). Because maintaining a stable seated pose can be such a difficult task, I teach students to do pranayama lying down for the first year or two. This allows them to be steady and comfortable and not become distracted by struggling to keep the chest open and spine long in a seated pose.

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